Dragon, choose cultural victory to make money

Chapter 257: Waterdeep City is full of vitality and everything is flourishing

"Industrial zone, oh, yes, yes, industrial zone." The elderly planner wiped the sweat from his forehead. He really didn't know much about industrial matters. When he entered the industry, industry was not that important.

"I placed the industrial zone on the outskirts of the city, downwind, because industry will inevitably make the air very bad, so it must be far away from the main urban area. So I arranged it in the port area for centralized management and convenient transportation of resources."

The old man looked a little nervous, even though he had been in this business for forty years and had never received such a strange request to plan the present based on his expectations for hundreds of years to come.

Moreover, there are not many humans, whether it is the planned future local residents or the engineering team that has arrived so far.

I am an old man, and I am afraid that I will die here because I failed to design the city well.

"Don't be nervous," Drogo said, "Now we just need to each present our plans and discuss them together. It doesn't matter if they don't fit."

Drogo tried his best to make the atmosphere more relaxed. After arriving here, the human members of the team seemed to have fallen into serious paranoia.

"I think your design is very good, but the problem of vehicles cannot be solved. Suppose the nine neighboring communities are combined into a large block, with vehicles banned from passing through the middle to reserve space for people to walk. The roads in the large block can be widened, and express lanes can be set up in several large functional areas. This can alleviate the problem."

Drogo himself quite likes the grid design, which divides the space into small communities and preserves living space for people.

At least there won’t be a community full of super-high-rise buildings, crammed with tens or even hundreds of thousands of people.

Every day when I get home from work, I take one look at my residence and feel like it’s the home of my life.

Planning cities around vehicle traffic was the mainstream approach for a long time, but as development progressed, it was discovered that such a structure was not comfortable to live in.

"Oh, is that so? I thought the use of cars would be similar to that of horse-drawn carriages."

The old man couldn't quite understand the future that Drogo described as one filled with cars. Even horse-drawn carriages weren't that popular yet, so how could more expensive machines be everywhere on the streets?

"Well, can I ask you something," another planner asked, "if cars are really that important, how common will they be? For example, how many people will have one on average?"

"Well, in the next few decades, the number should develop to one car for every dozen people. In a hundred years, I'm afraid that on average every family will have a car. By that time, raising horses should be much more expensive than buying a car." Drogo thought for a moment and answered.

The second planner did a quick calculation in his notebook and said, "Although I don't quite believe in a future where every family has a car."

"The average household has a car," Drogo corrected.

As we all know, the word average sounds misleading, as if everyone is almost the same.

But most of the time, the average is much better than the majority.

"Well, on average, with that kind of vehicle density, no matter how wide the roads are, the city will be very congested, IMHO."

Drogo nodded. He knew that.

Traffic jams? Every big city has them. When it’s serious, driving is not as fast as walking.

"So I also planned public transportation. I mentioned in the plan I gave you that the railways running in the city will stop at fixed stations, and there are also public transportation buses, and the density of stations is higher than that of railways."

Drogo found the subway model from the sand table.

Several trains are running in an orderly manner on the network consisting of several subway lines.

It is a proper subway model, not a character model running on the shell of a train.

"You can transfer at the intersecting stations, and passengers are charged according to the number of stations they have taken."

How to solve the problem of traffic congestion?
The best way is to get people out of driving and provide more alternative and convenient transportation options.

“I like the idea of ​​public transportation,” the planner said, “but I think it could be more varied.”

As he spoke, he found a model that looked like a ship, but without sails, it had wings installed on both sides that looked very much like dragon wings and were attached with magic.

"Is this a, spaceship?"

"Yes, it was designed by me and my brother. We used magic to assist and fan the air to achieve the effect of making the boat fly."

"Wait," Drogo suddenly became curious, "Isn't your major city planning?"

"It's just a hobby," the planner shrugged. "I've loved inventing things since I was a kid. As for building a city, it's just a job." His tone revealed a strong resentment towards his job.

"Is there a real spacecraft like this? Or is it just a blueprint?"

"There is no physical product at the moment, but we brothers are very confident that we can manufacture it. We only need a little bit of funding, not too much. Each takeoff distance is 50 kilometers, and it can carry at least 200 passengers. It is a perfect public transportation vehicle."

The planner worked hard to sell his design.

Zhuo Ge couldn't help but look at him more. "Your main goal in applying for this job is to get investment for your invention?"

"Well, one thing doesn't necessarily have only one goal." The planner scratched his head awkwardly.

"I, Drogo, have invested in your project!"

Drogo swung his great claw.

“But we need to move the lab here.”

Drogo never missed an opportunity to increase the population of Waterdeep.

"Of course!" The young planner and inventor nodded excitedly. "I have another idea that can also be used to improve transportation. It's a short-distance portal. Compared with traditional teleportation spells, although the distance is very short, the expected limit will not exceed five kilometers, but the magic power consumed within five kilometers is only one-tenth of that of teleportation."

“I voted too.”

Dragons become inflated when they have money.

"But there is a problem with this design," the planner added, "It requires a continuous and stable supply of mana. If we want to deploy it on a large scale, it will be very difficult."

"What a coincidence!"

Drogo clapped his claws. "It is also my plan to set up lines throughout the city to supply a stable supply of magic power."

Over the next few hours, the ideas of the planners were integrated.

The final plan was to use the design of an elderly planner as the main body, emphasize public transportation, set up industrial areas outside the city, and mix residential areas, commercial areas, tourist areas, cultural areas and other functional areas within the city with a mixed distribution and the establishment of multiple central areas.

If a city has only a few central areas and most people go to the same place for work, no matter how many public transportation solutions are designed, it will not help.

The rush hour makes every poor worker understand what congestion means in a new way.

It was already evening when the urban design plan was finalized.

