Nanyang Storm 1864

Chapter 447: Cities ranked 10th to th

In the "Overall National Economic Development Report of Chu State in 1882", detailed data on urban construction, population and economic development, an important part of national economic construction, are listed, clearly outlining the appearance of urban development, especially the ten major cities of Chu State.

Compared with the urban development level in 1871, Angeles, the tenth largest city in Chu at that time, had a population of 29.71, close to 30, and was the gatekeeper of the top ten cities in Chu.

Eleven years have passed
The total population of the Chu State grew from 1871 million in 1377.6 to 1882 million by the end of 4685, an increase of 340%. Among them, the new Chinese immigrants exceeded million, and were the main force driving the rapid population growth.

Because the overall population size increased by 3.4 times, the sizes of the ten major cities in the Chu State all grew to varying degrees.

In 1882, Bandar Seri Begawan, which ranked tenth, had a population of 55.21, much larger than the 1871 population of Cebu, the fourth largest city in the country in 49.32.

The threshold is much higher than the population of 1871 in Angeles, the tenth largest city in 29.71.

From this
The thresholds of the top ten cities in the Chu State were rising rapidly, the urban population was larger, the industrial integration effect was very obvious, the level of urban construction was greatly improved, and there were more and more high-rise buildings.

Bandar Seri Begawan was originally the ninth largest city in the Chu State. Its population grew rapidly from 1871 in 34.71 to 1882 by the end of 55.21, but it almost failed to maintain its position as one of the top ten cities. This shows how fierce the competition among domestic cities is.

Cagayan, which was originally ranked eighth among the top ten cities in 1871, and Angeles, which was ranked tenth, were squeezed out of the new list of the top ten cities of Chu State in 1882 and disappeared from the ranking sadly. It can be seen that the competition among cities has become increasingly fierce.

Bandar Seri Begawan's economy mainly revolves around oil extraction. The abundant resources bring rich income and promote the great development of the city.

In the metropolis of Chu

The roads are generally paved with smooth and neat asphalt, with white lane markings painted on them. Tall trees and shrubs on both sides of the roads often bloom with flowers all year round.

The new trams were widely promoted and quickly became the mainstream of urban transportation, replacing the original public horse-drawn carriages and reducing a lot of pollution from cow dung and horse urine.

The widespread use of telephones and electric lights has become the norm in large cities.

The development of Chu cities closely followed the technological trends of Europe, which could be reflected in many aspects, especially the fact that many middle-class families in cities had access to electric lights, making the nights much brighter.

The new carbon filament lamps are more durable. In the past, we had to replace a light bulb every month, but now we only need to replace it once every six months to a year. If a house has more than 10 rooms, this saves a lot of money.

Among some powerful and wealthy families, this new technology, telephone, has quietly become popular.

Many wives from wealthy families get together to play mahjong, go shopping, or watch a play. What they often say is "Call my home", which is an invisible way of showing off.

Many wealthy ladies who didn't have a telephone at home felt embarrassed and thought they must install one when they got home. They smiled and complimented her by saying, "Oh, Mrs. Chen, you have a telephone at home. Congratulations!"

Bandar Seri Begawan is the seat of the Governor-General of Malaya and the headquarters of the Royal Ace 3rd Division, known as the "Shield of the Kingdom". The division has been stationed in Bandar Seri Begawan for more than ten years, bringing additional economic vitality to the city.

The salaries of Chu soldiers were generally higher than those of lower-level urban officials, and they also received additional income from meritorious fields. After receiving awards for meritorious service, the royal family would also reward them with money, houses, and women, making their spending power much greater than that of ordinary people.

It was common for military officers' families to have two, three or even more concubines. It was not uncommon for a family to have seven, eight or even ten children. They were typical middle-class families.

Bandar Seri Begawan is a regional transportation hub city in Malaya. Minerals from all over the world gather at the port, and imported industrial and consumer goods also gather at the port, creating the prosperity of the port.

The Bandar Seri Begawan Port alone has created as many as 2.2 jobs, covering a wide range of areas such as warehousing, transportation, supply, cargo distribution and mineral exports, making it a major customer for local labor.

The most regrettable thing is

In order to disperse resources, the kingdom's top leaders set up an oil refinery in Batangas. Batangas has developed Refinery 600, Refinery and Refinery , with a total production capacity of million barrels of crude oil annually, which is a world-leading scale.

Such a large chain refining and chemical enterprise requires an astonishing number of employees, as high as 3.9. Unfortunately, this big cake was eaten by Batangas.

