No matter how turbulent the outside world is, in the midsummer of 1657, the depths of the grasslands on the east coast are still shrouded in a bustling construction: the railway is stretching hard on the endless grasslands, and in bitter Italy, German road construction workers used their flesh and blood to "sacrifice" the completion of this long steel dragon. The railway has been completed 291 kilometers so far, and the funds have been invested more than 38 million bank lira. More than a thousand workers have been killed and injured (including many Congolese slaves bought by Genoese from New Courland), and there are countless people who have fled. In short, this railway has become an absolute "blood road".

"The Genoese are now a little difficult to get off the tiger." Yang Wanglin, director of the State Railway Administration, stood in front of the newly built Xiping Fort (near the village of San Gregrio in the later generations), and said in an indescribable tone: "The railway has only been built for 291 kilometers, but the funds have been spent 38 million, which has exceeded their previous expectations. In addition, last year, the annual revenue of Grassland Railway Company was only 136,000 yuan. After the cost, the total profit of Grassland Iron in the past few years is only over 200,000 yuan, and it has to be half a dividend with us, which is far from enough to make up for the Genoese's capital investment. So they are hesitant about whether to continue investing. The money invested in the previous one may not be recovered. If you continue to invest, God knows how much money you will spend later. Genoese are really confused now."

"Director, the Genoese people are too efficient to build railways and the cost is too high." Chen Hao, the second generation of the second generation who was responsible for on-site technical support, said: "It took only 291 kilometers to be built in six years. Except for the 40 kilometers of Xianing section we had built before the start of construction, the average annual construction is only 41.8 kilometers, and the average cost per kilometer is 25,200 yuan, which is almost twice ours... It would be strange if the Genoese people built railways like this. I doubt they still have the courage to persevere."

"We must cheer them up and let them continue to persevere. Isn't it just money? At worst, we can increase the annual financial subsidy of 100,000 yuan, and the section opening prize, and the project completion prize will be appropriately distributed in advance. In short, let them persevere." Yang Wanglin smiled and walked on the railway station platform covered with stone slabs. Looking at the clear sky in the distance, he said: "Of course, the possibility of them persevere is very high. Not to mention anything else, the funds invested in the early stage are not a small amount, and it will not be a small amount if they are not recovered. After all, according to the agreement signed at the time, the prerequisite for activate the terms of our repurchase railway is that the railway will be fully opened to traffic. In that way, they can sell it to us at a price of 60 million lira, otherwise everything will be free. For the sake of these 60 million lira, the Genoese will grit their teeth to complete the railway."

Chen Hao nodded after hearing this, and then asked in a low voice: "Director, do you want to tell the Public Security Bureau to tighten the hole and stop letting the Italians on the construction site? The Germans escaped too hard? The Genoese have transported 20,000 20,000 workers from the Old Mainland to build railways over the years, and spent nearly 2 million bank liras for this. However, according to incomplete statistics, at least one-quarter of these people fled to the Wujiang area to open up the territory. The Genoese were very worried about this. Should we help them? First curb the speed of labor escape and let them finish the railway. Seeing that the railway was completely completed with more than 130 kilometers, there was such a big block in the middle. It was not a big deal."

The Southwest Railway has been built for five or six years. According to the previous speed of the Genoese, it will be at least three years to complete, and the total cost is likely to be 57 million lira. Even if they activate the repurchase clause and sell it to the East Coast government for 60 million lira, they will have almost no profit. Well, including the subsidies, rewards, railway profits and other things given by the East Coast in recent years, the annual income of the Genoese will not exceed 2.8% within nine years. Just now, they invested in domestic annuities and had two or three times the bond yield, which naturally cannot satisfy them.

"It should be like this." Yang Wanglin said in the first sentence. "It's not that they can't be cold. It was a pit for them to build this railway. Now, it's a good idea to give more subsidies so that they won't lose so ugly. Although the total cost of this railway is a bit high, the problem is that we didn't have the ability to complete the railway at that time. Isn't it just to spend some money? What's wrong with money is not a problem! What's more, the workers transported by the Genoa people will be ours in the future. It's not a loss to buy out some of the contracts of some of the workers we spent money at that time."

