Before a series of infrastructure projects in the business district, the high-profile construction of public utilities was not a road, but actually the office building and operating expenses of the patrol department.

Due to the trouble of public security, whether it is the yamen of the business zone or the consuls of various countries, they are actually very supportive of the preparation and operation of the patrol police department.

In order to prevent the patrol police department from being troubled by the shortage of funds, with the assistance of the consuls of various countries, the yamen of the trade zone borrowed 30,000 taels of silver from several foreign banks for the construction of the patrol police office building, prison and other buildings, as well as the recruitment of patrol officers and the purchase of police equipment.

After the success of the first cases of borrowing for public utilities, a large number of subsequent infrastructure projects have also been used in this case, such as the construction of the Pidgin Bridge.

In order to meet the traffic needs of both sides of the strait, so that the north and south banks of the pidgin can truly become one, and the south bank of the pidgin will develop more rapidly, the yamen of the business zone has adopted the construction of a large number of foreign merchants and Chinese businessmen, and is ready to build a stone bridge on the pidgin near the Huangpu River, which is expected to cost two or two thousand taels of silver.

The construction of many bridges and roads was mostly short-term loans made by the yamen of the business zone with financial revenues as guarantees, and the total amount borrowed was about 100,000 taels.

borrowed money to repair the bridge and pave the road, so how to repair the road is naturally in accordance with the overall plan formulated by Lin Zhe.

The preliminary plan is to take the original British Concession as the core of the area along the river, as a financial and commercial area, because a large number of foreign businessmen, Chinese merchants, commercial banks and banks have gathered here before, and it was originally a ready-made financial and commercial area, but now it is just to continue to expand the place.

In addition, the inland area away from the river is planned to be an industrial area, as well as ordinary residential areas, high-end residential areas, etc.

At present, the development of the industrial zone is the most backward in the major plans, because Shanghai is a relatively pure trade city, with entrepot trade as the main support, and major foreign businessmen. The Chinese merchant houses did not produce things locally in Shanghai, but rather bought goods from all over China, sold them to foreign firms, and then shipped them to foreign countries for sale.

Most of its foreign products are also shipped to Shanghai by foreign companies, and then purchased by major Chinese businessmen in Shanghai and resold to all parts of the country.

Most of the local production is a small handicraft workshop, and the only ones that are slightly larger are the Linde Machinery QÌ Factory of Lin's Commercial Bank, and the Lin's Machinery QÌ Silk Reeling Factory, which is still in the preparation stage for trial production. It's just that the Linde Machinery Factory can only be said to be a handicraft workshop, while the Lin's Machinery and Silk Reeling Factory has not even recruited workers at present, and has not yet produced on a large scale.

Other sporadic handicraft workshops are not large-scale, and there is still a long way to go to develop industries in the business zone.

In fact, the most rapid development in the business area is still ordinary residential areas, these residential areas are mainly poorly built houses, mainly sold and rented to the Chinese who have just come to the business area, and thousands of simple houses have been built in just a few months.

And the development of high-end residential areas is just as rapid, why?

Because there are many rich people who come to the Shanghai Business Zone, many landlords in southern Jiangsu and southern Anhui have come to Shanghai to flee with all their belongings, and these people are not short of money in their hands, not to mention hundreds of taels of silver to buy a house, thousands of taels are without blinking.

Most of the small western-style buildings that had just been built were snapped up by these panicked landlords with a lot of money, which made several real estate businessmen who specialized in buying land and building houses laugh from ear to ear, and Yu Shengjun, who made a profit of hundreds of thousands of taels from selling land, was even more happy.

And the yamen of the business zone is also very satisfied with the tax extraction.

At present, the amount of various taxes levied by the yamen in the business zone is still relatively small, and the largest income is the real estate transaction tax for the time being.

According to the regulations, the sale of land in the business zone, well, that is, the transfer of 'perpetual lease rights', regardless of the price, is taxed at 5% of the transfer price, and the rental house is also taxed.

Although the current real estate tax revenue is the majority, other tax revenues in the business zone should not be underestimated in the foreseeable future.

According to the regulations of the Shanghai Business Zone, the Yamen of the business zone has the power to collect all kinds of taxes from foreigners and Chinese!

In the business area, Chinese and foreign people live together, and it is simple to tax the Chinese, and you can do anything, but how to tax the foreigners? This is a very embarrassing problem for contemporary China, and it is certainly not possible to levy taxes in the traditional way, and it is not possible to separate the taxation of foreigners and Chinese, because it is easy to cause disputes.

In the end, Lin Zhe gritted his teeth and directly imitated the West and other countries to establish a purely Western-style taxation system, on the one hand, he did not suffer losses, and on the other hand, he also made foreigners have nothing to say.

According to the Western-style system of taxation, then all kinds of taxes can be very much, if the development of the business zone is good, the tax revenue is just around the corner.

Lin Zhe has quite a lot of expectations for the business zone, otherwise he would not have put his energy into the affairs of the trade zone all day long.

When Lin Zhe was dealing with the affairs of the business zone, Shi Langyi, who led the Western Crackdown Mixed Group to Songjiang, also sent back good news.

Said that after he led the army to Songjiang, the thief army was about to attack Songjiang City, and then he attacked the thief army directly from behind and successfully broke it, after the thief army broke and fled to the north, he led the army to pursue more than 50 miles, and killed more than 600 thieves before and after.

After the battle of Songjiang, the strength of the Knife Society in the entire Susongtai region has basically been wiped out, and it is impossible for a large-scale thief army to threaten the stability of this region in a short period of time.

In this way, Lin Zhe has time and energy to continue to focus on the trade zone and the expansion of the army.

