I have fond memories of travelling on the old D-Bahn between Duisburg and Düsseldorf in the sixties. It was a regular treat in the summer holidays: if we were lucky, we'd even get a drink in the buffet car en route. If we were really lucky, we might get to ride on the K-Bahn to Krefeld (also with buffet car) as well. The new U79 that replaced the D-Bahn is probably faster and more efficient, but it doesn't have the same exotic character, so I came to this book about the development of the modern "Stadtbahn" network in Düsseldorf with rather mixed feelings.

This sort of book often turns out to be little more than an exercise in civic pride and self-glorification, a logical chain of events leading inexorably to the best of all possible transport systems, but in this case the author has made a serious attempt to present a balanced, critical view of the development of rail transport in the city. Plenty of space is given to abortive pre-war plans for fast electric lines linking Düsseldorf to Köln and the towns along the Ruhr. When we get to the post-war period, we get a lot of background information about the politics behind various transport plans, and the largely unplanned developments that led to the strategy eventually adopted. Just as an example, one issue I wasn't really aware of before reading this book: a lot of the pre-war drive for fast interurban tram routes came from the reluctance of the Reichsbahn to invest in local services at the expense of profitable freight and long-distance traffic. Another thing Grobe draws attention to, and which you don't see in the PR material - most of the senior planners and engineers who were influencing transport politics in the fifties and sixties learnt their trade building the Autobahn network for the Organisation Todt and Albert Speer, so they were predisposed from the start to favour road over rail and clear the trams off the streets.

Since the author was personally involved with the planning and construction of the U-Bahn in Düsseldorf, we get a lot of clear, practical detail about the how and why of the construction phase, with plenty of maps and illustrations.

A slightly irritating feature of the early part of the book is the author's decision to start the story with the first origins of rail-based transport in the middle ages. There is no particular relevance to Düsseldorf here - he just includes whatever material happens to catch his eye, such as a rather tendentious account from an early-20th century encyclopaedia purporting to explain why Stevenson chose 4ft 8½ in as his standard gauge. However, you can easily skip this bit. When he does get on to Düsseldorf at last, the anecdotal style pays off rather, and he uncovers a few gems, such as an old account of the rather uncertain progress of the original Kleinbahn between Düsseldorf and Duisburg (fore-runner of the D-Bahn and present-day U79). It seems that all the stops were outside pubs, and that landlords would keep a credit account for the tram crews, to which regular passengers would contribute. When the chalk marks started to build up, the drivers would discover a sudden need to "telephone the depot" and leave their passengers stranded while they disappeared into the pub... ( )