Molly Wright Steenson of Active Social Plastic is working on her Ph.D. and has a very interesting post up regarding the Pneumatic post in Paris:
Introduced to combat the shortcomings of the telegraphic network in Paris, the subterranean Poste Pneumatique (Pneumatic Post) moved written telegraph messages from 1866 until 1984. The pneumatic tube network relieved the saturated telegraph network, delivering physical messages across the city and to the suburbs faster and more reliably than the telegraph.
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By 1870, Paris also had an extensive network of vaulted sewers, built by Baron Haussmann during the Second Empire. The sewers were a natural conduit for other types of infrastructure (potable water, telegraph lines, and eventually electricity), making it easier to install pneumatic tube and compressed air lines and to access them in case of error.
She previously wrote about Postal services and pneumatic tubes and Active Social Plastic should be in your feedreader. Now.
Two things to take away from her most recent post:
- Never underestimate the bandwidth of a stationwagon, or a piece of paper
- Well designed infrastructure, such as Haussmann’s sewers, should accompany future technological advances being designed and constructed looking toward the future regardless of cost implications; it will always be more costly to build infrastructure projects in the future than now