Ressel proposal; Austria Post says it did not take hold.
Wiener Rohrpost · Austria Post 2025 stamp
Vienna, 1875–1956.
Austria Post’s 2025 stamp text records ten stations inside today’s Gürtel, 65-millimetre pipes, a 20-Kreuzer fee, red boxes from 1880, a 1913 peak of 53 stations over more than 80 kilometres, closed in 1956 as unprofitable. Wien Geschichte Wiki figures differ on some of those counts.
When pneumatic tube systems in other European cities proved effective for fast mail, Austria Post writes, a city system was established in Vienna in 1875. The “pneumatic tube network” connected ten stations, all within what is now the Gürtel. Pipes with an internal diameter of 65 millimetres were laid about one metre underground. Letters, postcards, and telegrams travelled in metal capsules by air pressure for a fee of 20 Kreuzer.
From 1880, dedicated red-painted post boxes were introduced for the pneumatic post, emptied every 20 minutes, with the collected mail then forwarded through the tubes. At its peak in 1913, Austria Post says, the network comprised 53 pneumatic post stations over more than 80 kilometres. Severe damage during the Second World War and the rise of telephony and teleprinters led to discontinuation in 1956 due to unprofitability.
Wien Geschichte Wiki dates telegram traffic to 15 February 1875 and letters and cards to 1 March 1875, names engineers Franz Felbinger and Auguste (or Arthur) Crespin, and gives an opening-year pipe length of 14,011 metres. The same wiki closes the service on 2 April 1956.
Mileage disagreement
More than 80 km. Or 82.5. Or 88.5.
Austria Post, German Wikipedia, and the city wiki do not match.
| Source | Peak network as stated |
|---|---|
| Austria Post, 2025 stamp text | 53 stations over more than 80 kilometres (1913) |
| German Wikipedia, Rohrpost in Wien | 53 post offices and 82.5 km at greatest extent |
| Wien Geschichte Wiki | 88.5 km and 53 stations (1913); more than 5 million telegrams plus letters and cards that year |
German Wikipedia also gives a 1950 traffic figure of 5,500 sendings a day — less than two million a year — as part of the unprofitability argument. That is an encyclopedia figure, not an Austria Post figure.
The 2025 stamp
One hundred and fifty years, on a 35-millimetre square.
Österreichische Post issued a commemorative stamp for the 150th anniversary of the pneumatic tube network. Official specifications, from the PostAG pages dated 15 January 2025:
- Face value: €3.50
- First day of issue: 11 February 2025 (pre-issue 7 February 2025)
- First-day city: 1070 Vienna
- Stamp size: 35.00 × 35.00 mm (sheet 110.00 × 65.00 mm)
- Graphic design: David Gruber
- Printing: Cartor Security Printers, offset
- Quantity: 130,000 stamps on sheets of 1
The first-day essay on PostAG adds color the stamp page itself does not: Josef Ressel’s 1844 idea of a pneumatic postal system did not take hold; the commemorative design shows a central station with an 1890 tube-mail letter card and a transport capsule in the background. Lou Guadagno, commenting via Stamps on Stamps, notes that the stationery in the souvenir sheet is not the 1875 first type but a later 1893 letter card (privacy when folded), and that Austrian pneumatic cards were issued on pink stock.
Austria Post’s first-day text also states capsules were propelled “at speeds of around 50 km/h” and that each tube-mail “train” could carry up to 15 capsules.
The 2025 Austria Post commemorative stamp and souvenir sheet are on PostAG.
Telegram service (Wien Geschichte Wiki).
Letters and cards (Wiki; Austria Post dates the network to 1875).
Red pneumatic post boxes, emptied every 20 minutes (Austria Post).
New Hörbiger compressors (German Wikipedia).
Peak: 53 stations; kilometre figures disagree (see table).
Severe damage (Austria Post).
Service ended as unprofitable (Wiki; Austria Post: 1956).
€3.50 commemorative, David Gruber / Cartor, 130,000.