Hauling mail and baggage by rail was once a lively everyday event and since the early period of service by rail an obvious self-evident fact. When the new, comfortable 26.4 meter / 86 foot 7 inch express cars conquered the German Federal Railroad rails starting in the Fifties, the German Federal Postal System purchased 685 new railroad postal cars to go with them. Following the old tradition, there was a slot for depositing letters, and work went on during the train’s run in the postal compartment of these cars. And not only in the express cars. Well into the late German Federal Railroad period there were fixed postal car routes in addition to the big urban routes, such as in the limited stop fast trains and the Württemberg South Railroad Ulm – Friedrichshafen, in which travel baggage was conveyed mostly. In that period a so-called half baggage car was enough as a rule for this service. This variation on the 26.4 meter / 86 foot 7 inch express cars (type BDüms) was built starting in 1958 as 138 units. All that has been history for a long time. The enduring success story over 150 years of hauling mail and baggage no longer had a future in the eyes of modern railroad managers at the start of the Nineties. The last baggage counter closed in 1995. Postal cars still ran until 1997 – at the end only in fast postal IC trains.

Prototype: A type Post mr-a railroad postal car for the German Federal Postal System (DBP), used on the German Federal Railroad (DB) and a German Federal Railroad (DB) type BDüms 273 half baggage car, 2nd class. Version of the railroad postal car as a general-purpose postal car with an exhaust hood for a coal oven, side air intake fins, and air changeover equipment. Car routing for the railroad postal car: Ulm – Friedrichshafen/Ravensburg. Car routing for the half baggage car: Ulm – Lindau. Car sequence number 20. Chrome oxide green paint scheme. The cars look as they did around 1978.