The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-11-04

it. The ideal is conduit system reaching every block in the city with a minimum of trench work. But again there are likely to be local conditions modifying such a scheme. Sometimes. for example, it may be better engineer ing to go some distance out of the way to avoid blasting ledge or lay ing a conduit over bed of quicksand
 A thorough switchboard study must be made in order that the complex sys- tenn of lines may be properly intercon- nected. This is based on the types now prevailing in the Bell system. for the engineers recognize that whatever may be said in favor of the so-called "au- tomatic' switchboard for very small exchanges in rural neighborhonds. 1t Is unlikely to play an important part in the future. A series of about 7.5O0 ser vice tests on manual switchboards and automatic conditions in different parts If the country has shown that the manual system possesses a far greater degree of reliability than the auto matic. Hence the familiar boards, with drops or signal lamps. according to the size of the exchange district, have been assumed.
 Building plans follow. These must be so designed that the switchboards housed. Offices must be provided for an executive force with departments of traffic, construction and maintenance. the size of these depending upon the probable development of the district It Is also learned from the number of lines. and from a study of the future traffic. about how many operators will be needed. The last named investiga- ton concerns the probable telephone use of the community, including the growing importance of toll communca- tions and the changing character of services. the lower grades of which tend to disappear as the telephone habit becomes fixed in a community. Such studies are an essential part of the calculations. for one operator with 100 lines at one exchange may be over burdened. while another with 400 at an exchange of different type may have just an ordinary load.
 Not only is the number of operators predetermined but the extent of floor space which will be required for their lunch rooms. rest rooms and lockers. The size of the accounting departments Is also forecasted, for the number of clerks and bookkeepers needed is pro- portioned to the lines involved and the messages handled. The specifications for exchanges which have thus been formulated. sometimes more than a decade in advance, are held in readiness to be turned over. with such emenda- tions as have been necessitated, to an architect when the occasion for build ing arrives.
 The theoretical plans, based on a long term of years, do not complete the telephone census. There then comes up the question of how much of the ulti- mate study must be utilized until de- manded by the expanding business. That involves a second set of elabor- ate studies, generally based upon a pe- riod three years ahead.
 Considerable sums of money will have to be set aside out of the savings of the American people for the next few years, in order to give them the tel ephone service for which they are clam bring. The necessity of spending this money wisely, instead of wasting 1t by haphazard methods. renders such forecasts as these now going on or lately completed among the companies of the Bell system of incalculable value.