After boarding the Pacific passenger ship, Li Xuan was not interested in the luxurious decoration. Although the cost of the luxurious decoration on the ship accounted for more than 30% of the entire shipbuilding cost, Li Xuan still had no interest.
.
What interests him is the ship itself!
This ship can be said to be the largest ship in the Tang Empire at present.
Even the former largest battleship in the Navy, the Hebei battleship, only had a tonnage of 3,800 tons, but the Pacific passenger liner was a full 4,500 tons.
The battleship Hebei is now abandoned due to the explosion accident and is now being dismantled!
As for the latest and largest battleship under construction, it is the Guiyang-class battleship with only 2,800 tons.
In terms of tonnage, it can be said that civilian ships are already ahead of warships!
Currently, the only ships with a larger tonnage than the Pacific are the flagship luxury passenger ships ordered by Fung Shipping Company and Yangtze River Shipping Company. The latest flagships ordered by these two companies are larger than the Pacific, with a tonnage of nearly 5,000
tons of displacement.
But these 5,000-ton passenger ships are still on the slipway. Well, they are not far next door. When Li Xuan looked up, he could see two huge shipyards next door, where huge hulls were being constructed.
However, these two ships have not yet been completed, so the title of Datang's largest ship is still on the Pacific for the time being, but it is estimated that it can only last for more than a year, because according to the plan, Feng Shipping Company is expected to
The new period with the Yangtze River Shipping Company will be completed and put into service.
After staying on the Pacific for a long time, Li Xuan even let people drive the ship around the harbor to experience the feeling of riding a luxury liner.
There is only one feeling, that is stability!
The passenger ship of more than 4,000 tons sailed in the harbor where there was no wind and waves, with almost no bumps.
Li Xuan feels that such large-tonnage transport ships can continue to be built and used for trans-oceanic routes in the future. For example, crossing the Pacific to America, India, and South Africa are quite good.
For example, for the upcoming large-scale immigration development plan in the Americas, this kind of transoceanic liner is very good. It is estimated that more than 3,000 immigrants can be transported to the Americas with just one squeeze of the Pacific.
This kind of sailing liner is not affected by monsoons and ocean currents. If necessary, it can travel between the empire and the Americas several times a year.
It doesn’t take much, just three ships, then tens of thousands of people can be transported there in a single trip, and at least 40,000 to 50,000 people can be transported in a year!
Coupled with a large number of thousand-ton transport ships, there is no problem at all in immigrating 200,000 people to the Americas in five years, and it is possible to double the number to 400,000 or even 500,000.
After all, the Tang Empire currently has a lot of thousand-ton ships. In addition to the navy, the major trading companies, regardless of whether they are officially controlled or privately owned, their new ships are basically over one thousand tons.
Although there are still a large number of ships with hundreds of tons in the early years, they are gradually used by major trading companies as the main transportation force in cross-ocean trade. They are basically used to carry out short-distance coastal trade, such as domestic coastal routes and South-ocean routes.
, Indian coastal routes, Beihai Province routes, etc.
It won't be long before these ships of less than 1,000 tons are probably no longer seen on ocean routes.
Li Xuan felt very pleased with the development of civilian ships represented by the Pacific passenger ship, at least more reassured than the development of battleships.
The development of battleships has lagged behind in recent years. Although the Navy has an ambitious 7,000-ton giant ship plan, now, the newly built warships are only the 2,800-ton Guiyang-class battleship, and its performance is no better than that of many years ago.
Jiangnan class battleships have been greatly improved.
After getting off the Pacific, Li Xuan was still reluctant to leave. This big toy was even better than he expected.
Then when he thought of the Royal Passenger Ship, which weighed more than a thousand tons, Li Xuan felt that the price had dropped a bit.
I decided on the spot that when I need to travel by myself and need to use a transoceanic ship in the future, I will use these luxury liner. It is much easier to use and safer than the royal liner of more than 1,000 tons.
As for directly building a new large-tonnage royal liner, Li Xuan is not so ridiculous.
This kind of large-tonnage luxury liner is expensive to build and operate. The royal family does not have much demand to go to sea by ship. Most domestic travel can be solved by train, so building a large-tonnage royal liner is not worth the gain.
After Li Xuan left Hong Kong, the largest, most luxurious and most advanced passenger liner in the country, the Pacific Ocean, was officially delivered to the Pacific Shipping Company.
When the imperial special train entered Hunan along the Huguang Railway and arrived in Changsha, Pacific Shipping Company also announced that the Pacific Ocean had passed a series of rigorous tests and was officially put into operation.
And began its maiden voyage!
It will set sail from Guangzhou, pass through Shanghai, then arrive at Tianjin, then return from Tianjin, pass Shanghai and then return to Guangzhou.
However, the domestic coastal routes it currently runs are only preliminary routes, and more importantly, they are mainly for trial operations. As an ocean liner of more than 4,000 tons, running domestic coastal routes is honestly very wasteful.
