The santana car drove out of the University of Finance and Economics campus, and Li Xiaolong, sitting in the driver's seat, asked, "Mr. Fang, where are we going now?"
They had already checked out, and all three people's luggage was in the car.
"Let's go to Nanpu Bridge first. Drive to the Bund, then follow the road along the river for three kilometers, and you'll be there," Fang Bai instructed. He planned to first check on the construction progress of Nanpu Bridge.
These past few days, they had been busy with house matters and had no time to inspect land. Now, they would go see the bridge leading to Pudong.
"Okay."
Li Xiaolong replied. In the past few days, he and Da Ge Zi had been studying the Shanghai map and had visited many places during the day, so they were quite familiar with Shanghai now.
He knew where the Bund was, but not Nanpu Bridge, as it wasn't on the map.
Qin Shuyu, sitting in the back, was like a cute little hamster, sipping a bottle of iced drink, feeling the cool breeze from the air conditioner.
She would stay with Fang Bai in Shanghai for a few more days, waiting for him to finish his business before returning to Wen City together.
But, would she share a room with Fang Bai tonight?
Or sleep alone?
She took two sips of her drink, glanced at Fang Bai next to her, and felt her heart beat a little faster.
She was a bit conflicted, wondering if she should tell him, "There's something dirty on my clothes" tonight.
Fang Bai noticed Qin Shuyu's gaze and asked with a smile, "Is the cola good?"
"Mmm, mmm."
"You shouldn't drink too much of this stuff; it's not good for your health if you drink too much."
"Oh, is that so?" Qin Shuyu was a bit disappointed, feeling like she had lost another hobby. Fang Bai hadn't bought her the cotton candy she ate last time. She pouted and asked, "Fang Bai, are we going to see the bridge now?"
"Yes, I heard it's almost open to traffic. This is the bridge connecting to Pudong."
Fang Bai planned to go to Pudong to take a look. Currently, there was no bridge to cross, so they could only take a boat.
At present, there were no major bridges open to traffic near the Bund; crossing the river depended entirely on boats, which locals called ferries.
The first bridge over the Huangpu River was the Songpu Bridge, opened in 1976, but that was too far from Pudong.
The first bridge that truly connected the two banks of the Pujiang River was Nanpu Bridge, located in HP District, Dongjiadu. It was over 8,000 meters long and was expected to open to traffic in December this year. Countless Shanghai residents had realized their dream of crossing the river on Nanpu Bridge, and it was about to come true.
Currently, to cross to Pudong, one still had to take a ferry.
An hour later, everyone drove to the vicinity of Nanpu Bridge.
Nanpu Bridge was currently in the final stages of construction. The few of them got out of the car and looked out, awestruck by the bridge.
"Fang Bai, this bridge is so tall, magnificent and spectacular, like a horizontal harp. That concrete pillar must be over a hundred meters, right?" Qin Shuyu pointed at the distant "H" shaped reinforced concrete main tower and said in surprise.
"It is over a hundred meters tall, I suppose. This is a cable-stayed bridge. It looks like it's almost open to traffic."
Wang Dakai, standing next to him, shielded his eyes from the dazzling sunlight and looked out, also curious: "Boss, how much money must this have cost? If Wen City had one or two more bridges, it would be much more convenient to get to the city center."
Fang Bai mused, "Probably a few hundred million. The completion of this bridge means that it will be much more convenient to get from Puxi to Pudong, and it also means that Pudong will usher in rapid development. We'll cross the river to take a look later. I plan to find a piece of land in Sha County to build a factory."
After watching for a while, Fang Bai told everyone to get back in the car and leave, to find a ferry crossing to Pudong.
That area was desolate, and precisely because of that, it was the best time to invest.
Everyone turned around and drove towards the Bund, where there was a ferry crossing.
Da Ge Zi got out to inquire and returned a moment later, saying that a single ticket was 8 cents, but crossing the river with a car was expensive, costing five yuan. They were ripping off the rich.
"As long as we can cross, that's fine. Buy the tickets," Fang Bai said, telling him to buy the tickets, separating car tickets and passenger tickets. The car ticket exempted the driver's ticket.
Half an hour later, they finally crossed the river and landed. The docking area was the ferry square of later generations.
Fang Bai told Li Xiaolong to drive north and explore. Everyone didn't quite understand why Fang Bai insisted on building a factory in Sha County; anyway, as far as the eye could see, it was all desolate, or just construction sites.
Fortunately, there were concrete roads; otherwise, the sedan would have difficulty driving on such bumpy dirt roads.
Fang Bai saw that the foundation of the Oriental Pearl Tower was being leveled, and he estimated that the groundbreaking ceremony would be soon.
Every piece of land along the river in Lu Jiazhui had already been planned for land use. Investing in industry was definitely not possible, and even investing in commerce had to meet the requirements of a financial district.
