. Electric railway journal . keeping an inspector in the vicinity of thestations continuously. As the equipments in the groupare relatively close together, the inspector could takecare of an additional station if not too distant. He isprovided with a Ford automobile for traveling betweenthe two stations for his daily inspection duties. The original estimates indicated that an annual sav-ing in labor of inspection expense over the labor ofsubstation operators required for manual operationwould have been slightly over $3,000. This saving was,of course, to be offset materially by the fixed charge
. Electric railway journal . keeping an inspector in the vicinity of thestations continuously. As the equipments in the groupare relatively close together, the inspector could takecare of an additional station if not too distant. He isprovided with a Ford automobile for traveling betweenthe two stations for his daily inspection duties. The original estimates indicated that an annual sav-ing in labor of inspection expense over the labor ofsubstation operators required for manual operationwould have been slightly over $3,000. This saving was,of course, to be offset materially by the fixed chargeson and the cost of operating and maintaining the auto-mobile; also it was decreased by the fixed charges andthe cost of maintaining that part of the equipment inthe two stations additional to the equipment that wouldhave been required for purely manually operated sta-tions. The automobile cost was taken at $600 annually,and $1,800 was assumed for fixed charges and mainten-ance of the purely automatic part of the - . x FIG. 5—SWITCHBOARD FOR TWO UNITS IN OAKLAND SUBSTATION 1042 Electric Railway Journal Vol. 52, No. 24 The total of these costs, $2,400, would allow atleast a net saving of $600 per year through the auto-matic operation of the two stations. As it turned out,however, considerably increased wages are being paidsubstation operators at present on the basis of an awardby the National War Labor Board. The inspector nowreceives $ per week. The payroll for the opera-tors required for manual operation would have calledfor a total expenditure of about $ per operators at Oakland and one at Harmony wouldhave been required. The saving in labor alone at pres-ent is therefore estimated at about $4,264 per year,and the net saving is correspondingly increased toroughly $1,800 per year. The figures given do not, as stated, include $200 or$300 of expense that will be saved in power throughautomatic operation of the Harmony substation. Atpresent the
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