Chapter 6 Section 4 The road after the Tang Dynasty

The Tang Dynasty was the heyday of the development of ancient Chinese roads.At that time, Chang'an, the capital city, was not only connected to the eastern region by waterways and canals, but also a hub of domestic and international land transportation, and had become one of the largest cities in the world.The scale of the Chang'an City Wall in the Tang Dynasty was unprecedented.It is 36.7 kilometers in circumference, 8651 meters long from north to south, and 9721 meters wide from east to west, approximately a square.The area is equivalent to 10 times that of Xi'an today.There are 11 north-south avenues and 14 east-west avenues in the city, which divide the whole city into more than 100 neat squares and cities.The north-south street in the middle of the imperial city is called Chengtianmen Street, which is 441 meters wide and has a wide view.There are six streets connecting the 12 city gates, among which Zhuque Street is an important street running from north to south in Chang'an City in the prosperous Tang Dynasty.It is the central axis, 147 meters wide, and divides Chang'an City into east and west parts.The district on the west side of the street is called Chang'an County, and the district on the east side of the street is called Wannian County.The streets are full of traffic, bustling and lively.There are many trees planted on both sides of the street, together with the scattered clear pools and streams, numerous gardens, and blooming peonies, which make the whole city very neat and beautiful.After leaving Chang'an City, head east, south, west, and north, forming a land transportation network extending in all directions.Not only leads to all parts of the country, but also frequent exchanges between China and foreign countries.In addition, cities like Luoyang, Yangzhou, Quanzhou, and Guangzhou, along with the development of politics, economy, and culture in the Tang Dynasty, also successively became important centers of domestic and international transportation.

During the Song, Liao and Jin dynasties, my country's road construction entered a new stage of development, especially in terms of urban road construction and traffic management, which were significantly different from those in the Sui and Tang dynasties.The urban construction in this period realized the organic combination of street and city.For the first time, the two sides of the avenue in the city have become a district where all kinds of industries gather.Residents in the city stepped out of the high walls of the workshops characterized by closed partitions in the Zhou, Qin, Han, and Tang dynasties, and entered an unprecedentedly active urban life;Bianjing (now Kaifeng), the capital of the Northern Song Dynasty, has been rebuilt and has become a metropolis with a population of over one million and more than 6,400 shops in the city.The street in the center of Bianjing is called Yujie, two hundred steps wide, with imperial corridors on both sides of the road.The government of the Northern Song Dynasty changed the old rules of the Zhou, Qin, Han, and Tang Dynasties that residents were not allowed to open their doors to the streets and engage in trading activities outside the designated market squares, and allowed citizens to open shops in the imperial corridors and do business along the streets.In order to activate the economic and cultural life, the curfew was relaxed, and the gates of the city were closed very late and opened very early.A military patrol shop is set up every 200 to 300 steps on the Imperial Street. The corner guard patrols in the shop maintain traffic order during the day and divert the flow of people and vehicles;This is probably the earliest patrol police in history.In the Tang Dynasty, there were public transportation vehicles, which were called oil wall vehicles at that time.In the Southern Song Dynasty, the oil wall car in Lin'an (now Hangzhou), the capital city, had new improvements.The body is very long, with carriages on it, windows on the walls of the carriages, curtains on the windows, and gorgeous decoration.The carriage is covered with satin cushions, which are very exquisite, and can accommodate six people for sightseeing.This is the earliest bus, and Lin'an is the city with the earliest bus in the world.

During the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, a dense post-road transportation network centered on Beijing was built.The post road trunk line radiates to all directions of our country.In particular, the Yuan Dynasty comprehensively expanded the mainland transportation network since the Han and Tang Dynasties, and further covered a vast area of ​​the Asian continent, including the Arabian Peninsula.Under the leadership of Genghis Khan and other accomplished leaders, the various tribes of the Mongols conquered the east and west. Wherever the troops arrived, the post stations were set up, the roads were connected, and the transportation was endless.During the heyday of the Mongolian army's military power, the road led directly to the Danube River in Eastern Europe. After attacking the Jin regime and the Southern Song Dynasty regime in the south, it also included a large area of ​​southern China into its own territory.Compared with the Silk Road in the Han and Tang Dynasties, the Yuan and Ming roads were larger in scale, more efficient, and played a more direct and important role.