Although it is planned to schedule construction shifts at night in order to build the city faster, there are currently insufficient lighting conditions. Except for Zhuo Er, other construction workers cannot work in the dark, so for the time being, all night is rest time.

"Gather all the members of the engineering team and all the villagers in the village," Drogo ordered. "We will show them a magic show tonight and provide them with a free dinner. But before the fun begins, I have something to say."

Drogo has to think of a way to find the first batch of citizens, human citizens, for Waterdeep.

Otherwise, when a large number of inferior demons, tieflings, and higher-level devils arrive in the future, it will be difficult to attract human immigrants. It is best to make the population structure a multi-racial mixed state at the beginning of the city's establishment.

It is usually quite difficult for newly established cities, or even cities that have not yet been built, to attract immigrants.

What kind of city can attract enough population?

What a bustling city!

So how can a city become prosperous?

There must be enough population first!

The household registration in Deepwater City is not attractive. There will not be countless people flocking to it just because they give away household registration as a gift for settling down there.

But Drogo had a plan of his own.

He has already bought the nearby land, and the purchased areas in the Kingdom of Sutton have a high degree of autonomy.

As long as it did not violate the kingdom's supreme law, landowners could enforce whatever laws they wanted locally.

It is for this reason that many rather abstract laws were born in the territories of many nobles.

However, laws that are too evil will drive away residents of the territory.

Therefore, most of the strange laws that have appeared in history will be revised after the rulers discover that the person has escaped.

The invisible big hand!
Based on the same principle, Drogo can also formulate policies to attract people who have fled from other territories to settle down.

Before that, the goal is to get the Tieflings working on the construction, as well as the villagers from all nearby villages, to choose to stay here.

Soon, all the people and the non-humans were gathered together in an open space.

The number is not large, only more than 300 in total.

Everybody seemed very excited, especially the local villagers, most of whom had never seen the magic movie, not to mention that there was dinner to be had.

As for what the boss of the Drogo Group and owner of this land would say before the entertainment, people didn't care too much.

Most likely they are newly arrived nobles who want to emphasize their authority here. There is nothing nice to hear.

Drogo walked to the front of the clearing, where a makeshift platform had been set up, complete with microphones and speakers.

He cleared his throat and said, "Good evening. I am Drogo, the current owner of this land. Before the magic shadow is shown, I want to announce some new rules. I hope that you can stay here in the future and become a part of Waterdeep."

As soon as these words were spoken, the people in the audience fell into chaos.

They feared that Drogo would force them to stay, to sign a magical contract, to become citizens in name only but slaves in reality.

It's no wonder they think this way, as there are indeed nobles who have done such things.

"I will not force you to stay here, the choice is yours, but for those who want to stay here, I can give the following conditions.

"First, for every participant in the construction of this city, all your contributions will be recorded, and eventually, based on the accumulated total, housing and suitable jobs can be allocated in this city."

The first point to attract population is the short-term benefits.

People who build houses can live in the houses they build. This will definitely not happen in Twin Towers City.

"Secondly, Waterdeep will provide free education. Any child born here, or whose parents live here, can receive general education during childhood and, after passing a test, be promoted to a higher level, free vocational or academic school. I hope this will be a city without illiteracy."

Hearing this, the crowd began to get a little agitated.

Literacy and knowledge are rare things in this era.

Even in cities, the percentage of people who can read and write does not exceed 30%. In villages in remote areas, it is very common to find that less than one in the entire village can read and write.

It’s not that they don’t want to learn. Everyone knows that knowledge means better job opportunities and a better life.

But there is no opportunity to learn.

For an average working class family with several children, it is already very difficult to save money and send one of them to school.

In fact, Drogo's goal is to improve basic education to the level where everyone understands magic. Although most people cannot cast magic, it does not affect their participation in magic-related work. Especially after the birth of the spell language, it will definitely affect all aspects of life.

However, if you say this, it will be regarded as a fantasy and no one will really believe it.

Seeing that the people at the scene had begun to waver, Drogo stated his final and most direct condition.

Spend a lot of money.

"Anyone who chooses to settle here and other races will receive a settlement subsidy of ten silver coins. If you come here with your whole family, you can get an additional ten silver coins. In addition, you can invite people to settle here. For each person you invite, you will receive a five silver coin reward. Of course, you need to sign a contract to settle here. If you move out within a year, the subsidy will be taken back."

After Drogo finished speaking, the audience had not yet reacted and were not sure whether what he said was true.

At this time, someone needs to set an example.

A man stood out from the confused crowd. Of course, it was arranged by Drogo.

He asked loudly, "Can I sign the contract now?"

"of course can."

“I can’t write my own name.”

"You can also press your fingerprints."

Then, under the gaze of three hundred pairs of eyes, he came to the stage, put his fingerprint on the contract, and then received ten silver coins.

In order to let people see more clearly, he also demonstrated that his hand slipped and a pile of silver coins fell to the ground, rolling to the feet of the villagers in the front row, and then he picked them up one by one.

The villagers could see clearly that they were indeed white silver coins.

They did a simple calculation in their minds. In this poor little fishing village, the annual income would be at most ten silver coins if they were lucky, but most years they would not even earn that much.

Even if Waterdeep City cannot be built, they will get a year's income for free. It's just like staying with a group of tieflings. What's the big deal? They can just endure it.

As a result, many villagers stood up and put their fingerprints on the contract.

Some people with more quick minds didn't even plan to watch the magic shadow that would appear later. They planned to rush to other villages overnight, bring those people with them, and earn a per-person fee of five silver coins.

There aren't many people nearby, so if we bring one less person here, it will be one less person.

In this way, Deepwater City, which would be called the City of Miracles in the future, started its rise in a way that was almost like a pyramid scheme.

(End of this chapter)