Daming: I help my wife be the empress

Chapter 483 Water Transport Reform, Railway Video

"Chen Junchong is looking at the problem from the perspective of development, which is not wrong." Hao Guangming from the old house in Zhulin expressed his thoughts.

"However, banditry and border troubles in the north are not so easy to quell. If there is no stable environment, it will be difficult for the people to feel at ease in production, and it will be difficult to promote high-yield grain quickly.

Therefore, it is better to give priority to promoting those grains that are suitable for planting in the north and south in the south in recent years.

But high-yielding grains can indeed improve the recovery speed of people's livelihood in the north - therefore, I think you can first estimate the share of high-yielding grains needed by each province, and then consider the distribution. "

After hearing this, Auntie Zhu nodded secretly.

Just at this time, the debate among the ministers below came to an end, and Auntie Zhu explained Hao Guangming's intentions.

Although Chen Junchong and other northern governors were not satisfied, they also understood that it was indeed difficult for the north to maximize the increase in the number of grain varieties in recent years.

Conversely, after a few years, when the north has really settled down and the population has grown to a certain extent, it will be relatively easy to obtain a large amount of high-yielding grain from the south.

In addition, grains that are more suitable for production in the north, such as wheat and sorghum, must be given priority to the supply of high-yield grains to northern provinces.

In fact, these high-yield grains have greatly helped the recovery of people's livelihood in the north.

After the plan for the distribution of high-yielding grain seeds was finalized, Zhu Wei raised a second small issue——

"Speaking of the development of the northern provinces, there is one thing that must be mentioned, and that is water transportation.

You should all know that before the imperial court was in the capital, and the three provinces in the northern frontier relied on the money and food support from the southern provinces, so my Ming Dynasty was extremely dependent on water transportation.

It can even be said that water transportation is related to the lifeline of the country, and it has become a major event in my Ming Dynasty. "

Having said this, Aimee Zhu paused.

The ministers nodded slightly.

Because Auntie Zhu was right, water transportation was the lifeline of Daming before.

"It is obviously unreasonable to entrust the safety of Ming Dynasty entirely on the water transportation. But if the water transportation is hindered, the country will be plunged into crisis.

Therefore, in the previous 200 years, although there were many disadvantages and serious problems in the water transportation, no one in the court dared to reform the water transportation.

However, the world was in turmoil in the past few years, the population of the northern provinces was completely empty, and the water transportation was completely cut off. Now is a good time for the court to solve the water transportation.

To solve the problem of water transportation, the first thing is to reduce the court's dependence on water transportation.

The population of the northern provinces has been greatly reduced, and the imperial court has moved to Nanjing, which has greatly reduced the imperial court's reliance on water transportation.

Only this is not enough, so I decided to develop land transportation and sea transportation to share the pressure of water transportation. "

Hearing this, all the ministers thought about it.

The so-called water transportation, in a narrow sense, generally refers to the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, the main water transportation route that runs through the north and south of the Ming Dynasty, but in a broad sense, it refers to all river transportation in the Ming Dynasty.

It should be noted that in ancient times land transportation was far less convenient than water transportation.

First of all, the transportation volume of land transportation is low, and the consumption of people eating horse chews is still high.If a batch of grain is transported too far by land, it may be eaten up by the people transporting the grain and the mules and horses before it arrives.

Waterway transportation does not require horses, and it employs fewer people, so the consumption is naturally less.

The only thing to worry about is that it is not as safe as the land route—if the ship capsizes, the whole ship of grain will be gone;

At that time, people called the situation that the grain transport ship had an accident on the water and caused losses as "drifting".

When the country's officials are clear and clean, and the government is clean and efficient, most of the exiles are true, and the overall number of exiles is quite small.

But when the government of the country is corrupt, corruption is rampant, and local control is insufficient, this drift will become higher and higher, making the cost of water transportation higher and higher.

