MESTO a DEJINY From Vienna to Ostrava – from Austria to Czechoslovakia: Urban Rail Transport in the Czech Lands (on the Example of the Ostrava Agglomeration), 1894 – 1924 Michaela Závodná vol. 7, 2018, 1, pp. 18-39 The following study focuses on the development of urban rail transport in the Czech Lands before 1914, specifically regarding electrification and municipalization. The second part of the study looks at the issue of nostrification of a transport company in the aftermath of World War I. Based on a case of a specific company, the study analyses its causes, course and consequences, while placing it in the historical context of the making of so-called greater cities. It examines the economic and political motives that lead to the decision to move the transportation company’s headquarters to Czechoslovakia even before being prompted to do so by the state authorities. It follows the impacts of the war on the running of the company, and the gradual permeating of members of the local authorities into the company’s board of directors. Taking into account the transformation of the Ostrava city agglomeration into a modern metropolis, it analyses the factors that culminated in the local authority of Moravská Ostrava joining the transport company as the majority shareholder, as well as the consequences for the subsequent development of the company. Key words: Nineteenth – twentieth century. City. Urban rail transport. Nostrification process. Economic history. Moravská Ostrava. Czechoslovakia. Czech Lands. Electrification. Municipalization. The development of urban rail transport in the Czech Lands1 has not received adequate attention and is not on par with literature focusing on outside contexts. Czech literature on transport offers only popularizing manuals, of which only a proportion focuses on the issue of technology transfer, whilst entirely omitting the social and cultural dimension of such a transfer.2 At the same time, the comparative and synthetic works of transport historiography explore the Central European context only minimally, if at all.3 If the historiography pays any attention to urban rail transportation, then it is 1 Given the complex character of Cisleithanian railway legislation, the study will use the following terminology. ‘Urban rail transport’ is used to describe rail operations in urban settings, regardless of traction. The term ‘street rail’, which corresponds to the German term Strassenbahn, will be used for urban rail transport using electric traction. For an extensive discussion of the issue, see: ZÁVODNÁ, Michaela. Městská kolejová doprava v rakouském železničním zákonodárství do roku 1914 na příkladu Brna, Ostravy a Olomouce. In: Hospodářské dějiny – Economic History, 2011, vol. 26, no. 2, pp. 154-173. 2 Cf. LOSOS, Ludvík – BOUDA, Jiří. Dějiny městské kolejové dopravy. Praha: Albatros, 1983, 296 p. LOSOS, Ludvík. Městská hromadná doprava. In: JÍLEK, František (Ed.). Studie o technice v českých zemích 1800 – 1918. Sv. IV. Praha: Národní technické muzeum, 1986, pp. 310-335. BAUER, Gerhard – FOJTÍK, Pavel – LOSOS, Ludvík – MAHEL, Ivo. Tramvaje v České a Slovenské republice: Od koňky k nízkopodlažnímu vozu. Dresden: Verlag für Verkehrsliteratur, 1998, 300 p. McKAY, John P. Tramways and Trolleys: The Rise of Urban Mass Transport in Europe. New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1976, 266 p. McKAY, John P. Comparative perspectives on Transit in Europe and the United States 1850 – 1914. In: ROBERTS, Gerrylyn K. (Ed.). The American Cities and Technology Reader: Wilderness to Wired City. London and New York: Routledge, 1999, pp. 88-97. SEMSEL, Craig. More than an ocean apart. The street railways of Cleveland and Birmingham 1880 – 1911. In: The Journal of Transport History, 2001, vol. 22, no. 1, pp. 47-61. SCHMUCKI, Barbara. The Machine in the City: Public Appropriation of the Tramways in Britain and Germany, 1870 – 1915. In: Journal of Urban History, 2012, vol. 38, pp. 1060-1093. 3 Cf. McKAY, J. P. Tramways and Trolleys..., 266 p. MILLWARD, Robert. Private and Public Enterprise in Europe: Energy, telecommunications and transport, 1830 – 1990. Cambridge; NY: Cambridge University Press, 2005, 351 p. LOPÉZ MARTINÉZ, Alberte. Belgian investment in tramways and light railways. An international approach, 1892 – 1935. In: The Journal of Transport History, 2003, vol. 24, no. 1, pp. 59-77. 18 MESTO a DEJINY mainly in relation to cities. 