The Qing Dynasty was the last feudal dynasty in my country and established the basic territory of modern China.Although, in terms of means of transportation, transportation facilities, transportation power, and traffic management, compared with previous dynasties, there is no qualitative breakthrough except for quantitative changes.However, after several rectifications by the Qing government, the national road layout is more reasonable and effective than ever before.The Qing Dynasty divided the post roads into three grades, one is "Guanma Road", which radiates from Beijing to all directions and mainly leads to provincial cities; the other is "big roads", which lead from provincial cities to important local cities; the third is "small roads" , from the main road or the branches of important cities to various towns.Guanma Avenue is a state-level official road. Huanghua Station is set up outside Donghuamen in Beijing.The most important part of the Guanma North Road system is the main line leading to the Northeast, that is, the official roads extending from Beijing via Shanhaiguan and Shengjing (now Shenyang) to Yakesa and Miaotun (at the mouth of Heilongjiang) respectively, and leading to the Korean Peninsula. international channels.Belonging to the Guanma North Road system are the main lines to Hulun and Qiaktu respectively, and the large horizontal passage on the plug.These roads played an important strategic role in the struggle to develop and defend northern Xinjiang in the Qing Dynasty.The West Guanma Road system includes the two main lines of Lanzhou Guanlu and Sichuan Guanlu. The former runs from Beijing via Baoding, Taiyuan, Xi’an, and Lanzhou to Qinghai, Tibet, and Xinjiang respectively, and leads to countries in Central Asia and West Asia; the latter It is the main line leading to the southwest, from Xi'an to Yun, Guizhou, and Sichuan, and extends westward to Lhasa, Tibet.In the process of establishing and consolidating the Qing Empire, the Guanma West Road system covering the entire western region of our country played a very important role.The Guanma South Road system includes three trunk lines: Yunnan Guanlu, Guilin Guanlu and Guangdong Guanlu.The first two trunk lines both go south from Taiyuan, cross the Yellow River to Luoyang, then branch off to Kunming or Guilin, and extend to the Indochina Peninsula; the third trunk line, the main road of Guangdong Guanlu, starts from Beijing to the south, Xuzhou, Hefei, Nanchang, Ganzhou, Shaoguan, directly to Guangzhou.This is the main official road from Beijing to Guangzhou running through the north and south of China since Yuan and Ming Dynasty.The only main line of Guanma East Road is Fujian Guanlu, which passes through important cities such as Tianjin, Jinan, Xuzhou, Nanjing, Suzhou, Shanghai, Hangzhou, and Fuzhou.It is an important channel for the economic survival of the Qing government.In addition, there are Changjiang Guanlu, which runs from east to west, and so on.It was through these roads that the Qing government realized political control and economic exploitation of all provinces, cities, counties, towns, and even natural villages in the country; in order to survive and develop, the people of all ethnic groups in all parts of the country also realized economic, social and economic development through this huge transportation network. cultural exchanges.

The roads in ancient my country were all gravel or dirt roads, and there were no roads paved with asphalt or cement.It was not until the end of the 19th century that railways and roads appeared in our country. In 1876, the British imperialists deceived the Qing government and built the Wusong-Shanghai railway without authorization.This is the first railway on the territory of our country.The Tangshan-Xugezhuang Railway, built in 1881, was the first railway funded and preserved by my country.The earliest highway in my country was the Longzhou-Nakan Highway built by Su Yuanchun in 1908 when he was stationed at the southern border of Guangxi.Too bad it wasn't all finished. In 1913, Hunan built a road from Changsha to Xiangtan about 50 kilometers long.With the rise of trains, ships, and automobiles in modern times, and the continuous development of railways, highways, and air routes, the ancient post-road transportation system in my country has finally completed its historical mission and gradually tends to disintegrate and be abandoned.