Australians will no longer need to carry around coins to use a public payphone after Telstra announced that they will now be available to use free-of-charge on Tuesday. People can now make standard national calls and SMS from Telstra’s 15,000 public payphones for free, but users will still be required to pay for international calls. Telstra CEO Andrew Penn said payphones were an iconic part of Australian history and have played a vital role in the last 18 months during emergency situations. “Since mobiles became nearly universal, a lot of Australians might not give them much thought until there’s a natural disaster. Until you’re in vulnerable circumstances, homeless, or fleeing domestic violence,” Penn said in a statement. “That’s why I decided it’s time to make payphones free.” Australians made 11 million calls through the payphones last year, and over 230,000 were to emergency services such as 000. Telstra expects to …