To be honest, the average construction cost of 25,000 yuan per kilometer of the Southwest Railway is relatively high, almost twice that of the East Coast people themselves. However, considering that a considerable part of this money has been returned to the East Coast people through the purchase of cement, bricks, rails, wood, stone, fuel, food and other channels, this cost should be reduced by a large part; if you count the old mainland workers transported by the Genoese people in every way, these people can create wealth for the East Coast many years in the future, not to mention that in order to transport these workers, they also ordered a considerable number of ships in the three major shipyards of the East Coast, which is also an income.

Therefore, the construction cost of the Southwest Railway is not as high as expected, and can be completely reduced to 16,000-18,000 yuan per kilometer. Considering that this is a shortage of road construction workers on the east coast (his own road construction army is building a double line between the Northwest Railway and the Qingmei Railway), and it is unable to start construction at the same time, which is even more precious. Not to mention, with the agreement between the East Coast and Spain on the "loan for land" (commonly known as) , the East Coast and the East Coast were exported to a large amount of grain on the old continent, while many towns along the Southwest Railway were originally developed from pioneering farms, with huge grain output. The railway construction naturally allowed these originally deep inland grasslands to be transported to the port cheaply by train, which was of great economic significance.

"In July this year, the latest statistics from the Ministry of Immigration showed that the total population of the country has reached 729,000, and it is growing rapidly." Yang Wanglin looked at a team of railway workers in front of him who were repairing railway tracks and said: "A considerable part of them will be divided into pioneering along the Southwest Railway, with about 15,000 people. New and old settlements will be divided into some. The Executive Committee is determined to develop the food, fruits, vegetables and vegetables here. In fact, there is no way. Our industrial scale is not large enough, and the employment population is limited. With so many new populations every year, what can we do if we don't go to farm..."

Speaking of the eastern section of the Southwest Railway, there are currently two county-level administrative units, namely Taoyuan County (10,849 people) with five townships and Minghe County (10,806 people) with four townships. One of the two poor agricultural counties had only 70,000 yuan in fiscal revenue (referring to taxes attributable to county-level governments) in 1655, and the other was only 60,000 yuan, which could hardly do anything. After the county government paid the entire county employees' salary, the remaining money was enough to do health and epidemic prevention, disease control publicity and other things in the county, and it was impossible to promote primary education across the county. The degree of financial embarrassment was really terrible.

However, with the prevalence of grain export trade in the past two years, the fiscal revenue of the two counties has grown rapidly, maintaining a 20% increase almost every year, which has made the county officials feel a little relieved. As grain exports have increased, the operating income of the Southwest Railway naturally also rises with a rise. Although it is not enough to say how many years of recovery costs, at least the annual maintenance costs and employee salaries have been earned. The extra profits can also be put up some telephone poles along the railway and build several telegraph rooms to prepare for the comprehensive deployment of some telegraphs in the future (of course, this will not be implemented after "driving away" the Genoese).

Since the railway has been built, it is naturally a great waste to abandon it. At least compared to setting up new settlements in the hilly areas of the Yazi Lake Basin in the north, the cost of resettling population along the southwest railway is greatly reduced and the speed is greatly accelerated, because they transport construction materials and personnel at low cost and high efficiency. Especially for the former, when the entire train brings a large amount of cement, lime, bricks, wood and other building materials, the construction of a new settlement will become much easier.

Now, the Executive Committee has ordered another county to be established in the west of Minghe County. In addition to Xiping Fort, there are several new settlements around it, namely Guangling Fort near Trinidad City, located in the southeast of Guangling Fort, Dahua Township near the town of Great Sarandi in later generations, Dalong Township near the village of Ismail Cordinas, and Dade Township near the city of San Jose Demayo in later generations. At present, the total of five settlements is only 6,000 or 7,000 people, and there is no output. However, I believe that under the leadership of the Southwest Railway, the area connecting Caijiazhai Township in the west and Shengli Township in Minghe County in the west will soon develop and become another important agricultural county.
Chapter completed!