African Entrepreneurship Record

"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, 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 moving the capital, the resources of the first town and city can no longer support its continued development.

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

"Everyone, please take a look. These four cities in the east on the map are familiar to everyone. 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 into the Dar es Salaam 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 changed in the previous life, the educational resources of some canceled administrative divisions will still remain in the local area. The first town and city are in a similar situation.

As the saying goes, a skinny camel is bigger than a horse. This is the case in First Town. Although the economic scale of First Town is far less than that of 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 terms of 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, there are direct connections between the First Town and the cities of Soga and Dar es Salaam by the central railway. Bagamoyo and Dar es Salaam are connected by the Eastern Coast Railway. 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. 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, a plan to further improve local transportation and achieve coordinated development of the four cities will be put on the agenda."

Although transportation in the four cities of Dar es Salaam was developed in the past, its established transportation network mainly served the whole country. After all, Dar es Salaam is one of the major ports in eastern East Africa. In the early days of East Africa, the territory was limited to the East African region. At that time, 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 the coastal province. In the past, due to the limitations of the times, local transportation focused on serving the whole country. Now the East African government wants 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.”

"At the same time, intercity expressways, which are direct highways between the four cities, will be built 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 education and scientific research resources of the original First Town and Soga, promote the development of emerging industries, integrate the shipbuilding industry of Bagamoyo and Dar es Salaam, and provide a large amount of developable land and more industrial population to promote more efficient economic development in the Coastal Province."

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

After all, the education and scientific research resources of these four cities are also in the first echelon among East African cities.

And education and scientific research resources are only one of them, and industrial integration is the big deal. Dar es Salaam and Mombasa are all-round players in East African cities. They have no shortcomings in many industrial fields. If they merge with Bagamoyo, their industrial scale will be further improved.

Bagamoyo is not a small city in the 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. Therefore, the combined population of Dar es Salaam and Bagamoyo alone has exceeded one million, and the first town and Soga are more than one million.

In terms of distance, the distribution of several cities is also relatively dense, and the distance between each other is no more than 60 kilometers. If they are first-tier cities in the Far East Empire in the future, they are enough to achieve the same city.

Of course, in the 19th century, East Africa obviously could not do it. After all, there was no way to achieve seamless connection in transportation, so the concept of urban circle is more in line with the four cities such as Dar es Salaam.

The only shortcoming of the local area is probably that the mineral resources are insufficient, and it is impossible to achieve the economic depth to the inland like Shanghai in the Far East Empire. After all, the terrain characteristics of East Africa determine that there will be multiple centers along the coast of East Africa in the future, rather than Dar es Salaam alone.

After all, in the past, when the East African coast only consisted of the coasts of Tanzania and Kenya, the city of Dar es Salaam could not outshine the city of Mombasa.