The railway on which special trains now run is the main line of the Guangdong-Jiangxi Railway and is part of the southern railway network.
The China Railway Corporation currently has five major railway branches, namely Zhili Railway Company, Southern Railway Company, Western Railway Company, Central Plains Railway Company, and Northern Railway Company.
Southern Railway Company operates the Southern Railway Network, which includes the three major railway networks: Guangdong-Jiangxi Railway, Guangdong Railway, and Hu-Guang Railway.
According to the plan, Li Xuan's special train will go south along the Guangdong-Jiangxi Railway, all the way to Guangzhou, and then go north along another railway connecting Guangdong, that is, the Hu-Guang Railway, enter Changsha, and then go to Wuchang in Hubei.
The Huguang Railway is also Chen Lifu's main political achievement for many years when he has been in charge of Guangdong. After he built the Guangdong-Jiangxi Railway, he felt that such a railway was still not enough to promote the development of the Pearl River Delta. In addition, in order to more conveniently connect Huguang and even the Central Plains
region, so he vigorously promoted the construction of the Huguang Railway.
That is, the railway line from Guangzhou to Zhaoqing, Changsha, and finally to Wuchang!
However, the Huguang Railway actually needs new planning only for the section from Changsha to Zhaoqing, because on the Guangdong side, the railway from Guangzhou to Zhaoqing already exists, and on the Huguang side, the railway from Wuchang to Changsha has also been planned before.
And construction started.
This railway was just opened to traffic at the end of last year. In fact, it only took more than two months to open to traffic. It is the main line of the empire that was recently opened to traffic.
According to the plan, after Li Xuan's special train arrives in Wuchang, the special train group will take a special ferry across the Yangtze River, and then continue northward along the Central Plains Railway after crossing the Yangtze River.
However, crossing the river is more troublesome, even if there is a train and ferry!
Because there is not just one special train for the Holy Patrol. The special train for the Holy Patrol does not refer to the royal class that Li Xuan rides on, but all the special trains for the Holy Patrol. In total, there are nearly twenty trains, two of which are still
Armed train!
It is not an easy task to safely transport so many trains across the river in a short period of time.
In fact, Datang Railway Corporation originally prepared a backup plan, which was to prepare a second or even third set of special trains.
If there is an accident on the ferry, people will be used to cross the river, and then the prepared backup train will be used after crossing the river.
But in this case, comfort and safety cannot be guaranteed.
Hantong, who was responsible for security, as well as the attendants and guards, were very reluctant to change cars midway because it represented many unpredictable risks.
This special train cannot be used as just any train, especially the imperial special train that Li Xuan personally rode on. Hantong would conduct detailed inspections on almost every component to ensure that there would be no problems.
Changing cars midway means unnecessary accidents.
Therefore, the spare special trains can only be spares.
After crossing the Yangtze River, the special train will arrive in Hanyang, then enter the Central Plains Railway Network, continue north to Kaifeng, then west to Xi'an, then turn around and return to Kaifeng, continuing north to Tianjin and Youzhou.
But it's still too early to go to Xi'an or Tianjin. They will go to Nanchang first and then to Guangzhou.
When the special train arrived in Nanchang, it was already the fourth day since the special train departed from Jinling City.
This speed is actually much slower than that of ordinary passenger trains.
Even though the speed of current trains is only more than 40 kilometers per hour, ordinary passenger trains do not have too many messy so-called security troubles, and they will not stop for several hours.
From Jinling City to Shanghai, one day is enough. Similarly, from Jinling City to Nanchang, even if the distance is longer, two days is enough.
However, the special train took a full four days. This is naturally because the speed of the special train is not fast, and it also stays for a long time.
After arriving in Nanchang, Li Xuan met with local officials as usual and then made an inspection. Speaking of which, this was Li Xuan's first time in Nanchang.
I have never been here in my previous life. After arriving at this time, although I had traveled from Guangdong to Jinling City before, I did not go to Nanchang at that time, but passed directly by the east bank of Poyang Lake.
After two days of curious inspection, Li Xuan's special class continued southward.
We passed through many cities along the way, but the only one we stayed in for a long time was Ganzhou. After staying in Ganzhou for a day, the special train went straight to Guangzhou.
After arriving in Guangzhou, Li Xuan saw a different industrial and commercial city!
Unlike Shanghai where there are many high-rise buildings and factories are highly concentrated, in the urban area of Guangzhou, you can't see too many high-rise buildings, at least not rows of seven or eight-story high-rise buildings.
Moreover, its factories are relatively scattered.
This is related to the early development of Guangzhou. Although Guangzhou in the early days had business districts and Guangzhou Industrial Zones, early Guangzhou officials did not put all factories in the industrial zones.
