¡°Railway is the lifeblood of a country. This is absolutely not nonsense.
When China was bullied by foreign enemies in later generations, the great powers were keen to build railways in China. This was not because they wanted to help you with construction or to contribute to you, but because they wanted to rely on railways and rely on railways as their lifeline to plunder China's wealth. and resources.
Its importance is self-evident.
The points mentioned by Liu Jin are just one of its most basic functions. In fact, the benefits that railways can bring to a region and country are countless. They can revitalize the entire country like blood vessels. all aspects.
¡°This is like a cement road, which facilitates transportation and facilitates the circulation of people and materials.¡±
Xie Qian thought for a while and then said.
"Yes, but the transportation capacity of trains is much greater than that of roads, but the cost is also higher. It requires the laying of special railways and tracks."
"The Beijing-Tianjin Railway alone cost tens of millions of taels of silver. It was almost built with silver."
Liu Jin nodded solemnly and said.
¡°The railway is so important and related to the lifeblood of the country.¡±
"So in terms of railway construction and operation, the court must achieve three points: unified standards, court operations, and a combination of public and private."
Then Liu Jin also put forward his three views on railways.
"Unified standards, court operations, and a combination of public and private affairs?"
When everyone heard this, they immediately began to think a little.
"What is a unified standard?"
Liu Jian thought for a while and asked.
¡°The so-called unified standards mean that from now on, all railways and trains built in our country must comply with unified specifications and requirements.¡±
"How wide is the track of this train, the construction structure, the structure of the train station, the system and standards for ticket sales, operation management, etc., all of which are unified."
"This is because if the standards of each railway are different, then there will be no way for different trains to run on different tracks, and there will be no way to achieve unified dispatching across the country."
"Actually, the simple understanding is that cars should be on the same track and books should be on the same page."
Liu Jin thought for a while and explained.
"That's it~"
As soon as everyone heard the explanation, they immediately understood and nodded accordingly.
This is easy to understand. If there is no unified standard and various regions and businesses build it randomly, then the Ming Dynasty's railways will not be able to achieve intermodal transportation, which will greatly affect railway operations.
"How do you understand the operation of the imperial court?"
Li Dongyang thought for a while and asked again.
"The railway is related to the national economy and people's livelihood, and is related to the lifeblood of the country."
"Such an important thing must naturally be in the hands of the imperial court, which will be responsible for overall planning and operation."
"This is one aspect. The other aspect is that there are differences between railways. For example, the Beijing-Tianjin Railway must be very busy. There are dozens of trains running every day without any problems."
"But when we build railways in Ming Dynasty, we must not only build railways in prosperous areas. In the future, we must build railways to remote areas. Railways in remote areas are more expensive to build, and at the same time have a small population and higher operating costs."
"This also means that building railways to remote areas does not actually make money, but the court cannot not build or operate them just because it does not make money."
¡°So this requires the imperial court to coordinate the operation and management of the railways. Even in remote areas and border areas, railways still need to be repaired and operated.¡±
¡°Because this is no longer about making money, but about the stability of the country¡¯s borders and promoting the development of remote areas.¡±
¡°The minister proposes to establish a special railway office under the Ministry of Industry to be responsible for coordinating the construction and operation of railways across the country.¡±
Liu Jin explained again.
In fact, this is easy to understand. The high-speed rails of later generations are all loss-making, but the country has always insisted on building high-speed rails and building them in poor areas. This itself is absolutely a loss-making thing, but it still needs to be done.
Because the existence of high-speed rail can promote the development of remote and backward areas, at the national level, many things cannot be measured by economics.
¡°But if the railway is privately owned and businessmen are pursuing profits, private enterprises will never engage in loss-making business and will never build railways in areas that have no value.
At this point, electricity, postal services, highways, etc. are also??, for every railway in the Ming Dynasty in the future, the imperial court will carry out planning, provide part of the funds, and then conduct a public listing on the Tianjin Stock Exchange to raise funds. In this way, it is a combination of public and private, and the imperial court is the major shareholder. Being able to get your own dividends from railway operations is a multi-purpose benefit. "
Liu Jin thought about it and came up with the idea of ??combining public and private matters.
Although the Ming Dynasty now has money, it is far from being comparable to that of later generations. One of the most important reasons is that the tax revenue of the Ming Dynasty is still very light compared to that of later generations. Even the commercial tax is very low. The second is that it has not mastered the printing of money. The money printing machine is in the hands of the First Bank of Ming Dynasty.
Therefore, there is no way to release water. The financial resources are naturally limited. It is impossible to use the power of the state to overhaul the railway like in later generations. We must rely on private capital and strength.
The real richest people in the Ming Dynasty are the gentry, landowners, businessmen, etc. of the Ming Dynasty, not the Ming Dynasty court. It has been okay in recent years. If before, the Ming Dynasty court was so poor that rats could starve to death in the treasury. (Remember the website address: www.hlnovel.com