Daming Yuanfu

Chapter 2271 Economy and Party Struggle () Five Major Industrial Zones

Of course Zhu Yijun doesn't know what a railway is, this is natural. Don't talk about him, even if he is highly pragmatic, he has hardly considered building a railway for a long time, because the inherent concept in his mind is: to build a railway, you must first have steam power.

Therefore, since steam engines can only be used to boil water in the laboratory of the craftsman school, and it is estimated that it will take some time to even be used for textiles, then there is no chance of railways, trains, etc.

However, a few days ago, while he was chatting with a missionary from the Silesia region of the Holy Roman Empire, he suddenly had an idea when he mentioned the stone tracks used in local coal mines, and he suddenly remembered the origin of the railway-this This thing did not appear without warning. Its predecessor was actually a "rail carriage".

As mentioned above, as early as the 16th century, the mining industry in Europe gradually emerged. With the increase in transportation volume, the earthen road surface could no longer bear the load. So the Germans learned from the experience of ancient Rome and took the lead in laying stone pavements in the Harz coal mine, which freed the horse-drawn mine carts from the muddy dirt roads and allowed them to transport large amounts of coal from the mines to the docks. However, the amount of construction was too much, so it was later changed to lay only two rows of stone slabs where the wheels ran over, which became a stone track.

As for the tramcar, history can be traced back to 1660, when a horse-drawn minecart with a wooden track appeared in a coal mine near Newcastle, England, making construction more convenient. But until now, the track was just a wooden track and had nothing to do with "iron".

After a hundred years of silence, in 1763, the Seven Years' War between Britain and France ended. Due to the sharp drop in military demand, the price of British iron plummeted. In order to solve the problem of easy wear and tear of wooden rails, the mine owners took advantage of the cheap price of iron and nailed a layer of iron sheets to the wooden rails, thus the world's earliest "rails" appeared. However, as the volume of transportation increased, the iron-covered wooden rails were still overwhelmed.

Five years later, in 1768, the owner of the Coalbrook Valley Iron Works in Shropshire, England, saw that the pig iron in the factory had piled up, which could neither be sold to make money nor take up a lot of space. So he ordered his people to cast the pig iron into iron plates and lay them on the road in the factory, ready to sell them when the price of iron rose.

The boss also did not expect that this kind of plank railway would be promoted and used in the mining area. Later, it was further modified into two L-shaped angle iron rails to jam the wheels for the horse-drawn mine cars to travel.

However, angle iron rails have the problem of being easily filled with coal dust and garbage. So in 1789, British civil engineer William Jessop designed convex rails and cast iron wheels with protruding outer rims, which were used on the Loughborough-Leicester horse-drawn railway. This was the prototype of modern railways. .

Jessop later also invented the cast iron wheel and the railway switch with a protruding inner rim (because the outer rim protrudes and needs to be locked with fasteners, and when the inner rim protrudes, the rail itself can constrain the position of the wheel.), This became the standard form of wheel track for modern railways.

Of course, the turnout system was invented after 120 years of arduous exploration. In the era of wooden rails, vehicles had to rely on turntables if they wanted to switch lines.

The subsequent development of railways is related to steam engines, and Gao Pragmatic is too lazy to think about it for the time being. After all, the steam engine also developed and matured step by step over one or two hundred years before it could finally be used in locomotives to provide power for vehicles. Now... it's still too early. According to his estimation, he should not be able to see it at least in his lifetime, so there is no need to bother now.

Then things turn back to why Gao Pragmatic suddenly wanted to build a "railway". In fact, the reasons are not complicated, there are only two reasons: one is to improve the transportation capacity of Daming; the other is to find a new market for Jinghua Iron and Steel, which has rapidly improved its production capacity and quality.

The issue of transport capacity has been roughly discussed in the previous article. In short: China is the country of choice in terms of water transport basics, even if you look at the world. But even so, there are still some difficulties in connecting, which requires land transportation to make up for it.

Yes, it is just to make up for it, just to allow the land routes in these areas to be connected to convenient water transportation.

Here is an issue that most people may not have noticed: Even in China in the 21st century, the freight volume of just one Yangtze River trunk and tributary even exceeds the national railway freight volume (the Yangtze River trunk alone exceeds 35 billion tons, plus Tributaries such as the Han River and Jialing River must exceed 40 billion tons).

Are you surprised? Don’t be surprised, because this is why China can be called the chosen country in terms of water transportation as mentioned above. The reason why most people have little awareness of water transportation is because water transportation is much slower than modern transportation such as railways and cars. But it’s slow, it’s low-cost, and the transportation volume is really huge!

It can be said that a large part of the reason for China's prosperity in ancient times lies in China's unique national water system.

Taking into account the technological level and social productivity of the Ming Dynasty, it is certainly impossible for Gao Pragmatic to start a "one hundred thousand mile railway" as soon as he opens his mouth. That is pure bullshit. His current plan is to spend ten or twenty years to connect several important mining areas and industrial areas with their adjacent navigable water systems using "rail carriages".