So there seems to be a scene of industrial zones scattered here and there.
But this also has advantages. First of all, there will not be any shortage of land resources like Shanghai. Guangzhou has established industrial zones in many places, not only in the Panyu area of Guangzhou Fucheng, but also in Foshan, Shunde, and even other places.
They are available everywhere, even in Humen now, which has also led to the development of Huizhou Prefecture. There is no problem of insufficient supply of industrial land.
However, this almost flat development model cannot be learned from other places, because it is based on a highly dense railway network and public carriage network.
Before there were trains, Guangzhou had already built a railway from Foshan to the Guangzhou Trade Zone, which was much earlier than Shanghai built rail carriages in the urban area.
How could trains run without trains at that time?
Use a carriage!
Guangzhou is the first city in the country to use rail carriages on a large scale. At first, it was only used in docks and port areas in business districts, and then quickly expanded to urban areas, and even became the main force of intercity transportation.
Before trains became practical, Guangdong had already built a dense rail carriage transportation network!
After the trains became available, the construction of Guangdong's railway network became even more out of control. The Pearl River Delta region is surrounded by densely packed railways, not only in industrial towns such as Guangzhou Fucheng and Foshan, but also in ordinary towns.
Train or carriage.
If the railway network (including trains and rail carriages) only connects major industrial areas and main urban lines, then their ordinary public carriage network basically extends to every corner of the city and even the suburbs, let alone towns.
Small villages on the outskirts of the city can all take public carriages.
Moreover, train schedules and public carriages are very dense. Many people live in the suburbs, and then take trains and then transfer to rail carriages or ordinary public carriages to go to work.
Especially the gentry lived in mansions in the countryside and traveled between the countryside and the city by train, rail carriage, and ordinary carriage.
The dense public transportation network has also created a very special flat development in the Pearl River Delta.
Therefore, after arriving in Guangzhou, Li Xuan did not see a large-scale factory area in the Guangzhou Industrial Zone. It could only be regarded as medium-sized and was far less huge and shocking than the Shanghai North Shore Development Zone.
But he did not express much disappointment, because he knew that there were at least a dozen industrial zones like this in Guangzhou Prefecture, with an industrial population of more than 800,000...
This is quite scary!
Except for Shanghai's special county, no other city has a larger industrial population than Guangzhou.
These days, if Shanghai is the largest industrial city, then Guangzhou is undoubtedly the second!
However, the size and industrial population of the industrial zone do not represent the industrial output value, because the industry in Guangzhou is mainly light industry, and the added value is not too high, while in Shanghai, there are all kinds of industries, including heavy industry.
Advance together with light industry. Because there is heavy industry, the added value of industry will be higher, and it will be much higher.
Therefore, contemporary Guangzhou still lags behind Shanghai in terms of industrial and commercial output value and taxation, but this does not mean that Guangzhou's infrastructure construction and people's living standards are lower.
In terms of infrastructure, Guangzhou and Shanghai have their own advantages and disadvantages. In Shanghai, almost the entire city is covered with cement roads and a large number of high-rise buildings, which makes people know that it is a prosperous metropolis at first glance.
But here in Guangzhou, there are not many high-rise buildings, and its public transportation network ranks among the best in the world.
As for the standard of living, everyone is in an industrial city, so average. We don’t count the middle class and the rich. Just ordinary people, well, they are not that good. Everyone is struggling to have enough food and clothing. Three meals a day are just for free.
Rice or white bread, still a long way to go.
After a brief inspection of Guangzhou No. 1 Industrial Zone, Li Xuan did not stop, but began his inspection intensively.
It has to be said that the industrial zones in Guangzhou are too scattered, making it a bit troublesome for Li Xuan to inspect. Unlike in Shanghai, where one can often complete a day's journey in one industrial zone, here one often has to walk several times a day.
an industrial zone.
But this also allowed Li Xuan to appreciate the developed public transportation network in Guangzhou.
You can go anywhere by train, public carriage, or ordinary public carriage...
Whether you are going from Guangzhou to Hong Kong, from the trade zone to other industries, or even to nearby ordinary towns, you can all get there by train or rail carriage.
There are more ordinary public carriages. If you go out to buy groceries, even if it is only a few hundred meters away, you can take a public carriage.
And more importantly, the fare is very cheap, because the passenger volume is very large, which dilutes the cost, and the local government also allocates funds to subsidize it every year, so the cost of taking a train or horse carriage is very low, with the starting price being only one cent
money.
According to the current currency laws of the Tang Dynasty, one yuan is equal to ten jiao, which is equal to one thousand cents, and the current average worker salary is roughly between 1.5 yuan and 2 yuan.
The starting price of one cent is roughly the same as that of later generations of buses.