The White Pages are going the way of the rotary-dial phone.

Beginning in January, Verizon is dropping the residential White Pages from the directories that it will deliver to its customers.

But the change won’t affect Verizon’s customers in Erie County for more than a year. Because the Erie County edition of the phone book comes out in December — before the change takes effect — the upcoming directory will include residential listings for one last time, said Andrew Shane, a spokesman for SuperMedia LLC, the Texas company that publishes the Verizon directory.

The move to eliminate residential listings, approved Thursday by the State Public Service Commission, is being touted by Verizon officials as a way to improve efficiency and keep about 5,000 tons out paper out of the state’s waste stream.

Verizon said most households don’t use the residential listings, relying instead on the Internet and other new technology. Only about 1 in 9 households still use the residential White Pages, Verizon said, citing a 2008 Gallup survey showing that use had declined from 25 percent in 2005.

The PSC decision allows Verizon to skirt a commission rule that requires the company to distribute a residential White Pages directory to all its customers. Instead, Verizon customers can request a free directory with residential listings, either in print or on CD-ROM.

“It’s a prudent step to take, given the combined environmental concerns and the declining use of the actual paper White Pages,” said Verizon spokesman John J. Bonomo.

With the PSC ruling, the Verizon phone books now will contain only busi-

ness and government White Pages, along with information pages and the Yellow Pages. Residential listings will be at www.verizon.com/whitepages . Printed or CD-ROM versions can be obtained by calling (800) 888-8448.

Verizon, which has 5.1 million phone lines in New York, was the first phone company in the state to ask state regulators to drop the residential listings, joining a growing trend nationally.

Regulators in Oklahoma, Ohio and Florida earlier this year allowed AT&T to provide residential listings only to customers who request them. Regulators in New Jersey last month joined Delaware in granting Verizon permission to drop its residential listings, and the company is seeking to make similar moves in Pennsylvania and West Virginia.

The PSC ruling does not affect other directory publishers, including Hearst Communications, which produces the Talking Phone Book locally.

Verizon has no financial stake in the switch. All of the savings from the scaled-back directories would flow to the books’ publisher, SuperMedia, in the form of reduced paper costs and lower energy expenses associated with printing and delivering the directories.

In addition, the residential listings did not generate any advertising revenue for SuperMedia. In contrast, the business White Pages generate revenue from companies that pay for more prominent listings, and the Yellow Pages are entirely made up of advertisers.

The Public Utility Law Project, an Albany-based advocacy group for low-income consumers that has since shut down because of the loss of state funding, opposed the elimination of the residential listings.

“Some of Verizon’s customers cannot afford Internet access to use its online database and may not have a wireless phone available to look up telephone numbers without additional cost,” the group said in its July filing.

“On top of this, any customer seeking a residential White Page directory has to contact the company in order to receive a copy,” the group said. “Presumably, this contact would require navigation of an automated call system that is daunting to many customers.”

drobinson@buffnews.comnull