4 The following study does not intend to fill in the deficit.5 It will only focus on two partial areas of research with two goals: to briefly characterize the development of urban rail transport in the Czech Lands before 1914 with respect to the process of electrification and municipalization; and, second, to capture the essential principles of the urban rail transport operation in the context of a newly formed state after 1918 based on the example of a selected transportation company. Development of the Urban Rail Transport in the Czech Lands before 1914: An Overview The development of urban rail transport in the Czech Lands, part of the Habsburg Monarchy and Cisleithania (after 1867), can be primarily characterized according to the method of traction. Until the 1890s, in the Habsburg Monarchy, so-called horse-drawn trams were the primary development. Before 1895, such trams operated in 17 towns: 11 in Cisleithania and six in Transleithania.6 They were predominantly started and operated by joint-stock companies with capital mainly of local and entrepreneurial circles, with minimal participation by foreign – in this period mainly Belgian – entrepreneurs7 or companies.8 For a short period of time, steam rail, which mainly developed in the industrial parts of the Czech Lands (the Brno area and the Ostrava area with the exception of Bohumín), formed a transitional type between the horse-drawn tram and street rail. Steam rail represented a transitional type in the development of urban rail transport. This was a response to the fact that Cisleithanian legislation before 1894/1895 did not include any statutory norms that would define the position of urban rail transport within the rail system, but at the same time did not allow the use of electric energy to drive urban rail transport. 4 BENDIKAT, Elfi. Öffentliche Nahverkherspolitik in Berlin und Paris 1890 – 1914. Strukturbedingungen, politische Konzeption und Realisierungsprobleme. Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1999, 682 p. CAPUZZO, Paolo. Transportation System and urban Space Vienna 1865 – 1938. In: Jahrbuch für Wirtschaftsgeschichte, 1998, no. 2, pp. 153-168. MELINZ, Gerhard – ZIMMERMANN, Susan. Die Aktive Stadt. Kommunale Politik zur Gestaltung städtischer Lebensbedingungen in Budapest, Prag und Wien (1867 – 1914). In: MELINZ, Gerhard – ZIMMERMANN, Susan (Eds.). Prag, Wien, Budapest. Blütezeit der Habsburgermetropolen: Urbanisierung, Kommunalpolitik, gesellschaftliche konflikte (1867 – 1918). Wien: Promedia, 1996, pp. 140-176. PEŠEK, Jiří. Od aglomerace k velkoměstu: Praha a středoevropské metropole 1850 – 1920. Praha: Scriptorium, 1999, pp. 28-33, 151-195. 5 An essential study that compares the development of urban rail transport abroad and relates it to the Czech context is: ZÁVODNÁ, Michaela. Koleje a město: Problematika městské kolejové dopravy ve vybraných moravských a slezských městech v letech 1850 – 1918. České Budějovice; Ostrava: Veduta; Ostravská univerzita, 2016, 326 p. The book analyzes the urban rail transport in select towns within the Czech Republic and places them in the global context of the development of urban transport as a sociocultural phenomenon. The manuscript’s disadvantage is that it is only available in Czech language with an English resume. 6 KOHN-KONTA, Ignaz. Eisenbahn-Jahrbuch der österreich-ungarischen Monarchie. Wien, 1869 – 1892. GOTTSLEBEN, Ferdinand. Lokal- und Kleinbahnwesen. In: Geschichte der Eisenbahnen der österreichisch- ungarischen Monarchie. V. Band. Das Eisenbahnwesen Österreichs in seiner allgemeinen und technischen Entwicklung 1898 – 1908. Wien; Teschen; Leipzig: Karl Prochaska Verlag, 1908, pp. 298-307. 7 The name of the Belgian entrepreneur Éduard Otlet is, in the Habsburg Monarchy, only connected with Prague. See: DUMOULIN, Michel. ‘Edouard Otlet’. Biographie Nationale. Vol. 41, supplement sv. XIII, fasc. 1 Abbeloos – Joassart. Bruxelles: Établissements Émile Bruylant, 1979, p. 602. 8 Before 1880 in the Habsburg Monarchy, the most important company, La Société Générale de Tramways à Bruxelles, operated only in Terst and Galicia (Lviv). The company rescinded its stated intention to take over the horse-driven tram in Brno in 1875 for economic reasons. DUMOULIN, Michel. Fonti e memorie. Jacques Errera, un banquier venetien à Bruxelles. In: Rassegna Storica del Rissorgimento LXXIII, 1986, no. 3, pp. 267-279. ZÁVODNÁ, M. Koleje a město..., p. 101. 19 MESTO a DEJINY In 1895 there were 38 public tram companies in Germany. This was absolutely not the case in the Czech Lands.9 Likewise, there was no electrification. In 1893, 60 % of all street railways were electrified,10 compared to only 5.8 km in Cisleithania.11 It was only Act No. 2/1895 that removed these shortcomings.12 The Act defined the category of street rail (Strassenbahn) as a branch line propelled by electricity, included it in the imperial railway system, and set a relatively long-term license.13 Unlike Great Britain or Germany, the Habsburg (specifically the Cisleithanian) legislation did not place restrictions on municipalities’ entrepreneurial activities, whether undertaken by the municipalities directly or as