Cost of living in German towns

Bibliographic data

Monograph

Identifikator:: 866449027

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-93831

Document type:: Monograph

Title:: Cost of living in German towns

Place of publication:: London

Publisher:: Stat. Off.

Year of publication:: 1908

Scope:: 1 Online-Ressource (LXI, 548 Seiten)

Collection:: Economics Books

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88 BOCHUM. Most of the houses on the outskirts are small, generally of two stories or of one story with or without attic rooms above. They are cheaply built and their arrangements are of the simplest. In the village of Hamme are scores of miners’ houses of small size, containing two tenements of two or three rooms below and one or two rooms above ; the rents vary from 10s. Qd. to 12s. 6d. per month. Many of these tenements have plots of land attached and stalls for goats or pigs. The goat is assiduously fostered in the Bochum district. It is known as the “miner’s cow,” and it saves the milk bill of hundreds of families in the colliery districts of Westphalia. So important has the industry of goat grazing and breeding become that regular goat fairs are held yearly at Dortmund, and the agricultural societies encourage the improvement of the stock by the offer of premiums. Allotment gardens are also popular. A very important factor in the housing arrangements of Bochum are the colonies of houses which have been erected by the large collieries and iron works. The Bochumer Verein, which owns coal mines, iron and steel works, and machine works, has provided nearly 1,500 dwellings of all kinds, most of them in or near the town, others situated some distance away. Of these dwellings about 1,000 consist of three rooms, 100 of four rooms, two only are of two rooms, and the rest have five, six, or more. As a rule the houses are built in small detached blocks, and the English plan of living rooms below and bedrooms above is favoured. Cellarage is universal, gardens are usual, and a large proportion of the dwellings have outbuildings for goats, pigs, and even cows. The average rent per room is about a shilling a week, which is much under cost. The large colony of Stahlhausen, in the neighbourhood of the original Bochum Works, may be regarded as a model in its way. An abundance of trees and planted spaces gives to the surroundings of the houses a rural aspect, and an air of comfort and well-being rests upon the place. While the dwellings are commodious, the convenience of their inhabitants is studied by the provision of promenades, playgrounds for the children, and a co-operative store for the supply of food and other articles of domestic use. The latest housing project of this firm is a colony of some 70 dwellings of the “single-family” type, with two rooms below and two above, built in rows in picturesque style and intended to be let at £9 or £10 per annum. For the unmarried workmen there is a large boarding-house (Kosthaus) at Stahlhausen, in which 1,000 men are lodged and fed at a charge of 10d. per day or 6s. 8d. per week, which is barely half the cost of board in private houses. Among the regular lodgers are many Poles and Italians. Other workmen’s colonies in the immediate vicinity of the town are those built by the companies owning the Dannenbaum, Hannibal, Constantin der Grosse, Hanover, and Lothringen collieries. In the districts of North and South Bochum 1,825 purely miners’ dwellings have been provided by the companies, the return varying from 2\ to 3 per cent. The rents range from £4 10s. to £6 per annum for two rooms with appurtenances, from £4 10s. to £7 10s. for three rooms, and from £6 to £9 for four rooms. A Building and Savings Society has also built 122 workmen’s dwellings in several parts of the town and suburbs. The rents are fixed as nearly as possible at cost price, and at present run as follows :—1st story, £3 17s. per room per annum ; 2nd story, £4 2s. : 3rd story. £3 17s. ; 4th story, £3 10s. The municipality has done little or nothing directly in regard to housing. It owns a number of tenements, but they are only intended for its workpeople, and their acquisition has been dictated by convenience rather than by benevolent motive. The rent varies from £4 to £4 10s. per room per annum, equal to from 4s. Id. to 5s. 2d. per week for a tenement of three rooms, though attic tenements of this size are let for less than 3s. per week. It is customary to reckou rent at Bochum at so many marks per room and year, and the rates vary not only as between the old town and the newly incorporated suburbs^ but also as between different parts of the town, and, a^ain, within the same building it varies according as the story is lower or hu her. The usual range may be taken as from 80 to 100 marks per room yearly in the old ton n, and fiom oO to 80 marks in the new municipal area. It will be undeistood, howe\er, that three rooms, as a rule, cost less proportionately than

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