After the trial operation is completed, it will begin its first ocean voyage, starting from China, passing through Beihai Province, Honolulu, and finally arriving at Xinjinshan in North America.
The maiden voyage of the Pacific also caused a sensation across the country and became the most influential news in recent times, second only to the Holy Patrol.
To a certain extent, the Holy Patrol has lasted for more than half a month, and will continue for a long time in the future. The news has gradually faded away. Although the people are concerned, they cannot pay attention to the news of the Holy Patrol every day.
But as an epoch-making ocean liner, the Pacific Ocean has naturally attracted public attention.
Even Li Xuan, who had already arrived in Changsha, was more concerned about the Pacific's maiden voyage.
It is said that in order to ensure the success of the Pacific's maiden voyage and to avoid malfunctions, in addition to the Pacific, there is actually a passenger ship of the Pacific Line accompanying it, um, to serve as a rescue ship when necessary...
At this time, Li Xuan also ordered the Immigration and Reclamation Division. Since domestic shipping companies are preparing to open the Pacific route, you must hurry up. It would be foolish not to take advantage of this opportunity.
Li Xuan was not interested in the Pacific's domestic route trial. He was focused on the ship's Pacific route. If successful, the ship would become the empire's main ship for immigration and trade to North America.
Just such a Pacific, its role is more than ten times that of ordinary transoceanic ships in the past!
Li Xuandu personally ordered them to take advantage, and the Immigration and Reclamation Department also took action quickly.
Connect with the Pacific Shipping Company and prepare to borrow the Pacific to transport more immigrants to North America!
As a royal asset, the Pacific Shipping Company had this awareness as early as when they built the Pacific. Otherwise, why would their superiors let them build such a large-tonnage ship?
For this Pacific, all the profits of the Pacific Shipping Company for many years have been squeezed out.
Nowadays, the Pacific Shipping Company is counting on the Pacific route to recover costs, so the cooperation intention proposed by the Immigration and Reclamation Division is also in their appetite.
In order to organize and encourage immigrants to go to America, the Immigration and Reclamation Department has funds. Some places will directly charter ships to transport immigrants for free, while other places will subsidize part of the ship tickets to encourage immigrants to go independently.
Immigration to America is mainly based on subsidies.
After all, there are still many people who want to immigrate to America.
Many people in the country want to immigrate, first to the Americas, and then to Beihai Province. As for various parts of Southeast Asia, domestic immigrants have always been relatively repulsive. The main reason is that these tropical rainforest areas are too dangerous, and the indigenous people are not important. The key is
Local climate and diseases.
Over the years, the mortality rate of immigrants in Nanyang has remained high!
It can even be said that the people of the empire paved the localization of Nanyang with their own flesh and blood!
Therefore, in response to this situation, the Immigration and Reclamation Department generally provides free shipping tickets for immigrants to Southeast Asia, and subsidizes part of the shipping tickets for immigrants to the Americas.
As for immigrating to India and Africa, it depends on the situation. If you immigrate to South Africa, it is all-inclusive. Not only the boat ticket, but also food, drink, and water are all included by the immigration office. But except for this extremely remote place, the immigration office in other places basically does not provide boat tickets.
The subsidy is of the kind that you want to take or not.
With the substantial ticket subsidy provided by the Immigration and Reclamation Department, the fare of ordinary tickets on the Pacific liner can be reduced to a level acceptable to ordinary immigrants.
The Pacific's maiden voyage on its domestic route has not yet begun, but the Immigration and Reclamation Department has reached a cooperation agreement with the Pacific Trading Company.
At this time, Li Xuan also left Changsha and appeared in Wuchang.
Wuchang was also an important city in the empire. Huguang University was established here, and it also received a lot of policy support to develop local industry and commerce.
However, the development is quite average, at least there is nothing worthy of Li Xuan's special attention.
But this is not important, because in the current industrial layout of the empire, Huguang and Huguang provinces are positioned as food supply bases, and developing agriculture is their first priority. Although developing industry and commerce is also important, it is obviously not as important as developing agriculture.
Although the empire's population is gradually increasing, the pressure on food is also increasing. As major food provinces, Huguang and Guangzhou are naturally the key areas of concern for the empire.
Therefore, during his inspections in Huguang and Huguang provinces, Li Xuan also focused on agriculture!
In the Wuchang area, he inspected a large local farm!
This is a large farm owned by the government. Previously, these areas were a wasteland. The government set up a planting company to cultivate and develop it, and adopted the most scientific planting methods. The grain yield is slightly higher than that of ordinary farmland.
In addition, Li Xuan also noticed that they had begun to use bird droppings as fertilizer.
After asking, I found out that these guano came from some islands along the coast, and some came from islands in Southeast Asia.
However, there are not many applications, because not all islands are like Nauru, the entire island is covered with guano!
It is a pity that Nauru is still hidden deep in the Pacific Ocean, and the expedition fleet of the Tang Empire has not yet discovered this island.
As for South America, there are more guano, but that place is temporarily the territory of the Spanish!
If Datang wants to set foot in South America, it still needs some planning.