Wandering the Heavens

After hesitating for half a year, Zhengde finally got the railway planning book he had been longing for. He read the general outline part word for word.

Based on the current reality of the Ming Dynasty, the Ministry of Revenue established the Railway Department, and first built a railway school in Tianjin Port to train at least 5,000 skilled craftsmen within five years. At the same time, the 500,000 people managed by the Grain Transport Office were transferred to be craftsmen for railway construction and put under the management of the Railway Department.

Let the Ministry of Rites design a system of official positions or titles suitable for railway construction in the name of natural labor, so as to encourage some scholars who have no hope of passing the imperial examinations to join.

The first super-long railway planned is from Beijing to Kaifeng via Baoding, Zhengding, Handan, across the Yellow River. These areas are mainly plains, and the engineering difficulty is not great. It is mainly for technical accumulation. After the completion of the construction and operation of this railway, it will continue to extend westward, with Xi'an as the terminus.

The second route is from Beijing to Zhangjiakou, passing through the vast grassland into the Hetao area all the way south, and the end point is Lanzhou Prefecture. Considering the current relationship between the Ming Dynasty and the Tatars, it is recommended to shelve this route and instead start from Lanzhou through the Hexi Corridor to Jiayuguan.

These are the two railways that Zhengde was most likely to see when he died.

Before that, the Ming Dynasty must recover the Hexi Corridor as soon as possible. With the Shenjiying beginning to take shape, I believe it will be achieved soon.

The transportation from south to north in the Ming Dynasty can currently rely on canal and sea transportation, and the need for railways is not so urgent. Tianjin Port is already experimenting with steam-powered river and sea ships.

But this is not the case in the west and northwest. There is an urgent need for railways to change the current transportation difficulties, strengthen the empire's control over the western territory, and recover the Western Regions that had been lost for thousands of years.

Under the current Ming Dynasty, Sichuan, Yunnan and Guizhou in the southwest did not have the technical and economic conditions to build railways within 50 years.

In this railway planning scheme, Zhengde felt unprecedented pressure.

"Mr. Zheng, I just realized today that there is nothing wrong with pretending to be asleep." Zhengde was silent for a long time before he spoke slowly.

"Your Majesty, each generation has its own responsibilities." This was all Yu Xian could do to comfort them.

"Since you said this, I will not admit defeat. I will fight for my life. Go ahead and do it! In addition, I have approved the transfer of Qiongzhou Prefecture to military control, but who can shoulder this heavy responsibility?"

Zhengde knew that they had brought back a tree species during this voyage, and the juice extracted from it could make bicycles run faster. Unfortunately, it could only be planted in hot and humid places, and after much thought, only Qiongzhou Prefecture was suitable. For this reason, Yuxian petitioned last month to place Qiongzhou Prefecture under military control and plant this tree there.

"I recommend Shangguan Haitang and Gui Hai Yidao." Yu Xian said.

"If they leave, who will be around you to help you?" Zhengde was worried that this dead eunuch would really die one day and there would be no one to inherit his skills.

"Your Majesty, I believe that the children of the Railway School will inherit my mantle." Yu Xian did not receive any notification from the communicator to leave, so he still had plenty of time.

Yu Xian left the Forbidden City and returned to Tianjin Port. Along with him came several hundred useless sons of nobles who were forced to join the school by Zhengde. They were the first batch of students at the Railway School.

Zhengde had a good idea, thinking that there was not much to learn from road construction, it was nothing more than leveling the ground and laying the tracks. In fact, a project has to take all aspects into consideration, and there are many things to consider.

Yu Xian held the imperial sword in his hand and examined this group of people, and finally divided them into technical class, external liaison class and management class.

The technical class is responsible for survey, design, construction management, the external liaison class is responsible for land acquisition, land exchange, relocation and resettlement of the people, and the management class is naturally responsible for project management and material allocation. In fact, Yu Xian runs the school in the way of a comprehensive enterprise operation.

When he leaves one day, the Ministry of Revenue Railway Bureau will be able to operate without any hindrance and build railways all over the land.

The Tiangong School was opened together with the Railway School. They are divided into several classes, but their current main business is still to serve the construction of railways, so the content taught is basically about subjects such as bridge building, steel smelting, and mechanical design.

After the two universities were officially established, Tianjin Port expanded several times and became a fortified city with tighter defenses than Beijing City. It no longer resembled its original appearance.

During this period, Zhengde demonstrated his responsibility as a boss. He took on pressure from all sides and gave unreserved support to Tianjin Port and Qiongzhou Wei.

His support paid off in the third year. After investigation, Tiangong Academy moved the terminal of the first phase of the first railway project from Kaifeng to Zhengzhou and began preparations for the construction of a bridge across the Yellow River.

After more than three years of construction, an experimental Yellow River bridge for vehicles and horses was built. With the accumulated technical experience, the students of Tiangong Academy officially began to design and build a railway bridge across the Yellow River.

The court rejoiced at the celebration of the completion of the Yellow River Bridge.

At this time, the technical class of the Railway School had completed the survey and design of the section from Beijing to Baoding, the external liaison class had completed the land acquisition task according to the designed route, and the management class had completed the deployment of craftsmen and materials.

Zhengde personally presided over the groundbreaking ceremony. He had a premonition that he might not be able to see the completion of this railway in his lifetime, but if he did not start, his descendants might not have the determination and courage to do it. All things are difficult at the beginning, as long as you start, the people behind you will continue to do it.

"I could have pretended to be asleep, but I saw a world I had never imagined, and an imminent crisis!"

When Zhengde faced the dissuasion of several trusted ministers, he confessed everything and took them to visit the huge embroidery that was given as a birthday gift to the empress dowager, as well as various materials compiled by the ocean-going fleet, especially the Franks' unscrupulous aggressiveness and plundering behavior.

The emperor's trusted ministers understood his painstaking efforts, but they had no choice but to secretly suppress many harsh memorials to the emperor and did not dare to do anything out of line to ensure the normal construction of the railway.

Yu Xian did not go to the groundbreaking ceremony. He was still wholeheartedly running schools in Tianjin Port. After several years of hard work, whether it was the Military Academy, the Railway Academy or the Tiangong Academy, they were finally able to grow on their own.

So these days Yu Xian has been writing a plan, planning to do something big.

So Zhengde, who was worried about building the railway, received a memorial. This dead eunuch felt that things in Tianjin Port were on the right track, so he wanted to go out and have fun again. The fleet that went out to sea at the beginning has now been expanded into a fleet of 50,000 people, equipped with the latest ship guns.

The dead eunuch wanted to take this fleet to travel around the South China Sea and the Japanese waters and kill some people along the way.

Taizu issued a maritime ban in the past, but now more and more people are going out to sea privately, so clearing the sea area is inevitable.

Zhengde picked up a red brush and wrote the word "approved" on the memorial.