The northwest railway was still relatively cold in early spring, but Yang Wanglin, who replaced the old superior who retired from illness, temporarily presided over the work of the State Railway Administration and the director of the Technical Department, was in a hot heart. Now, he had just been in charge of work for less than a week and took a train from Dongfang County to go north through the Milin Lake-Yihe River system. After getting off the ship at Xiayihe Town, he took a 10 carriages to pull from the newly developed "Barbaric-6A-change" steam locomotive by the Southern Vehicle Factory, and ran all the way to the Canyon Fort, Baiqiya Fort, Merlot Fort and other places along the railway.

After a walk around these places, Yang Wanglin took a train back to Xiayihe Town, and then took a ferry to cross the river to the south bank. The castle of Xiayihe Town was originally built in the north, but with the gradual development of the southern bank of the Yihe River, the mayor of the town, Qin Yu, began to set up several agricultural production teams on the other side of the river after obtaining approval from the Government Council, and gradually expanded the jurisdiction of Xiayihe Town to the north and south banks of the Yihe River.

Next to the original ferry on the south bank, there are now a lot of people and noisy. A large group of Crandi people arrested from the La Plata area on false charges, the Guarani people were transported here by boat by police from the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Then the poor people with shackles on their feet wore thin clothes and heavy tools, and began to build large cargo yards and stations here - this was prepared to build railways from Xiayihe Town to Ningjin Fort, Dahuang Farm and Shu Farm in the south.

This railway was promised by the Executive Committee for investors who are willing to go to the Western Dahuang to clear and farm. After all, if the transportation problem cannot be solved, the attractiveness of the Western Dahuang area will be greatly reduced. The reason is very simple: if the harvested grain cannot be transported or the transportation cost is too high, growing grain there will be more than worth the cost.

Therefore, when planning there, the Executive Committee publicly promised to build a railway for investors as soon as possible - that is, before the end of July 1649, the railway of about 40 kilometers between Xiayihe Town and Ningjin Fort was first built, and then gradually extended to the Western Wilderness area.

However, unlike other railways ordered by the Executive Committee, the short 40-kilometer line from Xiayihe Town to Ningjinbao adopts a public-private joint venture. To be precise, the funds for the construction of this railway will be jointly raised by the State Railway Administration and private investors. After the construction is completed, the railway management rights will be controlled by the State Railway Administration, but the profit dividends generated will be public and private four, namely, the Railway Administration accounts for 60% and private investors share the remaining 40%. After 50 years of continuous operation, the Railway Administration will no longer distribute dividends to private investors. In the future, all rights and interests generated by the railway will be exclusively owned by the Railway Administration.

To be honest, the State Administration of Railways, which the state is supporting, is not unable to make this money to build railways now. However, considering that domestic inflation is already quite serious, if the State Administration of Railways invests separately to build a new railway, it means that the state further invests a large amount of currency into the market, which will inevitably increase the degree of inflation in the domestic market. This is obviously not what a responsible government should do. Therefore, after a while of consideration, the Executive Committee finally agreed to the proposal of the State Administration of Railways, that is, to absorb a large amount of capital accumulated in private and enter the lucrative railway industry, locking these funds, which may be more than 100,000 yuan, in an investment with a long return period, to eliminate domestic excess capital and reduce inflation pressure.

Speaking of the current railway in China after several years of development, its prospects have been recognized by the public. As of October 10, 1648, the total national railway mileage of the East Coast Republic of China had exceeded 300 kilometers, reaching a new historical length of 308 kilometers.

Among them, there are even 180 kilometers of railways that are double-tracks, and this is the famous first railway on the east coast: the Luomei Line (from Luoqia Port to Meilin Port). The initial construction of this railway was to resolve the possible maritime blockade by the enemy, so as to ensure that after the offshore offshore of the east coast is blocked, the industrial center at the northern end of the Yazihu ​​Lake and the southern grassland area can still communicate through the inland river system and railways.

In other words, the railway was originally built only for reasons of national security, and domestic parties did not expect it much. However, nearly three years after the railway was officially in operation, the benefits generated by the railway have begun to attract the attention of all parties.

When the Luomei Line first started operating on New Year's Day in 1646, the railway was once plagued by problems such as immature technology, lack of professional technicians, frequent locomotive failures, and was in a lot of situations. Even though the domestic transportation capacity was tight at that time, the State Administration of Railways sent personnel to check the accounts at the end of that year and found that the Luomei Line still failed to make a profit throughout the year, with a loss of about 30,000 yuan. The reason is that the extremely high operating expenses (the railway has oversupplied several times the workers and technicians as a future talent reserve) and the high maintenance costs are the culprits. Of course, there are also some other miscellaneous expenses, such as bank loan interest, local government fees, etc., but they are not mainstream and account for a very small proportion.

