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62

ASCHAFFENBURG.
working-class  houses  of  recent  date  there  has  been  a  decided  advance  both
in  comfort  and  appearance.  The  walls  are  no  longer  left  lime-washed  or
roughly  painted,  but  are  neatly  papered,  and  the  floors  are  painted  where
formerly  bare  deal  was  thought  good  enough.
The  only  part  of  Aschaffenburg  which  is  entirely  given  up  to  the  working
classes  is,  as  already  stated,  the  recently  incorporated  suburb  of  Damm.  Here  a
considerable  part  of  the  resident  factory  population  lives  alone  in  the  neighbourhood ­
  of  the  principal  paper  mills  which  give  them  employment.  The  streets
are  plain  and  irregular  ;  many  of  the  houses  are  one-family  houses  and  the
rest  contain  from  two  to  four  tenements,  the  usual  size  being  either  two  or
three  rooms  with  a  miniature  kitchen.  The  rooms  of  a  typical  tenement  in
this  quarter  were  found  to  have  the  following  dimensions  :—No.  1,  16  feet
3  inches  by  13  feet  :  No.  2,  15  feet  by  9  feet  9  inches  :  No.  3  and  kitchen,
9  feet  9  inches  square,  the  height  of  the  lower  rooms  being  9  feet.  The
attics  in  these  houses  offer  as  a  rule  inferior  accommodation.  The  building
of  the  Damm  quarter  is  of  a  very  rough  kind.  No  expense  has  been
incurred  for  external  ornamentation  or  internal  finish  ;  the  houses  have  been
built  for  people  of  restricted  means,  and  to  the  wants  of  such  people  they
correspond.  With  the  Damm  colony  may  be  classed  a  smaller  group  of
working-class  dwellings  in  the  Fabrikstrasse  (Factory  Street),  not  far  distant,
which  are  built  in  pairs,  divided  by  a  space  giving  access  to  gardens  or
courtyards  behind.  These  houses  consist  of  two  stories  and  an  attic  story,
and  most  of  the  tenements  have  three  rooms  and  a  kitchen,  one  tenement
to  each  floor.  The  general  dimensions  of  the  rooms  are  from  11  to  14  feet
deep  and  10  feet  wide,  with  a  height  of  9  feet.  The  tenant  of  one  such
tenement  was  a  labourer  with  9  children  and  weekly  earnings  of  3s.  6d.  per  day
in  summer  and  2s.  6(7.  on  on  average  in  winter,  though  several  members  of  the
family  supplemented  his  own  income.  His  rent,  28s.  6(7.  per  month,  represented
about  one-third  of  his  unaided  earnings.  There  were  beds  in  every  room.
Houses  are  let  by  the  month,  and  signed  contracts  of  tenancy  are  rare  in
the  case  of  working-class  dwellings.  It  is  the  general  rule  for  the  water  rate  to
be  included  in  the  rent.  The  municipal  authorities  undertake  the  duty  of
collecting  domestic  refuse,  which  is  deposited  at  the  street  door  at  any  hour  of
the  day  in  pots,  pans,  dishes,  and  boxes,  for  any  receptacle  is  allowed.
Rents  in  Aschaffenburg  are  high.  Taking  the  predominant  rents  in  Berlin
as  100,  the  index  number  for  Aschaffenburg  is  67,  a  figure  exceeded  by
only  three  other  of  the  towns  investigated  for  the  purpose  of  this  report.
There  has  for  several  years  been  a  steady  rise  in  the  rents  of  dwellings  of
small  and  medium  size  in  consequence  of  the  development  of  industry  and
the  growth  of  the  town  ;  and  there  is  no  prospect  of  a  decline,  for  there  is  no
over-building  and  the  demand  for  working-class  houses  always  keeps  well
abreast  of  the  supply.  Taking  the  town  as  a  whole  working-class  rents  fall
within  the  following  range,  but  the  lower  figures  represent  the  Damm  district,
which  is  still  by  far  the  cheapest  part  of  the  town  :—

Number  of  Rooms  per  Tenement.

Predominant  Weekly  Rent.

Two  rooms  with  kitchen*
Three  rooms  with  kitchen*

2s.  9d.  to  4s.  2d.
4s.  7d.  to  5s.  9(7.

*  This  is  almost  invariably  too  small  for  use  as  a  living  room.
In  Damm  the  best  of  a  not  very  superior  class  of  tenements  of  three  rooms
with  kitchen  can  always  be  had  for  os.  9d.  per  week.  Four-room  tenements  are
abnormal  for  working-class  families,  and  when  tenanted  seldom  cost  more
than  those  of  a  room  less,  for  they  are  taken  because  of  special  cheapness.  It  is
noticeable  that  families  with  few  children  often  have  a  preference,  which  takes
the  practical  form  of  a  reduction  in  the  rent  to  the  extent  of  several  shillings  a
month.  It  is  estimated  that  ten  per  cent,  of  the  families  rentin°'  tenements  of
three  and  four  rooms  take  one  or  two  lodgers,  who  pay  as  a  rule  15,?.  per  month,
this  sum  including  morning  coffee.