I want to be emperor

Chapter 843 Suburbs
Wang Liqing's carriage stopped and stopped on the road, and it was better when it encountered a straight road without intersections. Although there were many cars, it could still guarantee a certain speed.

But if you encounter an intersection, you will have to wait for a long time.

However, although it is not fast to take turns crossing the intersection under the command of the traffic patrol, it is still much faster than when there was no relevant traffic law more than ten years ago.

Wang Liqing still remembers that in Songjiang City more than ten years ago, there were not as many horse-drawn carriages as there are now, but the traffic situation was even worse. The main reason was that there were no perfect traffic laws at the time, and there were no traffic patrol police at the intersections, so pedestrians and horse-drawn carriages were crowded at the intersections , No one will let anyone else, it is simply impossible to pass.

It was precisely because of the traffic conditions in Songjiang City back then, especially the serious traffic problems at the intersections, that finally led to the Songjiang Prefecture first promulgating local traffic rules. A traffic law.

Well, it’s not the kind of etiquette in ancient times, it all depends on people’s conscious ritual orders, but a very serious formal law, the kind that violates it and you will be jailed...

The law stipulates that horse-drawn carriages must be registered, especially public carriages used as public transportation and rental horse-drawn carriages must be registered for business, and the groom who drives the carriage must pass a professional examination and obtain a public carriage driving license before he is allowed to drive a public carriage. carriage.

At the same time, it is required that all horse-drawn carriage companies engaged in commercial operations, whether they are freight or passenger transport enterprises, can only hire drivers with a horse-drawn carriage driving license to drive horse-drawn carriages, and later extended to any organization’s own use or operation of horse-drawn carriages, the driver must have a license .

As for private ones... I can't control that much for a while. After all, in many rural areas, farmers just hitch a car and go on the road. You can't control it if you want.

But later on, when those wealthy families hired professional coachmen for their own private carriages, they also required the coachman to have a driver's license. For example, Wang Liqing's coachman had a public carriage driver's license issued by the official transportation agency.

When the carriage travels, or when the horse travels, the driver or rider must be by the side of the carriage at all times, control and appease the carriage at any time, to avoid possible frightening of the horse, and when the driver or rider leaves the horse, the horse must be firmly fixed with the rein, Horses cannot be allowed to walk around freely.

At the same time, for commercially operated horse-drawn carriages, the operating organization is required to purchase insurance to cover compensation for third parties and passengers in possible accidents.

These days, carriages can overturn, and carriages can kill people...

On the one hand, it regulates the management of carriages, and on the other hand, it formulates perfect road driving rules, clearly stipulating that people should drive on the right, and before overtaking, they must ring the bell in advance to advance the carriage ahead, and can only overtake from the left.

When driving at night, the carriage must be lit... not to let you see the road clearly, but so that the carriages and horses in the distance can see you in time... so that they don't directly hit you.

When passing through the intersection, if there is no traffic patrol command, you must turn and let go straight. When both parties go straight through the intersection, give way to the right.

Coupled with many other regulations, it constitutes the first special traffic law in the Great Chu Empire, which regulates the driving of horses (including other animals) and carriages (animal-drawn carts), and improves the safety of public transportation.

Of course, the most intuitive feeling is that the situation at the previously chaotic and crowded intersections has improved. When horses, carriages, and pedestrians are at the intersection, they will pass according to the traffic rules, and in the busy traffic section, the patrol agency will also set up The traffic command and patrol police directly conduct on-site command.

So don't look at the fact that Wang Liqing has to stop and go in the carriage now, especially when passing the intersection, sometimes he even has to wait for several rounds of traffic patrol signals before he can pass smoothly.

But this is already very rare, and it has completely improved compared with more than ten years ago.

If it was changed to the mess of more than ten years ago, relying on people's self-conscious courtesy, with the massive number of horse-drawn carriages in Songjiang City today, the entire Songjiang City can be completely blocked directly.

It’s just that it’s not easy to solve it completely. After all, Songjiang has too many people and is too dense, and the contemporary construction technology is limited. There are no high-rise residential buildings. More dependent on horse-drawn carriages.

In this regard, the opinions of many transportation experts gathered in Songjiang Prefecture are: to further enhance the capacity of public transportation!
In addition to continuing to increase the operating mileage and quantity of rail carriages, it is also planning to build urban trains.

Compared with ordinary public carriages, rail carriages can carry more capacity per horse.

For example, an ordinary four-wheeled carriage pulled by two horses generally carries about 16 to 20 passengers. A few routes with busy operations may use some large public carriages with a capacity of about 30 passengers, but the road requirements are very high. At the same time, because the horses are too burdened, they need to change horses after running for a long time.

