: The author draws according to “Hekou Yao Autonomous County Annals”
In Hekou, the modern Western surveying and mapping engineering knowledge applied by the French delegation and the Yunnan-Vietnam Railway Company was also changing the concept of local officials in Hekou at that time, which in turn contributed to modern practice in China’s border areas.
According to Qing history records, although the Honghe and Nanxi Rivers were the borders of China and Vietnam before 1885, the central government’s control was difficult to reach remote borders. Therefore, there were only a dozen fishermen living in scattered areas in the Hekou and Laojie areas. In the river beach, there is no country.
Before the construction of the railway started, although the Shangbang in Hekou had developed to more than 30 households, the houses of bamboo huts were scattered in a disorderly manner, and the roads were not paved and uneven. It was still a messy rural scene.
After the construction of the railway began, the population increased further. By 1909, there were more than 200 houses in Hekou City, but the urban environment remained unchanged. In 1909, due to the flooding of the Red River, almost all houses in Hekou City were flooded.
The then Deputy Flood Supervisor Xu Defen immediately organized the post-disaster reconstruction work to investigate the hydrological conditions of the Nanxi River and the Red River, focusing on the Yunnan-Vietnam Railway Company’s survey report on Hekou-Old Street, and based on this The survey staff surveyed the topography of the Hekou city area and drew a plan of the new city area.
There are 16 streets and lanes in the new city, in a well-shaped layout, extending from Silian Mountain to the northwest along the bank of the Red River. Drainage ditches are set up in streets and lanes, and ponds are set up in urban areas to play a role in water storage.
After the plan was approved by the Yunnan Provincial Government, the deputy supervisor’s office led the flood soldiers and migrant workers to excavate more than 500,000 cubic meters of earth according to the plan, reorganize the Red River beach, and invited a construction team from Guangdong to build houses. [4]
The consideration of terrain and the more scientific knowledge of surveying and mapping engineering not only keep the estuary away from the trouble of river flooding, but also give the estuary a modern town style. Even after several wars, the urban built environment has been repeatedly devastated, but the street pattern is still in use today.
2. Sub-contracting, subdivision of work types and standardized production: railway engineering organization and construction process
In 1901, the Yunnan-Vietnam Railway Company contracted the Yunnan section of the project to Indo-China, France at a contract price of 95 million francs