The mosquitoes, savages and mountain roads in the Miaosu Mountains didn't take long to make Feng Guanjie want to die. There was nothing but primeval forest here, and the feeling of being far away from civilized society made him want to flee from this place all the time.

Heaven bless, finally one day I heard that the Shanghai Free Trade Zone was under construction. So Feng Guanjie didn't say a word, went back to say hello and went to the front line - whoever dared to mention the word Miao Su again would be in a hurry, and it would be more than half a year, and it was time to change shifts.

took a few apprentices to Hangzhou first, and Feng Guanjie rushed to Xiongdao by river boat.

Knowing that the surname Feng was coming, Xiong Dao didn't dare to slack off. In the telegram, he had already clarified his position: the chief designer of the free trade zone, responsible for the overall design and planning of the port area, the industrial zone along the river, and the living area.

That's why Xiong Dao took Feng Guanjie to Zhangsutan to inspect today.

It's now May when the weather is starting to get hot. In previous years, Zhang Sutan had already grown waist-deep thatch in this season, which became the best cover for thieves to act as traitors.

Today's Zhangsutan has changed a lot. Located at the confluence of the Huangpu River and the Yangtze River estuary, Zhangsutan is the first free trade core area to be identified as a wharf area.

So the first batch of construction workers came to Zhangsutan and began to build. The main force of this group of people was the landless tenants who were separated from Zuojia Village, and later a large number of homeless beggars from the surrounding areas were added to the construction team, resulting in an increase in the number to more than 2,000 people.

......

Large-scale projects in the Jiangnan region have a benefit that is not found elsewhere: food.

17th-century engineering was very difficult. In many places, if thousands of strong laborers are gathered at once, the transportation of grain, which later generations have no concept of, will become a big problem.

This is equivalent to assembling an army with a huge amount of food near the county seat, but in the poorer areas, the stocks will soon be out of supply, and grain and grass will need to be transported from the nearby areas. And the cost of this kind of transportation is very high, in the northern zone, it is good to transport ten cars to five cars.

When the crossing country was engaged in engineering in Fujian, he suffered this kind of hardship. It was difficult to transport grain in the mountainous areas, and Fujian itself was a grain-deficient province, so the inexperienced engineering headquarters at the beginning had a few problems in this regard.

In the Gangnam area, there is no such problem. First of all, the extensive inland water network ensures timely and low-cost transportation of supplies.

Secondly, although the grain fields have been replaced by a large number of cotton fields, because Hangzhou is the main station of Caoyun, there is no shortage of grain in the Jiangnan region - the grain of the southern provinces will be concentrated here.

In the Ming generation, in order to maintain the 4 million quintals of grain on the surface, the cost of the entire transportation system is getting higher and higher.

By the end of the Ming Dynasty, the so-called quota of 4 million quintals had long been insufficient. The central government, local governments, gentry, officials, and officials of all sizes, all of whom have aspirations, have inserted tubes and sucked blood on the main artery of the country.

So the current situation is: the grain on the surface is still 4 million quintals, but the actual collection of grain has been fried by various national taxes, bad regulations and additional consumption, and the quota has been pushed up to the level of 10 million quintals.

Then for the traversal, this situation is a good thing: because food can be purchased centrally.

After the officials and gentry levied the extra amount of grain, it was certainly not used to steam rice from their families, but it was eventually sold to merchants to be used to monetize and complete the cycle of wealth accumulation.

So if a certain force now takes out silver and all kinds of rare commodities in exchange for food, it is really invincible. When I was in Hangzhou at the beginning, it was still a sneaky one; After General Cao's recruitment, the Taiwan side began to unscrupulously transport a shipload of industrial products to Hangzhou.

After the industrial goods were exchanged for silver on the spot, shiploads of grain and people were brought back to Taiwan - the Ming had an innumerable amount of "currency" that could be used to compensate for the trade deficit: population.

The consequence of the emergence of a strong consumer force was that from the second half of 1628, the price of grain in the Jiangnan region began to rise slowly; By the beginning of 1629, when the harvest was scarce, the price of brown rice had been pushed up to one tael of silver a load.

This change, which had not been seen in history, has led to the production of more displaced people in areas where prices have risen. The good news, however, is that after the initial hardships, the surplus displaced and bankrupt are being transported away in a steady stream.

In the future, as the 4,000-square-kilometer granary in Tainan is gradually reclaimed, a few years later, the grain that bursts out by industrial means can be used to support the population collection of the Ming Kingdom.

The story goes back to Zhangsutan: thanks to the abundant food supply, the infrastructure construction operation here quickly gathered 2,000 people to build the scale.

This scale is also thanks to the tireless infrastructure construction that has been carried out tirelessly. Now a large number of experienced construction personnel have been trained, such as the simple work of organizing people, building construction sites, and leveling the land in the early stage of construction, there is no need to cross the crowd to preside.