The biggest demand of Bandar Seri Begawan now is to keep the fourth refinery in the local area. While generating a large amount of fiscal and tax revenue for the local area, it can also create a large demand for employment and promote the overall growth of the city.

Without the development of the petrochemical industry based on its resources, Bandar Seri Begawan would have no other advantages in the fierce competition among cities in the country except for its beautiful scenery.

The ninth largest city is Xinxi'an. Compared with the population of 1871 in 38.83, by the end of 1882, the population of Xinxi'an had rapidly grown to 58.97, an astonishing increase.

However, the city's ranking dropped from seventh to ninth, a sharp drop of two places.

Located on Shangri-La Island, New Xi'an is a major city in the western part of the island and is also classified as an offshore island. Its "strong trunk, weak branches" industrial policy restricts its development, which has many disadvantages for both light and heavy industries.

In addition to the necessary industries such as cement, timber, brick kilns, coal kilns, agricultural tool factories, rice mills, and oil presses that are necessary for urban development, the most important industry in New Xi'an is the sugar factory.

Shangri-La's geographical conditions are very suitable for the development of sugarcane production. It and Donggang are both major sugarcane producing areas. New Xi'an has 11 sugar factories, which is the area with the highest concentration of sugar factories in the country.

The Chu State supplied bulk white sugar to Europe and East Asia, with the New Xi'an area accounting for about 35% of the total, making it an important sugar-producing area. In addition, it also produced a lot of coffee, cocoa and high-mountain tea.

Shangri-La Island has many mountainous terrains and complex geographical conditions, which is also its advantage in producing high-mountain tea, but it is just a niche product.

Within the scope of New Xi'an, there is the world's largest copper mine with proven reserves. Unfortunately, due to restrictions on mining, it has never been transformed into a resource advantage.

Just because Shangri-La Island is an important immigration area, New Xi'an is able to rank among the ninth largest cities. No matter how you look at it, it is an excellent performance with great strength.

However, due to various restrictive measures, the development potential has not been fully tapped, and the industrial field focuses on sugar factories, which is relatively biased.

New Xi'an is a typical Chinese-style city with a beautiful environment. The city streets are paved with neat asphalt roads, and there are flying eaves and pavilions on both sides of the road. It is mainly based on Han and Tang Dynasty classical architecture, with a unique quiet and profound beauty.

At night, when kerosene street lamps are lit, these classical buildings burst into a stunning hazy beauty against the backdrop of dim light, attracting people to linger.

During his inspection, King Zheng Guohui of Chu once said with emotion: "New Xi'an is the city with the most quintessence of Han and Tang Dynasty architecture. It often makes people dream of returning to the Tang Dynasty and not knowing where they are." This is the highest praise for New Xi'an and the builders of this city.

The eighth largest city of the Chu State was Pontianak, which was once the capital and largest city of Lan Fang. Because it was closest to Singapore and the Strait of Malacca, it was the western outpost of the Chu State for many years.

Due to the prosperous economic and trade relations between the south and the north, Pontianak developed rapidly in the hands of the Chu State. The city's population more than doubled. By the end of 1882, the total population reached 61.02, ranking it the eighth largest city.

During the Lan Fang period, Pontianak was a famous mining city, rich in gold and natural rubber, with hundreds of gold mines and more than 420 rubber plantations of various sizes.

it's here

There are also more than 20 shipyards, most of which are small and medium-sized inland shipbuilding and coastal shipbuilding, creating a developed Kunjiang inland shipping industry, connecting all inland prefectures and counties through inland shipping.

Pontianak is located at the gateway for river-sea transportation conversion. After the completion of the Kunjiang Bridge, the momentum of rapid development here has become increasingly unstoppable.

The city and suburbs are closely connected by bridges. There are many factories in the suburbs. It is a center for processing rubber and oil palm, has a relatively developed hemp textile industry, and is also the main production area of ​​natural rubber.

Due to its advantageous geographical location, Pontianak is approximately the same distance from Singapore, Penang, Bangkok, Saigon, Hong Kong and Batavia, making it an important transit port on the Eurasian route, with a constant flow of foreign merchant ships.

Many British, French and American businessmen like to invest in Pontianak, a vibrant and open coastal metropolis with a large seaport and numerous inland ports, and extremely convenient transportation.

There are many European and American expatriates living in Pontianak. It is common to see blond-haired, blue-eyed white people in the streets and alleys, riding rickshaws or driving cars through the city. It has long been commonplace.