Moreover, land prices were not cheap.
From 1990 to 2000, land prices in Shanghai did not fluctuate much.
In 1995, the transfer price of the Tomson Riviera land was 600 million yuan, covering an area of over 20,000 square meters, about 30 mu, with an average price of 20 million yuan per mu, and a floor price of over 5,000 yuan (total land price / total building area).
In this era, this land price was truly incredible, too expensive.
The Tomson Riviera land had a good location, but the surrounding land was not cheap either, reaching an average price of 10 million yuan per mu in 1995.
Perhaps land prices in 1991 were cheaper. Fang Bai estimated that, based on the land price of the Oriental Pearl Tower, land in a slightly more remote location in Lu Jiazhui would also cost five or six million yuan per mu, and the Tomson Riviera land would now cost over ten million yuan per mu.
Even if Fang Bai had a good project, he simply couldn't start.
When he last came to Shanghai, he thought that even if he didn't make money, he wanted to leave his investment footprint here, but now that he thought about it, without two or three hundred million yuan in capital, he couldn't buy a decent piece of land.
If the investment amount was too small, the local government would not transfer the land, and there were also various stringent requirements.
Wang Dakai saw Fang Bai staring at the surroundings with keen interest, and even squatted down to touch the soil under his feet, curiously asking, "Boss, what's so good to see here? It's desolate. Is there gold underground?"
Fang Bai smiled: "Haha, an acre of land here is worth tens of millions of yuan. What do you say?"
"Oh my goodness, that expensive!" Wang Dakai couldn't help but exclaim loudly, "Is there really gold?"
Qin Shuyu and Li Xiaolong were equally shocked when they heard Fang Bai's words. They also squatted down and dug through the dirt, but felt there was nothing there.
"It's a national planned international financial plot, so how could it not be expensive?" Fang Bai explained, "Pay more attention to the news from Shanghai."
"Boss, you wouldn't want to buy land here, would you? It would be better to buy it near the Bund," Wang Dakai knew that Fang Bai's family had a lot of money, in the tens of millions, but he didn't know the exact amount.
"Buy what? I don't have money. Let's look somewhere else." Fang Bai pouted and waved his hand, telling everyone to get back in the car and leave.
Looking at it with keen interest but lacking funds was very painful.
After everyone got into the car, Fang Bai told Li Xiaolong to drive east towards Sha County.
At this time, Pudong was on the eve of its opening and development, with few high-rise buildings.
On April 18, 1990, the state officially announced the development and opening of Pudong, proposing to use Pudong's development and opening as the leader, further open up cities along the Yangtze River, and quickly build Shanghai into one of the international economic, financial, and trade centers, driving a new leap in the economy of the Yangtze River Delta and the entire Yangtze River basin. Pudong New Area was about to be established.
Two years later, in 1992, Sha County was incorporated into Shanghai City and renamed Pudong New Area.
At this time, Sha County was very much like a remote county town in the western regions today, with utility poles covered in small advertisements and residential buildings that were relatively dilapidated.
A Hong Kong businessman named Zheng bought a piece of land in Shanghai in 1993, hoarded it for 20 years without developing it, and later sold it, making a profit of 7.9 billion.
Unfortunately, he didn't do real estate, otherwise he would have earned even more.
Although there were regulations for buying and selling land, requiring construction to start within a certain period of time.
However, there were always countermeasures. For example, Li Jiacheng had many properties that were always under construction, but the construction speed was very slow.
His original idea was to first acquire a piece of land in Sha County to build a factory. A dozen years later, the local government would definitely require all factories in Pudong New Area to move, and the land acquisition price would not be low, which was equivalent to making a profit from the land price.
However, building a factory in Sha County now, due to inconvenient transportation, difficulty in electricity supply, distant supporting chains from the factory, and inconvenient living for employees, was simply not a good location for a factory.
In addition, it was inconvenient for Fang Bai to commute from school to Sha County.
Overall, it was not suitable to build a factory in Sha County at present. It would be better to build one near Jiao Tong University.
Currently, Sha County was an undeveloped virgin land with almost no industrial foundation. Even if an Eden was planned on this land, various inconveniences would make everything useless.
Moreover, factory construction takes time, especially in Sha County where transportation is inconvenient, and Fang Bai couldn't possibly wait a year to start.
Therefore, he came up with a plan: purchase land in Sha County and develop it slowly;
At the same time, lease a factory building near Jiao Tong University to accelerate investment.
After 1992, with the development of the Pudong area, a large amount of capital poured in, and high-rise buildings rose one after another. At this time, factories in Sha County could also be established, and it was almost 1993, with convenient transportation, then the factories would be moved.
Land acquisition was not the goal, just a convenient way to make more money.