As for why a large carriage with four horses is not used, it is because if four horses are used, it will be more difficult to control when there are more horses... In fact, it is difficult to apply it on a large scale in cities with more complicated traffic environments, and there are too many uncontrollable risk factors. If it is not good, there will be an accident.

Therefore, whether it is a public carriage or a truck in the city, they are actually two horses, and there are very few four horses. There are also some two-wheeled carriages, and most of them are single horses.

For example, many two-wheeled carriages are all single-horse, and the most typical one is the "An's Taxi Carriage" produced by Huating An's Carriage Manufacturing Company. Although it is just a two-wheeled carriage, it is actually a serious one. It is a technical product with light weight and very good performance. After the passengers and the driver get on the car, the force points of the vehicle are basically on the wheels, and the horses are lightly stressed, so they can run more easily.

The driver of this kind of carriage does not drive at the front, but behind the passenger seat... This is not to say that the performance of the carriage is higher. It's not fast, it's basically walking on horses, and the passengers just jumped out of the car to escape the fare, and your coachman doesn't even know it...

So when you see a coachman driving at the rear of a carriage, this kind of carriage is basically a rented carriage. The purpose of the coachman behind is to keep the passengers in his sight...to prevent passengers from jumping out of the carriage and escaping the fare.

Well, although the Great Chu Empire is the most powerful country, and there are many people who claim to be decent, not all of them are decent people.

Today, this An's carriage-style rental carriage almost occupies the vast majority of the rental carriages in Songjiang City and other cities.

Of course, there are also some two-horse four-wheeled carriages for rent, but the fare of these things is more expensive, and most people can’t afford them. This kind of two-horse four-wheeled carriages usually travels with multiple passengers, but there are more people with It is used by rich people when they travel.

For ordinary middle-class people, it takes a long time to do it once!
For rental carriages in cities, public carriages generally have one or two horses, and private carriages are actually similar, and four-horse carriages are relatively rare.

They run the suburban route, and some long-distance public carriages or trucks use more four horses... This is because there are no asphalt or cement roads in the suburbs or intercity roads, and they are often gravel roads and cinder roads. Some are even dirt roads.

There are fewer horses, and it is too difficult to pull them up, and they can't run very far, so four horses are more common.

Ordinary four-wheeled public carriages with two horses do not carry many passengers, and there are other problems in simply increasing the passenger capacity.

At this time, someone proposed to simply imitate the early horse-drawn rail vehicles and build a rail carriage.

Rail carriages are no strangers in the Great Chu Empire. The predecessor of the train is actually a rail carriage. In the early years, it was very common in docks, ports, mining areas and other places with huge cargo transportation needs.

However, it has not been tried much before to carry passengers in cities.

As for the senior officials in Songjiang City, they were already troubled to death by the messy traffic situation, so after hearing about this kind of urban rail carriage, they were moved to prepare for it.

After trying to open a rail carriage route a few years ago, I found it to be pretty good.

Because of the existence of the track, the friction force of the wheels of the carriage is smaller, which means that the transportation volume of a single horse can be made larger.

As a result, rail carriages carrying about 40 passengers began to appear in some busy sections of Songjiang.

The rail carriage has at least twice the transportation capacity of ordinary stage carriages, and its safety has been greatly improved. The accident rate is only a dozen percent of ordinary carriages, and the most important thing is that it is faster... It can reach about ten kilometers Operating speed!
Ordinary public carriages these days actually operate at a speed of only a few kilometers per hour, which is very slow!
And the rail carriage, because the horses have a lighter burden, so the operating distance of the route can be longer... Otherwise, it can only be the same as those large public carriages before, and the horses will be changed after walking for a short distance, which will affect the operating efficiency.

Other public carriage companies also have to consider cost and operational efficiency.

Of course, the cost of rail carriages is also higher. After all, steel rails need to be laid on the streets... This has also led to the fact that the price of rail carriages in Songjiang City is higher than that of ordinary carriages... For the same distance, public carriages cost six cents In terms of money, the rail carriage will cost ten cents.

The price comparison between the two is about 60.00%.

But even so, some middle-income people prefer to take a rail carriage when traveling, because it is faster, safer, and more comfortable.

The difference between ordinary public carriages and rail carriages these days is probably the difference between green leather trains and high-speed rails in later generations.

However, even if many middle-class people want to take a horse-drawn carriage, they can't take it... Because the investment in this thing is relatively large, the Songjiang Public Horse-drawn Carriage Company will not be able to open it in all places for a while, and it has to be opened step by step.

Moreover, the investment of rail carriages is large, and the operating costs are also higher, so some areas with little traffic will not be opened.

Anyway, there are public carriages, and they are cheaper, and the public carriages are also owned by other people's public carriage companies... But there is no need to engage in vicious competition with yourself.

