User:Ww2censor/Vienna pneumatic post

The Pneumatic post in Austria was a pneumatic tube network in Vienna and, from 4 March 1899 also the one in Prague. They operated in Austria-Hungary by the Austrian Post and Telegraph Administration (today: Österreichische Post). In its greatest extent the Viennese network reached 53 post offices with 82.5 km of pipe. It was discontinued in 1956 because it was inefficient compared to modern telecommunications services.

Monarchy and republic until 1938
The Viennese pneumatic mail systems started first put on 15 February 1875, initially only for telegrams (dispatches) and express mail. On 1 March 1875, the carriage of letters was possible as announced in the Regulations for the Austrian Telegraph Offices, issue no. 3 of 19 March 1875. At the start there were ten post offices connected by pipes at distances of 1-3 kms and all within the current ring road.

The pneumatic network was 14 kilometres long, of which 2.2 were allocated for the supply of compressed or diluted air to two storage facilities in the Laurenzer building at Fleischmarkt (meat market) street. By 1813 the system had expanded to 53 post offices and 82.5 kms of pneumatic pipe. In 1902 new compressors by Hanns Hörbiger were installed.

At peak hours, up to 20,000 cylinders were sent daily through the tubes under the city as pneumatic tube trains, each with up to 15 cans. The pneumatic tube trains could reach a speed of almost 50 km/h.

A Viennese pneumatic tube station with see-through tubes made of brass and glass is on display at the Vienna Technical Museum.

Under National Socialism 1938-1945
During the Anschluss, March 1938 until April 1945, the Vienna pneumatic mail system ran just like those in Berlin and Munich. However, in 1938, between 4 April and 31 October the old stamps of the Austrian Republic were valid even in combination with stamps of the German Reich.

Post World War II
During the Second World War the pneumatic tube system was badly damagedwith only 7% functioning, but was operational quite quickly. However, it was never achieved the pre-war usage. In 1950 it only managed 5500 sendings per day, i.e. less than 2 million sending a year. Given the extent of the network, this was not sufficient to keep it operating.

On 2 April 1956, the post office discontinued the pneumatic tube service in Vienna due to the reduced usage and the increased use of telephones by the population. The pneumatic tube system was used for decades for the quick sending of incoming express mail, etc. This is evidenced by backstamps or receiving marks on mail.

Non-public use
Before the planned remodelling of 2017, the Austrian parliament building on the Ring retains its own pneumatic tube system, that also provides access to the surrounding buildings on Reichsratsstraße, that belong to the parliamentary administration.

The Kaiser-Franz-Josef Hospital in Vienna had a pneumatic tube system installed in 2016 to transport blood samples to the laboratory. The samples are barcoded, placed in the can and because they must not be shaken too much, they only travel at a speed of 5-6 metres per second. Urgent consignments, such as tissue samples from ongoing cancer operations, are given priority over less urgent consignments.

This system was supplied by a Viennese industrial and building technology company, Sumetzberger, for whom pneumatic tube systems have become an important division and that for instance, supplied 167 hospitals in China with pneumatic tube systems.

Nowadays most pneumatic tube systems are built are usually for corporate use, such as, removing cash from department store tills or from tollbooths, tools in industrial plants, or samples from ongoing steel production or cement works. Sumetzberger's more than 30 listed Viennese clients include installations in banks, universities, office and event buildings, hotels, schools and haulage companies.

It was proposed by Sumetzberger to reactivating Vienna's pneumatic tube system, especially between the West and South stations. Due to the high cost of digging up the roads, this idea was rebuffed due to the high cost of digging up roads.

Prague
The Prague pneumatic post was the world's last preserved municipal pneumatic post system. It was an underground system of metal tubes under the wider centre of Prague, totaling about 55 km (34 miles) in length. The system started in 1889 and remained under Austrian control until Czechoslovakian independence until 1918 and continued operation until it was rendered inoperative by the August 2002 European floods.