Well I chose this one today as a theme as this splendid MAN D 2556 UH double-decker in the shape of 3838 has suffered more of a prang than a major accident in Kreuzberg therefor not really qualifying for the whole Christopher Friday-Thirteenth- bus-turned -upside-down-thirty-people-dead-treatment. Still it was a new shiny bus of that year 1990 and the knowing can see from it that the two very different public transport operations of the Communist East and Capitalist West had yet to be integrated as bus services like the 41 in Free Berlin had yet to have 100 added to it. Also believe it or not, despite people not watching how they pull out, double-parked cars and delivery lorries making movement difficult this was still The Good Old Days when there was still comparatively free flowing traffic in both the East and the West and life was by post Reunification standards laid-back. However even in those days bus driving in West Berlin was considered a stressful job and not only were bus drivers well paid, like policemen they got to retire early. Later the Berlin crews went on strike for more money because of all the changes but the two large former East Berlin garages continued running because still on lower pay they could not afford to stop work.
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