Bringing the Railway to Daming

Concubine Hu Shun glanced inside the palace and saw that the palace servants were not close. She couldn't help but complain in a low voice, "Your father is really something. Why did he insist on having you go to a place like Luohuang for an inspection?"

Zhu Bo said, "Mother, several of my brothers have gone overseas to establish fiefdoms. We who remain in the country and are already adults should share more of the responsibilities for Father and my eldest brother."

"My eleventh brother (Zhu Chun) has been ordered to inspect the Anxi Province and the Beiting Military Commission. Not only are those places much farther away, but they are also full of bandits. We might even encounter enemies from the Western Chagatai Khanate or the Golden Horde. It's much more dangerous than Luohuang."

People's sense of happiness is derived from comparison.

When Concubine Hu Shun heard that Concubine Guo Hui's son was sent to inspect the Western Regions, she felt a little better and was no longer so worried about Zhu Bo's trip to Luohuang.

But she still warned, "When you go, be sure to bring enough warm clothes. If you encounter any problems, don't try to be brave. Put your own safety first. Remember?"

Zhu Bo smiled and nodded, "Son, I'll remember this."

The next day, Prince of Xiang Zhu Bo, with the farewell of Zhu Biao, took a train from the capital railway station to the north with a thousand guards.

Today's train speed has increased a lot compared to before 1989. Although one still had to get off the train and take a boat to cross the river in Xuzhou, Zhu Bai still reached Peking in only three or four days.

After Zhu Bo got off the train at Peking Railway Station, he saw a group of officials welcoming him not far away, led by Yuan Wendi, the prefect of Peking.

Speaking of which, Peking is now the capital of Hebei Province, and the offices of the Hebei Governor and the Provincial Governor are all here, but no one from these provincial-level officials came to greet them.

It was not that these provincial leaders looked down on Zhu Bo, but Zhu Yuanzhang had issued an edict stating that whenever the prince visited a local area, he could only be greeted and accompanied by officials at the prefectural level at most, and provincial officials would only meet with him when necessary to prevent the prince from becoming arrogant and domineering.

Officials didn't want to deal with the princes much, and with Zhu Yuanzhang's imperial edict, provincial-level officials would not violate it.

When Zhu Bo, his guards, Yuan Wendi and others walked out of the Peking Railway Station building and came to the square, he looked around and saw that there were more than ten or twenty three- or four-story concrete buildings near the square. As for two-story brick and wood buildings, there were even more. On the contrary, one-story houses were very rare and almost non-existent.

Moreover, most of the buildings have shops on the first floor, and some have signs and billboards hanging on the second and third floors. The gap-shaped streets formed around the square are almost shoulder to shoulder with pedestrians.

On the streets leading to the warehouse area of ​​the train station, there is a constant flow of cars.

After taking a quick look around, Zhu Bo couldn't help but sigh, "I didn't expect the area around Beiping Railway Station to be so prosperous. Especially the thriving commerce and trade is almost as prosperous as that of the Beijing Railway Station."

Yuan Wending smiled and said, "Nowadays, most of the supplies from Mobei, Liaoning, Luohuang, and Jilin are heading south and will be gathered in Peking for convenient transportation by train."

"Similarly, when goods and supplies from the Central Plains and the South are transported to Mobei and other places, a considerable portion is first sent to Peking by train and then dispersed to the four regions."

"As a result, the cargo throughput of the Beijing Railway Station has increased dramatically year after year, and the number of pedestrians and business travelers traveling north and south has also increased year by year. Naturally, the area around the railway station has become increasingly prosperous."

"Just this spring, more than a dozen wealthy merchants reported to the government office, applying to build buildings around the train station."

Zhu Bo's trip actually also included the mission of understanding the actual situation of Hebei's civil affairs, but it was not his main mission.

Hearing this, he asked, "How much is the land around the train station selling for per acre now?"

"Your Highness, land is now flexibly priced and sold according to the location of each household. Therefore, the price of land around the train station varies. The average price this spring is approximately 40,000 guan per mu."

Forty thousand strings of cash per mu?

Although Zhu Bo had expected this, he was still a little surprised when he heard the number.

As far as he knew, although the land around the Beijing Railway Station cost more than 50,000 strings of cash per mu, that was the capital.

The price of land around railway stations in other provincial capitals is more than 20,000 guan per mu, while the price of land around railway stations in ordinary cities is only more than 10,000 guan.

Moreover, the court could only lease or sell these lands to private individuals for thirty years. Once the time was up, the land owners had priority to lease or purchase them again at market prices.

However, given the current development speed of many cities, the land price will inevitably reach another sky-high level by then.

Zhu Bo originally thought that if the land around the Peking Railway Station was much cheaper than he estimated, he would secretly submit a memorial to the court and ask them to send someone to investigate whether there was any corruption in the household registration office of the Peking government.

But now it seems that the housing allowance of the Beiping government office is probably a bit too high?

"No wonder I read in the imperial gazette that the Beiping government has made remarkable economic achievements, with rapid development in industry and commerce."