Although there are a lot of people in Xicheng District, and there are often traffic jams, the overall population density is still not as good as that of other urban districts.

Now that Songjiang City is in place, the most congested area is Beicheng District, which is the city north of Suzhou Creek. The planning and construction was relatively early, and many roads are not too big.

This road is small, and there are many cars and people, which has caused the traffic problem in Beicheng District.

Relatively speaking, Xicheng District has a later development time and a relatively small population. Although there are factories, they are far less exaggerated than Beicheng District, and there are not as many as Nancheng District. The economy is relatively backward, but the traffic jam is not so serious.

At the same time, the overall air quality is actually a little better, which also attracts many wealthy people like Wang Liqing, who live in the suburbs of Xicheng District...

As for the real city center, especially the area in the northern city... they wouldn't live there even if they were killed.

And people in the future may especially like the view of the Huangpu River... These days, the rich and powerful in Chu state don't like to live by the river, otherwise when you open your eyes, you can see the smoke from the chimneys of countless ships flying towards you come over!

Because of the highly developed economy of Songjiang City, the Huangpu River is also the busiest waterway in the Great Chu Empire. There are ships smoking soot all the time, and there are many steam ships on some docks on the shore, and the steam ships After starting, it is often necessary to pressurize before sailing, which means that many steam ships smoke on the pier after starting... Some large ships smoke in situ for several hours before they can raise the pressure of water vapor , and finally sailed away slowly.

Not to mention the smog from the ships, and there are a lot of factories along the river. When the development was carried out in the early years, in order to facilitate the transportation of goods, the early enterprises were basically built along the river, and these were often large factories, using many and large power steam engines. !
The densely packed factories by the river are billowing with thick smoke all day and night!

So the surface of the river in other people's homes is foggy, and it looks like a Jiangnan water town.

But the river surface of Songjiang is smoky... Not to mention, it is actually quite beautiful just by looking at it, and you can often enjoy the feeling of being in the sea of ​​fog!

Therefore, in some windless seasons, there will be frequent fog in Songjiang City, especially along the riverside in the city center where factories are dense.

And in the windy season, if the river wind is in the wrong direction, it will blow the billowing smoke directly to your home.

Such a place, not to mention rich people like Wang Liqing, even ordinary high-income groups would not want to live in it.

Therefore, in the riverside area of ​​the city center, or some other urban centers, which are very good in the eyes of later generations, in the Great Chu Empire these days, there are not many rich people living there, but ordinary citizens... and not cheap.

In the past ten years or so, apartment-style housing has also emerged in Songjiang City. These apartments are generally four stories high, and they are basically small and medium-sized units, such as small two-bedrooms and one-bedrooms.

Well, this kind of apartment is generally a welfare building, and it cannot be sold. After the special approval of the government, a specific charity company buys the land and builds the apartment according to the standard, and then it can only be used for rent, and the profit is promised not to exceed 5.00 %... These apartment building and operating companies are often specially approved by the government, led by the government, and invested by charitable funds donated by some companies and rich people.

Because this thing is mainly used to alleviate the shortage of land in urban areas, the housing difficulties of low- and middle-income groups, and to solve the problem of poor kilns that have emerged in cities.

To some extent, this is the first housing welfare measure tried in the Great Chu Empire, but it is a commercial operation with limited profits.

It is worth mentioning that although these apartments are not cheap, they are often occupied by migrant workers, such as Sun Xu...

As for the real rich, even ordinary high-income groups, or even middle-class families who start a family, would not live in this kind of place if they had the conditions. They lived in the suburbs.

They often choose some communities in the suburbs that are closer to the city, and live in some multi-storey apartments with better environment and larger area, or simply some small buildings in a row, where they live better and work closer... ...This kind of house is also the most expensive unit price in Songjiang City.

As for the richer ones, it is naturally a single-family compound in the suburbs with a higher environment, or even a mansion manor...

This is also the special distribution of real estate prices in Songjiang City, a special big city, that is, the real estate prices in the city center seem to be much more expensive than those in other cities...but the middle-class houses in the suburbs of Songjiang are more expensive!

In the outer suburbs far away from the city, the land price is cheaper, but it is also far away from the city center. This ordinary middle class does not have a private carriage, and it is difficult to solve the daily commuting to work... So these outer suburbs that seem to have cheap land, the ordinary middle class They can't afford it either!

These suburbs are often the first choice of rich people like Wang Liqing... After all, rich people generally have private carriages, so they don't have to worry about travel problems. Even if the roads along the way are not good, they can even build asphalt roads in the community by themselves, or simply donate Give the place money to build roads.

This kind of suburban community far away from the city is the real top-level community in Songjiang City, and it is full of manors and mansions!

Well, this is what Wang Liqing lives in!
Don't ask, it's his wife who bought it!

(End of this chapter)