African Entrepreneurship Records

 Chapter 982 Dar es Salaam City Circle

"By 1905, in terms of transportation, the national railway mileage should reach 150,000 kilometers. In terms of urban rail transportation, two new Dar es Salaam subways and intercity railways will be built to connect the first town with Rhine City and Soga City. , expanded the Rhineland metro network, exceeded 2 million kilometers of cement and asphalt roads, built 12 new canals, and connected the water transportation network between Mozambique and central China.”

After the capital was moved, the political status of the original first town and city declined, which meant that the first town and city lost its original political industry. Therefore, if the first town and city were not abandoned, they could only merge with the city of Dar es Salaam. In order to achieve sustainable development, because of the problem of relocating the capital, the resources of the first town and city can no longer support its continued development.

Sweite used a red pen to circle the cities of Dar es Salaam, Bagamoyo, First Town and Soga in an enlarged version of the map of Maritime Province (formerly Central Province).

“Everyone, please look at these four cities in the east on the map. I think everyone is familiar with them. After all, most of us have worked in the first town before.”

“The problem now is that in the past, the development of the first towns and cities relied on the highest priority political resources, including hospitals, schools, transportation, industries, etc., all centered around political services.”

"But with the completion of the capital relocation, it also means that the original urban ecology of the First Town cannot be maintained, and most of the medical, educational, and industrial resources have been split up and reorganized in the Rhine City. Even the population of the First Town is reduced to There are less than 50,000 people."

Ernst also added at this time: "Although the First Town lost its original status after the capital was moved, it is still the political center and one of the transportation hubs of Maritime Province. The urban construction is also quite complete, so for the First Town The city’s arrangement is to make full use of its advantages to ensure its subsequent development. My current idea is to merge the first town and city into the Dar es Salaam City Economic Zone, which is conducive to strong alliances.”

Although the capital of East Africa has been changed, the former Central Province and now Coastal Province government is still in the first town and city. During the period when it served as the capital, the first town and city accumulated a large amount of medical, educational and administrative resources, although most of them were transferred to the capital with the relocation. Rhine City, but the remaining resources are also considerable in size and quality.

Just like when the administrative divisions of the Far Eastern Empire were changed in the previous life, the educational resources of some canceled administrative divisions would still remain in the local area, and the first town and city were in a similar situation.

As the saying goes, a skinny camel is bigger than a horse. This is the case in First Town. Although it is far less economical than Dar es Salaam, in terms of public resources such as administration, education, and medical care, First Town is even larger than Dar es Salaam. The city of Dar es Salaam needs to be developed.

Sweet continued: "The First Town can serve as a satellite city of Dar es Salaam, cooperate with Soga City to form the technological, political, and cultural center of the Eastern Coast Province, and build an economic development cluster for the Greater Dar es Salaam City. , thus achieving overtake of European and American megacities.”

“The four cities of Dar es Salaam, Bagamoyo, First Town, and Soga are developing together. The urban population in the region exceeds one million. They are also at a leading position in economy, culture, education, medical care, and transportation. In the first echelon of the country, if we want to achieve the coordinated development of the four cities, the core issue is to solve traffic obstacle avoidance.”

“Currently, the Central Railway directly connects the First Town to Soga and Dar es Salaam. The Eastern Coast Railway connects Bagamoyo and Dar es Salaam. The First Town There is a canal connection with Bagamoyo City, which forms a triangular transportation network. There are also roads connecting the four, which has obvious inherent advantages in the transportation field. "

“It’s just that in the past, this transportation network was centered on the first town and city, but now the first town and city are obviously unable to assume the task of guiding economic development in the region.”

“At the same time, in order to release the economic vitality of Dar es Salaam, build a new bridgehead for the Indian Ocean economy, promote the division of labor in eastern cities, and enhance my country’s industry and industrial upgrading, cluster development is an inevitable option.”

“On this basis, the plan to further improve local transportation and realize the coordinated development of the four cities has been put on the agenda.” 　　　　Although the transportation in the four cities of Dar es Salaam was developed in the past, its established transportation network was mainly for Nationwide service. After all, Dar es Salaam is one of the major ports in eastern East Africa. In the early days of East Africa, when the country was limited to the East African region, it was the only important outlet to the sea. At that time, Mombasa had not yet developed.

Correspondingly, there is still more room for progress in the coordinated development of cities in Binhai Province. In the past, local transportation focused on serving the whole country due to time constraints. Now the East African government aims to make its transportation facilitate regional economic services.

Obviously, it is impossible to cancel the original functions of local built transportation in East Africa. Then we can only re-plan and build a new transportation network that serves the local economic and industrial integration on this basis, and the key to this is intercity railways and highways. construction.

Sweet continued: “That is to build an intercity railway loop around Dar es Salaam, connecting Dar es Salaam, Soga, First Town and Bagamoyo. , to achieve smooth flow of people, logistics and information.”

“Construct intercity expressways at the same time, which are direct highways between the four cities, to facilitate the connection of future automobiles and other highway transportation. This will not only relieve the pressure on the original transportation network, but also further enhance the coordinated development capabilities of the four cities.”

“At the same time, the new Dar es Salaam City Circle will cover the educational and scientific research resources of the original First Town and Soga City, promote the development of emerging industries, and integrate Bagamoyo City and Dar es Salaam City "

In fact, the educational and scientific research resources of Dar es Salaam and Bagamoyo are not bad. If First Town and Soga City are integrated, their scientific research capabilities and potential will directly exceed the current scientific research center in East Africa. Beia City.

 After all, the educational and scientific research resources of these four cities are among the first echelons among East African cities.

Education and scientific research resources are only one of them, and industrial integration is the big one. Originally, Dar es Salaam and Mombasa were all-round players among East African cities, and they had no shortcomings in many industrial fields. , if merged with Bagamoyo City, its industrial scale will be further enhanced.

Bagamoyo City is not a small city among current East African cities, but a relatively developed medium-sized city. It is also the current shipbuilding manufacturing center in East Africa with a population of more than 300,000, so Dar es Salaam alone The combined population of Mu City and Bagamoyo City has exceeded one million, and together with First Town City and Soga City, the population is over one million.

In terms of distance, several cities are relatively densely distributed, and the distance between them is no more than 60 kilometers. If they were first-tier cities in the Far Eastern Empire in later generations, they would be enough to achieve urbanization.

Of course, in the 19th century, there was obviously no way to achieve this in East Africa. After all, there was no way to achieve seamless transportation connections, so the concept of urban circles is more in line with four cities including Dar es Salaam.

The only local shortcoming is estimated to be insufficient mineral resources, and it cannot be as deep into the inland economy as Shanghai in the Far Eastern Empire. After all, the topographic characteristics of East Africa determine that there will be multiple center points along the East African coast in the future, not Dar es. The city of Salam is dominated by one family.

After all, in the past, when East Africa only had the coasts of Tanzania and Kenya, the city of Dar es Salaam could not stabilize the city of Mombasa.

 (End of this chapter)