From Our Berlin Correspondent.
Page 13
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The Ikmover Tramway Company, which has an electric system, has supplemented it by running Stolz steamdriven buses.
I ob-erve 1.13at the P.O. officials at Frankfort have at last determined to ;lye a trial to a tight motorvan for the delivery of express parcels. They are -unning it for a month. With a moderate amount of luck, a gotxl make should convince them that the horsedrawn van leaves much to be desired or this class of service.
B. Polack Aktiengesellschaft's First Dividend.
The 13. Polack Aktiengesellschaft, which was floated in December, 1907, with a share-capital of 1,200,000 marks (L6o,000), is able to announce a dividend of 20 per cent. as the net result of its first year's trading—ended the isth August. This is a very auspicious peginning, and speaks well for the Popularity of the company's rubber ;foods.
Progress in Bavaria.
"Nulla dies sine linea" might almost be the motto of the Bavarian Traffic and Post Ministcries, for no sooner has the opening of one postal line been thronicted than another claims notice. The new line, whiCh connects Eg-genfeiden-Stadt and NeuOtting-Stadt, will be worked entirely by the Post Office, summer and winter. The winter arrangements provide for two services daily each way.
Combination Against the Motor Traffic Bill.
Owners 01 industrial vehicles in and around Berlin have been invited to attend a meeting, on the 8th October (to-day), for the purpose of discussing the provisions of the Bill for the Regulation of Automobile Traffic, and of passing resolutions against such as may be deemed prejudicial to their interests. The training of chauffeurs and the establishing of a school with that *Pet are also down on the paper for discussion, and I note that the conveners of the meeting, to which admission will be by ticket only, purpose suggesting the combination of all owners Df industrial vehicles in Greater Berlin
into a Commercial Association " which shall take steps to keep down the number of accidents.
Heavy Decline in Exports.
From an examination of the foreign trade returns for August, I find that, up to the end of that month and from the beginning of the year, Germany exported only 88 industrial vehicles, or t2 fewer than during a like period of 1907, the difference in weight standing at 395, too kilos. Since the value is given as 300 marks per moo kilos., we have a fall of 1,975,500 marks, that is, -Co8,75o. The British market absorbed 11,900 kilos. only, as compared with 3to,000 in 1907. Sweden took less, likewise the Argentine; on the other hand, Germany more than doubled her sales in the European Russian market,
exporting ,'so.70o kilos. against 39,800, and she slightly improved her position in :Nustrc.>-littrigary. With a falling export trade, Germany experienced a rising import trade, having imported 72,700 kilos. as against 68,7oo. All vehicles were imported under a duty of is marks per 100 kilos. Both France and Switzerland improved their 1907 figures ; 1.3,9o0 kilos. to ..ti,600, and 31,200 kilos. to 30,3u0, respectively ; only these two countries are mentioned amongst exporters to Germany.
International Road and
Railway Congress at Munich. Amongst the delegates who attended this; congress was M. Mauclair, of the Compagnie Generale des Omnibus de Paris, who dealt with the motorbus from an economic standpoint, and its utility in supplementing car systems or, in the case of small towns without such systems, in bearing the whole burden of. traffic. On this latter point, however, Engineer Otto, of the Grosse Berliner S trassenbabn Gesellschaft, failed to agree with his Paris colleague, A motorbus line would not pay, he said, unless fares were low and a frequent and regular service might be counted upon ; with cheap travelling rates the working rests could not be covered. The Strassenbalm-Gesellschaft, I may remind n.:Iders, runs motorbuses in Berlin, and from Engineer Otto's remark, coupled with others not exactly bubbling over with enthusiasm for the petrol bus, it is clear that little profit is being produced be them. Dr. Kiihles, representing the local Corporation, observed that, with the working costs at over is. 411. :1 mile, no profit had been made, or was likely to be made, on the municipal buses, which the Corporation wotdd be glad to sell. Munich's street traffic was not dense enough to make rilOtnrhase:s pay ; the few vehicles in use served only as connecting links between two tramcar lines.
The Munich Motorcabs Again.
Munich's petrol cabs fail to commend themselves to the City Fathers, on the two-fold ground of smoke and veloeity, and the police have been asked to deal more sharply with offenders whose vehicles manifest these vices from a street-traffic point of view. The municipal official who induced the councillors to approach the j)olice in this matter went so far as to advocate that petrol cabs should be banned in favour of electro-taxis. What seems to lie at the root of the municipal feeling against the petrol class is the fact that the vehicles at present running are far too powerful for city traffic, being often hired for 6o-mile excursions into the mountains, With engines equal to such journeys at his feet, the Munich cabby finds the practice of virtue terribly hard; hence, accidents not infrequently occur, especially as the Munich citizens arc a lethargic lot, and are apt to wander across the streets as sheep without a shepherd, whilst the police have a way of handling traffic that would suggest to a Londoner that they are badly in want of at least six months' training at the Mansion House or the foot of Ludgate Hill.
There is a proposal on foot to license two classes of cabs : (a), say, a 1211,p. category for metropolitan work ; and (b), cabs fitted with engines of up to 4011.1>. for suburban "mountaineering." This would tend to remove the grievance respecting speed, and, ceteris paribus, the low-powered droschke would pay better through economy in rubber and the consumption of fuel, Whether ally firm will accept the hint ahout the electroscabs is doubtful. They are delightful vehicles to ride about in, hut they don't par a dividend—at any rate, not in Berlin, as the directors and shareholders of the Berliner Elektromobil-Droschken-Gesellschaft know to their discomfiture and sorrow.