However, after a year of operation and the Southern Vehicle Factory also vigorously improved the quality of steam locomotives, in 1647, the Luomei Line Railway finally turned losses into profits, with an annual profit of 3,528 yuan. During this year, the State Railway Administration, which was extremely tight due to the war, revised the train schedule of the Luomei Line many times throughout the year, and the departure frequency gradually increased from every three days at the beginning, and finally reached the frequency of two trains per day by the end of the year.

A large amount of leather, animal fat, livestock, salted fish, wood, cotton, oil, building materials and other materials from the south are transported to Meilin Port by railway, and then transported to the northern or western inland areas; while wheat, steel, coal, chemicals, machinery products, textiles, and military products in the Yazi Lake Basin are also transported to the south through canal-rail transportation, which effectively supplements the shortage of offshore transportation forces and allows the industrial and agricultural system on the east coast to continue to operate well.

At the end of 1647, the Southern Vehicle Factory located in Meilin County once again made a certain degree of technological breakthrough in steam locomotives, which caused the railway maintenance cost to be reduced sharply, and also triggered a profit frenzy of railway transportation in 1648. As of today (October 10, 1648), the Luomei Line had already made more than 22,000 yuan in the first nine months, and the annual profit was expected to reach more than 28,000 yuan.

The State Administration of Railways announced as early as the beginning of the year that, except for the intercepting part of the profits of the Luomei Line as planned for other purposes, the remaining profits will be allocated to shareholders: the State Administration of Railways and the Ministry of Transportation. It is estimated that the dividend per share distributed by the Luomei Line Railway will reach 2% that year. This data seems not high, but investors are indeed seeing extremely bright prospects, because next year, the number of trains on the Luomei Line will further increase, and the departure interval will be greatly shortened. At the same time, the huge training costs of workers and technicians have reached the peak. In addition, the continuous advancement of locomotive and railway technology, according to insiders, the dividend per share of the Luomei Line Railway may reach 6%-8% next year, which is very investment prospects.

It’s a pity that the equity of this golden railway line is in the hands of the state. Although private capital is salivating about it, there is no way to do it - because the financial situation of the Luomei Line Railway is quite good and there is no intention to sell shares. In this case, these private capitals can only turn their attention to the newly built railway. At the beginning, they almost rushed to the Northwest Railway, which is being built, but the government has no intention of selling equity in various sections of the Northwest Railway or publicly offering to build railways, so they can only return in a bad mood.

However, the Executive Committee and the State Council did not fail to give them any chance after all. For example, the 40-kilometer section of Xianing section of the Southwest Railway (Xiayihe Town - Ningjin Fort) was prepared for them. The Xidahuang area is currently the only large-scale farm planting area in China with the support of the Executive Committee. In addition, the Executive Committee also plans to build new settlements in Dahuang Farm and Shu Farm at the end of this year and early next year in order to vigorously develop state-owned farms.

It can be seen that the development prospects here are quite good, and in this way, the profit prospects of the railway can be expected: the massive tools, building materials, grain supplies, machines, livestock, personnel, etc. required for early development can be continuously transported through the railway; and after the development is completed, a large amount of grain, wool, leather, animal fat and other products produced will also be continuously transported and exported through the railway, and the profit space here is still quite large. If the operation is done well, an annual return on investment of 8%-10% will not be a problem. Even after the railway operation is mature, the annual dividend will be further increased, and a 15% dividend will not be just an unattainable dream.

At this time, the preliminary roadbed construction work of Xianing section railway has been underway for a long time. The large-scale application of steam plows, ox pulling drum machines (clear shrubs and small trees), steam hammers and other machinery has greatly reduced the workload of building a railway. After getting off the train, Yang Wanglin, who went to the construction site to inspect, clearly saw that in the drainage ditches on both sides of the roadbed, there were several steam plows digging ditches extremely quickly, which was much better than those of the Crandy slave workers who dug trenches with shovels. Moreover, as long as this machine does not fail, it can start work 24 hours a day and night, and its work efficiency is extremely stable. It is definitely not comparable to those of the Indian slave workers who wear shackles, have low morale and are inefficient.
Chapter completed!