In December, after several months of intense recruitment, Yu Shengjun's various units were basically full.

Five infantry regiments, four artillery companies, two cavalry companies, and two baggage regiments have all been fully staffed, making the total strength of Yu Sheng's army exceed 5,000 for the first time.

In terms of equipment, the infantry guns are still the Minnie infantry guns modified from the Linde Machinery Factory, and the artillery is different from one artillery company to another, the first artillery company is still the old style of mountain splitting guns, the second artillery company is a twelve-pounder gun, the third artillery company is a six-pounder gun, and the fourth artillery company currently has only a few old-style mountain splitting guns, and the six twelve-pounder guns purchased specifically for this company are not yet in place.

At present, all units of Yu Shengjun's army are stationed in Huzhou, Songjiang, and Shanghai to suppress the local areas to eliminate bandits, and there is no large-scale war in these departments at present, so they can devote all their energy to training.

Lin Zhe believes that giving him another half a year is enough to train 5,000 elite modern troops!

Just when Lin Zhe was busy with his miscellaneous things, Wu Jianzhang finally swallowed the consequences of losing Shanghai!

At the beginning of December, the imperial court officially dismissed Wu Jianzhang in the name of 'dereliction of duty and corruption'!

Although Wu Jianzhang spent a lot of effort to recapture Shanghai after the fall of Shanghai, and actively cooperated with Lin Zhe's actions in Shanghai, the bigwigs of the imperial court still dismissed him directly.

Lin Zhe was also mentally prepared for Wu Jianzhang's dismissal, Wu Jianzhang, who lost Shanghai in this year and was once captured by the Little Knife Society, is simply a disgrace to traditional Confucian officials, and not dismissing him is not enough to comfort countless officials who committed suicide or were killed after breaking the city.

It's just that this Wu Jianzhang was dismissed, who will be the successor?

How is the successor's personality and behavior? These are the problems that Lin Zhe needs to face!

Although Lin Zhe is the governor of the trade zone, he has no direct connection with Su Songtaibing Dao in terms of administrative authority, because this business zone is not under the management of Su Songtaibing Beidao, or even under the management of the governor of Jiangsu, and can be regarded as a small-scale independent administrative agency.

But in any case, this business zone is in Shanghai, and the county seat of Shanghai is on the side, and there are many places to deal with Su Songtai's military preparation, and if this successor is ignorant, it will inevitably cause a lot of trouble to Lin Zhe.

Lin Zhe was worried, and as the directly responsible official on the ground in Jiangsu, Xu Naizhao was also worried about the selection of Su Songtai's successor.

Don't think that Su Songtaibing's preparation is just an ordinary four-grade Dao platform, in fact, in contemporary times, Su Songtaibing's preparation is a very sensitive and important position.

Because he had to deal with foreigners, the current Qing court did not have any institutions such as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that specifically dealt with foreigners, and ordinary diplomatic affairs with various countries were generally handled by local officials in the provinces where the treaty ports were located.

The official directly responsible for the Shanghai Treaty Port is Su Songtai's military preparation!

In other words, this Su Songtai Bingbeidao was a diplomat sent by the Qing court in the Shanghai area, and at the same time, Su Songtaibing Beidao also served as the Jianghai Customs Dao and had to deal with customs affairs.

Therefore, the requirements for officials in this position are quite high, first of all, the first thing is to be able to deal with foreigners, and ordinary officials are simply not competent.

"I think Lan Weiwen, the coastal defense acquaintance of Songjiang Prefecture, is good, he is in charge of coastal defense affairs and has frequent contact with foreigners!" A staff member next to him built yì Xu Naizhao.

But Huang Yidian on the side said: "The importance of Su Song Taidao is undoubted, and it not only needs to deal with foreigners, but also needs to be able to cooperate with Lord Lin. ”

"I think Xue Huan, the prefect of Songjiang, is good, he had a good relationship with Lord Lin when he was in Songjiang Mansion, and he will definitely be able to cooperate with Lord Lin to deal with various affairs after he arrives in Shanghai!"

Another staff member with a beard on the side, Shan Yoko, said: "You might as well directly let Qu Shengchao, the prefect of Huzhou, go to Shanghai, he and Lin Zhe cooperate better!" ”

"At the beginning, Yu Shengjun fought fiercely with the thief army in Huzhou, and Huzhou gave Yu Shengjun great support, otherwise Yu Shengjun would not have won easily!"

If Qu Shengchao heard this, he would probably faint directly, when did I take the initiative to cooperate with Lin Zhe? I've impeached him several times, okay!

Xu Naizhao listened to the words of these staff, and he was also a little hesitant in his heart!

It is not easy to arrange the position of Su Songtai's military preparation, he has to be able to deal with foreigners, and at the same time, he must also cooperate vigorously with Lin Zhe to do some of the aftermath work of Yu Shengjun.

What did he invite Lin Zhe to help defend Shanghai? But it was not just as simple as letting Lin Zhe's Yu Shengjun assist in the defense of Shanghai, but also hoped that after Yu Shengjun expanded his army, he would continue to garrison Suzhou and even Zhenjiang in the west, he had already heard the news that Xiang Rong had already asked the imperial court for reinforcements, and this reinforcement included Yu Shengjun in addition to other Qing troops.

Therefore, the possibility of Yu Shengjun's westward advance in the future is very large, once Yu Shengjun moves westward, this logistical support work will require the active cooperation of the local government, and if a person who does not deal with Lin Zhe goes to Shanghai, I am afraid that there will be trouble in vain.

As everyone spoke again, Huang Yidian on the side suddenly said, "Proprietor, I don't know if you have considered letting Lord Lin directly act as Su Song Taidao?" ”