This is how the export to domestic sales came about. After these foremen and technicians went to Taiwan to learn their skills, this time they were sent back to the Ming Kingdom to take on important responsibilities. Unlike back then, they no longer have long hair, so in order to avoid shock, they had to shave their heads and pretend to be monks.

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The original Zhangsutan pier has been burned down. Now, after the initial remediation, the river channel has also been filled in and connected with the island in the middle of the river.

At the original site of the island in the middle of the river, a traditional wooden pile trestle is extending out of the river, and a large number of workers are busy like ants around the unfinished trestle.

Accompanied by Xiong Dao, Feng Guanjie took a turn in the dock area, which is still quite rudimentary. He had a rough idea in his heart, and he started work the next day.

The first thing Lao Feng did was to take his apprentices to survey and map all the surroundings. He is now almost no longer involved in this kind of work, and young people can become proficient in using instruments such as total stations and running around against tripods.

After getting the detailed data of the surrounding land, Feng Guanjie lived in the landlord's house in Zuojia Village and began to draw the design drawings one by one.

At present, since all the projects are concentrated around Zhangsutan, his design task is relatively easy: flatten the banks along the river, harden the pavement of the wharf area, and build a few more trestle bridges, a few warehouses, and a few square residences...... And, of course, the most important paths.

As for the industrial zone, this one will have to wait. At present, both Xiong Dao himself and the cabinet of distant officials are worried about opening a factory in the Jiangnan area that emits billowing black smoke, and it seems that the time is not yet ripe.

But Feng Guanjie still planned the industrial zone. Large formal factories are not realistic, but a small amount of steam machinery to power the docks is fine.

In addition, if a large factory cannot be built, such as the handmade papermaking workshop promised to Yu Bende, as well as the planned match workshop and mahjong workshop, these "smoke-free industries" can also be opened in advance.

"Little by little." Feng Guanjie and his apprentices spent almost half a month drawing all the drawings of the first phase of the project he planned.

The entire first phase of the project covers an area of quite large, almost three square kilometers, and is located in the area of the later Takahashi Port.

After lying on a large table and reading Feng Guanjie's general design drawing, Xiong Dao did not express any opinion: he knew nothing about architectural design, and he couldn't say anything.

However, the next moment, Xiong Dao stretched out his hand and pointed to a place in the upper left corner of the design drawing: "This land is not in a hurry to be built, right?" ”

Feng Guanjie leaned his arms, glanced at the map, touched his stubble, and thought for a while before saying: "This is the planned cement gravity dock area, and in the future, it is necessary to stop warships and unload heavy equipment." To build this, you have to build a cofferdam first, and there is no construction machinery here, so the construction period will be very long. ”

When Feng Guanjie said this, he showed a "you know" look: "Even if you start working tomorrow, you won't be able to repair it for half a year, let alone tomorrow." ”

When Xiong Dao heard this, he felt that his head was big: "This land hasn't been bought yet." ”

"Then hurry up and buy it, this is the land that extends to the west, and you will have to buy it sooner or later."

...... Xiong Dao understood what Feng Guanjie meant.

The Huangpu River is in the Wusongkou area where it enters the Yangtze River, and is a waterway from south to north; The river surface of Wusongkou here presents an "S" shape. In the planning of the crossing country, the upper part of the "S" shape, that is, the area of nearly 30 square kilometers east of Wusongkou and west of Gaoqiao Town, is the territory of the future "Guoguo".

In other words, in the future, all indigenous lands will be emptied of this peninsula-type land, and it will become an administrative area similar to a "concession". Then, on the day of the fall of the Ming Dynasty, a large number of mobilized troops will quickly set off from this source of war and capture all parts of the south of the Yangtze River.

Feng Guanjie just said "the land extending to the west" refers to the land west of the Gaoqiao River - these plots are the core areas that must be obtained in the above-mentioned long-term planning, so Xiong Dao should not hesitate in this regard.

"The problem is that he has a lot of land!" Xiong Dao shook his head helplessly at this time: "I've done a lot of things recently, and it's already very eye-catching." This land is the manor of the Great Threshold family, and I really don't want to cause trouble now......"

"How you deal with the natives is your business, I don't care."

Feng Guanjie laughed gloatingly: "The only thing I can provide you with now is professional advice: it is best to take this land as soon as possible, and as soon as the trestle is repaired, some construction machinery will arrive, and construction will start there." ”

"If I really don't succeed, I'll change the drawings, but I kindly remind you: stretching out the head is a knife, shrinking the head is also a knife, and sooner or later it will have to be taken down."

Xiong Dao sighed: "Alas...... I know what you mean. But now the situation is tense, and I need to think about it, and I'll talk about it after I talk to my hometown. ”

That piece of land is the Zhuangzi of the late cabinet first assistant, Taishi, nicknamed Wenzhen, and Xu Zisheng's family......