This of course requires planning. The first step is to plan several "national-level" industrial zones and areas that provide them with main raw materials nearby. This question is relatively simple, after all, you can copy the homework. Gao Pragmatic's current plan is for five industrial zones: Jingshi, Shenyang, Susong, Guangzhou, and Wuchang. There are two prefectures in Susong here, and the others are all the size of one prefecture or prefecture-level administrative district (mainly because Jiangnan is rich and the land is divided into fine parts).

There is no doubt that, except for Wuchang, the other four are directly corresponding to the "four major industrial bases" of later generations of China. The reason why we are more pragmatic and draw another Wuchang is because no matter in terms of transportation, resources or location, Wuchang can be built as an important industrial base.

Gyeonggi currently mainly relies on the Kaiping Industrial Zone. However, since the Kaiping Industrial Zone is built directly on the raw material production area, it does not have to worry too much about the transportation of raw materials. Its main function is to transport products to other regions by sea - whether domestic or overseas.

Kaiping Industrial Zone is a complex industrial zone with dual military and civilian uses, with steel production and processing as its core. It not only produces various weapons and equipment, but also produces agricultural tools and vehicle parts. It is also the northern supplier of rails for the "railway" in the high-pragmatic plan. Main producing area.

Shenyang is an industrial base built after Gao Pingshi became governor of Liaodong. Shenyang currently has three major industries: steel products industry, tussah silk industry, and grain and feed processing industry.

Needless to say, steel, like Kaiping, is produced for both military and civilian purposes; the tussah silk industry has been mentioned many times before and is the most concentrated tussah silk one-stop industrial zone in the Ming Dynasty; grain and feed processing is mainly due to Gao Pragmatic’s original planning. The introduction and promotion of corn and cold-tolerant rice caused a surge in grain production in Liaodong.

The increase in rice production has allowed the population of Liaodong to steadily increase, while the explosive increase in corn production has made it the main source of concentrated feed for horses. It not only supplies Liaodong, but also supplies most of the "Nine Borders". Its importance is beyond doubt.

Susong is currently a silk and cotton textile industry base. It also underwrites high value-added products such as porcelain and paper from upstream, and basically follows the "light industry" route. Of course, this is related to the fact that highly pragmatic business forces have never entered this area in a large scale. But for the time being, Gao Pragmatic has no strong will to change this.

After all, it is only around 1600 AD, so there is no need to engage in heavy industry all over the country. Since the Yangtze River Delta is suitable for the development of light industry, let's develop it like this first. Anyway, they are all high value-added industries, and there is no disadvantage in continuing to grow bigger and stronger.

Guangzhou is more interesting. Foshan has been able to produce good iron and steel since ancient times. However, Gao Pragmatic, a person who likes to engage in steel-related industries, has never invested in the steel industry in Guangzhou. This is because Gao Pragmatic knows that Guangdong does not have the resource competitiveness of the steel industry compared to the northern provinces. Instead of developing the steel industry in Guangdong, it is better to do a good job in the northern regions.

Gao pragmatically also has certain industrial plans in Guangdong and Guangxi. According to his previous arrangement, Guangxi will focus on the sugar industry, while Guangdong will focus on the shipbuilding industry, Cantonese embroidery, and cotton spinning.

There is a premise that must be said here: Guangdong at this time is different from Guangdong in the 20th and 21st centuries. The current Guangdong economy is not outstanding, let alone compared with the Jiangnan area. The economic strength of Guangdong is higher than that of neighboring Jiangxi and Huguang. It must be strong (the rise of Guangdong's economy is directly linked to the arrival of the maritime age).

Because of this, Gao Pragmatic has not arranged too many industrial development plans for Guangdong for the time being. After all, its era has just arrived. When the wave of the times arrives, there is no need for anyone to arrange it, and Guangdong will naturally embark on the fast track of development.

Finally, there is Wuchang. If one is to say that Wuchang's pragmatism is impressive, it is undoubtedly the Hanyang Iron and Steel Plant and the Hanyang Arsenal in the original history. The former is more tragic, while the latter made great contributions in the Anti-Japanese War.

However, although Zhang Zhidong was a bit crazy when he started the Hanyang Iron and Steel Plant, it was not too serious. At least the convenient transportation in this place must be a major advantage. Of course, Gao Pragmatic did not plan to build a steel plant in Hanyang. Even if it were to be built, it would have to be built in nearby Qizhou, because there are mines near Qizhou, both coal and iron, and Qizhou is also located along the Yangtze River.

As for now, didn't the emperor just speak? Then build an arsenal first—or, in other words, build a royal arsenal in conjunction with the steel factory in Qizhou.

Of course, considering that Wuchang is in such a good location, only steel plants and arsenals are not enough. Inland shipyards can also be expanded. Yes, Jinghua originally had an inland shipyard here. In addition, cement plants, vehicle manufacturing plants (carriages), etc. also have a certain foundation and can continue to be expanded.

At the same time, considering that there is no steel industry base in the south, the Qizhou Steel Plant can be built on a larger scale. In the future, the steel demand of the inland provinces in the south will be met by it - including the demand for rail tracks.
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