Berlin Beaten

About a year ago Herr Semi Feblowicz, smart Berlin lawyer, drove his automobile along slippery Berlin streets, skidded, smashed into another car, ran up an 80-mark repair bill at a garage.

Berlin's streets are paved with smooth asphalt which becomes eel-slick in wet weather. The problem of slippery asphalt is more acute in Berlin than in most cities for though the city is as far north as Hudson Bay, little snow falls there. Rainy weather is normal weather from November through March.

Lawyer Feblowicz, irked at his 80-mark repair bill for an accident that was neither his fault nor that of the other car. learned from scientific friends that a new type of asphalt paving has been perfected which is guaranteed antiskid. None of it has been laid in Berlin.

Lawyer Feblowicz assembled his friends, summoned chemists, engineers, traffic policemen, asphalt manufacturers, chauffeurs, sued the municipality of Berlin for 80 marks ($19). Object of the case was to force the city to lay anti-skid paving in its streets. Since the suit was for less than 100 marks, no appeal is possible.

For ten months the financially strapped city fathers fought the case in & out of court. Last week the decision and 80 marks in cash went to Lawyer Feblowicz, the court holding that since anti-skid paving exists, the city is responsible for skidding accidents where reckless driving cannot be proven.

Balancing the chance to provide thousands of jobs to unemployed against draining several million marks from the city treasury, Mayor Sahm issued calls to city department heads last week for a great conference to decide whether to wait for more damage suits or to start at once replacing Berlin's 70,000,000 sq. feet of asphalt.

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