According to the statistics

Foreigners account for 8.2% of Pontianak's population, totaling 4.77 people. The foreign population ranks second among cities in the country, second only to the largest metropolitan city, Manila.

The official opening of the Kunjiang Bridge has given wings to the development of Pontianak and opened up the deep inland hinterland, which has very significant economic significance.

In time
The continued rapid development of Pontianak is completely expected. It has all the favorable conditions for economic development, with capital gathering and excellent geographical conditions. It is the face of the Malayan Governor's Office and the largest emerging city.

Ranked seventh is Cavite, a city near Metro Manila. This city ranked fifth in the 1871 statistics, but now it has dropped two places to seventh in the latest statistics in 1882.

其城市人口从1871年的42.2万，飞速增长到1882年未的66.95万人，有了50%的人口成长。

This city, which is mainly based on the light textile industry, has been developing steadily and vigorously and has great potential.

Building on its original advantage in wool textile industry, Cavite has recently developed printing and dyeing, electrical engineering and agricultural machinery industries. The recently popular walking tractor comes from the Tieniu Tractor Factory in Cavite.

When the Iron Ox tractor first appeared at the 1880 Melbourne World Expo, it instantly amazed the world and started a crazy export momentum.

Orders came in like snowflakes from all over the world, especially from Europe and the United States, who were eager to learn about the "Iron Ox" brand walk-behind tractors. A single order could be for hundreds or even thousands of units, and they were scrambling to get them as if they were free.

Hand tractors have an immediate effect on improving agricultural production efficiency. They can be equipped with farm tools to work in the fields, and can also transport agricultural products over dozens or hundreds of kilometers.

They don't need to eat grass or rest, and as long as they have diesel, they can work all day long. One hand tractor is equivalent to 20 strong laborers.

This is a great blessing for American farms with vast land and sparse population. It can also be used to great effect on small and medium-sized farms in France and the UK.

As soon as it appeared, it achieved extremely high sales popularity.

In order to rapidly expand the market for walk-behind tractors, machinery factories, farm implement factories, and various parts processing factories around Cavite are all expanding production on a large scale. Now, new brands such as "Fengshou" tractors, "Tie Ma" tractors, "Jinggong" tractors, and "Volkswagen" tractors have emerged, and a large number of new factories have been put into operation.

This wave of industrial development has greatly boosted the industrial development of Cavite. The local governor said with great confidence: "Give me three years and I will build a metropolis with a population of one million."

Such bold words are not empty talk. Today, Cavite is on the brink of explosive growth. Further industrial development and urban progress are entirely foreseeable. It is a typical example of industry-driven development.

Hundreds of manufacturers in the entire hand tractor industry chain are now recruiting workers to expand production. Production capacity is rapidly increasing from 3400 units per month, and it is expected to reach a monthly output of 6000 hand tractors by the end of this year.

However, this production scale is still not enough to satisfy the hungry appetites of people all over the world. Large orders continue to come in, and production tasks have been scheduled until the year after next.

The expansion of production capacity has been ongoing, which has strongly driven the demand for steel products, the development of the mechanical processing and parts assembly industries, and the demand market for turning, cutting, gunning and pressing machine tools, all of which are showing a prosperous scene.

Cavite's demand for workers has increased rapidly, which is the basis for the city's growth, so it is not surprising that it has experienced extraordinary development.

This city, which has developed slowly over the past decade, is now experiencing explosive growth due to the emergence of new agricultural machinery and is expected to develop into a large city with both light and heavy industries.

A new industry creates a city, and this is the case in Cavite.

In addition, its traditional wool textile industry has been growing steadily, absorbing a large number of female industrial population, making the city's employment demand relatively balanced, with a greater demand for both male and female workers.

This has made the industrial economic development of Krabi Prefecture particularly stable, and the mechanical processing industry and machine tool industry have also developed accordingly, adding extraordinary vitality to the city.

The decision to locate the walking tractor industry in Cavite was made personally by King Zheng Guohui of Chu. On the one hand, it was based on the balanced industrial development of cities surrounding Metro Manila, and on the other hand, it was based on the fact that Cavite had a good industrial foundation.

Another important industrial city, Batangas, is nearby. Several large steel mills of Nanyang Heavy Industries are located here. There are also rich coal resources in the surrounding area. Manila has the strongest technical support in the region.

With all these favorable conditions combined, it would be difficult for Jiami Underworld not to develop.

(End of this chapter)