"A single glimpse reveals the whole picture—the land around the train station is selling for such a high price, so the land elsewhere in Beiping must be equally expensive. Thus, the Beiping government can generate a significant amount of fiscal revenue annually simply from land sales." "With this money, the Beiping government can naturally increase its investment in industry and commerce, which in turn will generate more revenue for government factories and commercial taxes. Perhaps, as the teacher said, this will form a virtuous cycle in economic development."

After coming to his senses, Zhu Bo asked again, "There are so many people around the train station, won't there be any problems with safety and order?"

Yuan Wending smiled confidently and said, "Don't worry, Your Highness, the Prince of Xiang. The Beiping government has set up a patrol station near the train station. It's a large one, with 300 patrolmen."

"Plus, there's a Qianhu Suo nearby, so there won't be any problems with the safety and order at the train station."

Zhu Bo nodded, "Alright, take me to Prince Yan's Mansion."

"Yes."

Since Zhu Di went overseas to establish a vassal state, the Prince of Yan's Mansion built for him by the imperial court in Beiping naturally became the property of the royal family. It is now used as the emperor's palace and a temporary residence for royal family members when they come to Beiping.

The same was true for the Jin Palace in Taiyuan and the Qin Palace in Xi'an. Only the Zhou Palace in Kaifeng was still considered Zhu Su's. However, Zhu Su and his family spent most of their time in the capital and rarely returned.

Zhu Bo rested in Peking for three days with his guards, escorts and other entourage.

Although it was said to be three days, in fact Zhu Bai was not idle for a single day.

He inspected the Beijing Locomotive Manufacturing Bureau, Beijing Cotton Mill, Silk Mill, Cement Plant, Coal Plant and other state-owned factories. If the Zunhua Iron and Steel Plant was not far away from Beijing City and he had limited time, he might have gone there to inspect it.

In addition, he also inspected schools, public libraries, the Daming Yuebao branch and other government offices in Peking.

However, Zhu Bo only inspected and inquired, and did not give any "guidance" or "suggestions" to these government offices, because he and the officials knew that he did not have the power to do so.

Although he could only watch and ask, Zhu Bai still felt that he had gained a lot after three days.

Since Zhu Bo received the task of the northern tour at the end of last year, he has made a lot of preparations, the most important of which is to read various relevant materials on Hebei, Mobei and Luohuang.

As far as he knew, when the Ming army recaptured Peking in the second year of Hongwu, there were less than 10,000 people left in the city, which could be said to be an empty city.

By the eighth year of Hongwu, the city's population had recovered to about 100,000, of which 60,000 to 70,000 were garrison troops and their families, and the remaining 20,000 to 30,000 were forcibly relocated from Shanxi and Zhejiang.

But now the population of Peking has reached more than 300,000!
Among them, except for some who were born in the past twenty years and a small number of people who were allocated by the imperial court during several migrations to the north, most of them voluntarily migrated here after the opening of the Pinghu Railway through the imperial court and local household registration migration policies!

"Our Ming Dynasty's prosperity has come so quickly."

After boarding the train again at Peking Railway Station, Zhu Bai sat by the window, looking at the city of Peking flying away outside the window, feeling emotional.

He knew that Liu Kuan had made an indelible contribution to the rapid development of the Ming Dynasty in the past decade, and it could even be said that he had made a great contribution.

As Liu Kuan's student, he is also proud of it.

In the past two years, railways in Peking have been built to the north and east. Now, the railway has been built to Kaiping (Wei) north of the Great Wall in the north, and to Shanhaiguan in the east, and will be built to Liaoning and even Jilin.

At the same time, this year the imperial court sent a railway corps to begin building a railway from Peking to Datong and Taiyuan. When he was still studying at the Dabentang, he heard Liu Kuan mention that this route was difficult to build and might take two or three years to open to traffic.
Beiping was not far from Pingben, and Zhu Bo arrived there in less than a day by train.

In Kaiping Wei, Zhu Bai followed the procedure to mobilize more than a thousand military horses and continued to march north.

It was just the beginning of February, and the wind outside the Great Wall was bitingly cold. Although Zhu Bai had brought enough warm clothes and had been riding a horse all the way, he still felt tired - in his twenty years of life, this was the first time he had returned to such a northern place, and in early spring.

Fortunately, there was a cement official road built by the Ming army along the way, and every five miles there was a roadblock for the garrison troops to rest when they were performing patrol missions. A small amount of water, coal or firewood was stored in it. They were not afraid of getting lost on the grassland, and they had a place to rest.

As far as Zhu Bo knew, there was now a military fort with a general flag stationed every twenty miles on the grassland, a thousand-household stationed every hundred miles, and an acropolis every three hundred miles.

In the future, the density of garrison construction will increase depending on the situation, but the number of garrison troops stationed will be reduced accordingly.

On the second day of riding on the grassland, Zhu Bo and others entered the territory of Mobei Province (part of the grassland south of the Mobei was assigned to Hebei and Liaoning).

The further north we went, the colder and bitinger the wind became. After about two hours of walking, the sky turned gloomy, the wind became stronger, and then a heavy snow began to fall! (End of this chapter)