One reason for the increase in drift is that some rivers have not been dredged and repaired in time, the sailing environment is not good, and the accidents of real capsizing have increased.

But the main reason is that the upper and lower officials used the water transport as an excuse to embezzle the food that originally belonged to the country like moths.

The problem of water transportation is not limited to Ming Dynasty, it can be said that it has existed since the water transportation began.From the emperor to the small official in the Ming Dynasty, many people knew about the problem of water transport, but under normal circumstances, no one had the courage and ability to solve it.

Because in the past, water transport not only involved a large number of corrupt officials and gentry forces, but also involved the livelihood of 10,000+ Cao troops and millions of family members behind them.

Cao Jun, also known as Yunjun and Cao Gong, are actually workers who specialized in transporting food and other materials for the imperial court in ancient times.

However, after the wars in the last few years of the Chongzhen Dynasty, not only the corrupt officials involved in the water transportation were dispersed and wiped out, but even the Cao army existed in name only.

Therefore, if the Ming Dynasty wanted to reform the water transport now, it would not have to face these two major obstacles—officials who depended on the water transport for profit, and the Cao army who relied on the water transport for their livelihood, of course, still existed, but their numbers and power had been weakened compared to a few years ago. extreme.

Even if these people are unwilling, it is difficult to influence the court's decision.

···
Fang Kongxue, who was sitting in the last row, was a little puzzled after hearing what Aimee Zhu said.

Auntie Zhu said that sea transportation was used to share water transportation, and he could understand, because in the Yuan Dynasty, sea transportation was used to share the pressure of water transportation.

It can be said that it is okay to use land transportation to share water transportation?
This land transportation loss is the biggest.

Fang Kongxuan didn't think that Zhu Yuxi and Ma Shiying and other cabinet ministers didn't understand this truth, so there must be some reason why he didn't know about it.

Just when Fang Kongzhang was puzzled, he saw Lu Zhenfei, Minister of Communications in front of him, stand up and said: "Your Majesty is wise, it is time to take this opportunity to reform water transportation, and share the pressure of water transportation with sea and land transportation.

Sea transportation can rely on ships - Chenguan ships not only require greatly fewer sailors, but are also stronger and can resist greater wind and waves.This also means that if all ships are shipped by sea, the risk will be much smaller than before.

Land transportation can rely on railway transportation, and even in the future, railway transportation can be used as the main mode of transportation for my Ming Dynasty. "

As Minister of the Ministry of Communications, Lu Zhenfei has the most and deepest understanding of railway transportation among the ministers, and he already knows about the successful trial production of practical trains and railways.

He even watched a video of train transportation in later generations and was so shocked that he became a staunch supporter of railway transportation.

However, although other people have heard about railway transportation, they still do not know the weight of railway transportation because they have not seen the real scene.

Even some such as Fang Kongzhang, Yang Wencong, Zhang Kuang, etc. who heard about trains and railway transportation for the first time showed a dazed look.

Noticing the changes in the expressions of these courtiers, Auntie Zhu smiled and said, "It seems that not all of you gentlemen know about trains and railway transportation, anyway, I happen to have a video here, and Zhuqing will understand after watching it."

Immediately, Aimee Zhu asked Forsythia to project a video on another screen.

The content of this video is divided into two parts. The first part is a scene of a train trial-produced by the Chengdu Secret Engineering Bureau running on a section of railroad tracks.

Fang Kongzhang looked over and saw that in a wilderness, a circular double-track "road" estimated to be one mile long was paved with iron bars of different thicknesses.

On this railway, there is an iron car parked.

The car has two sections, the front section has a chimney, and the rear section is a carriage.

At first glance at the beginning of this video, Fang Kongxuan's first thought was - luxury, really luxury!

Not only is the car made of iron, but even the "road" under the car is also paved with iron.

Then he couldn't help but wondered, and thought to himself: The railways that His Majesty and Lu Zhenfei mentioned are all roads paved with iron, right?
　First more.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)