Chapter 113: New Housing

The pregnancy of Tang Menglong’s life secretary led to the complete collapse of the “Bairen City Veteran Accommodation Regulations.” The distribution of life secretaries had already made the General Office consider the need for separate residences for veterans, and now it was on the urgent agenda.

But this matter was not simply about building residences for the veterans; it also involved the current management system of Bairen City.

The original fortress-style residential area of Bairen City, which combined office, living, and storage, was already outdated, and the practice of prohibiting natives from entering was inconvenient for both life and work.

The distribution of life secretaries had ended, but due to the Bairen City management regulations, these women could not enter Bairen City. It was originally planned to build a separate residential area for the life secretaries, but the news of the Ming army’s punitive expedition put this project on hold. As a result, the veterans could only meet their life secretaries in the commercial guild in Dongmen Market. The rooms in the commercial guild were limited, and for a time, the demand exceeded the supply. Li Mei was overwhelmed by the endless complaints—everyone was complaining that it was almost impossible to book a room. She could only order that veterans with life secretaries be limited to three hours per room, and then it was shortened to two hours.

“If I had known this, I would have opened a budget hotel myself,” Li Mei was very enthusiastic about this business opportunity.

Outside of the three hours, the life secretaries could only work with the veterans at their respective posts. This was not bad for the veterans who worked in offices, as it livened up the office atmosphere. The veterans in the agricultural sector also had no complaints—most of the life secretaries were from farming families and were very good at farming. But for the veterans in the industrial sector, it was very uncomfortable to have women wandering around in the workshop. Except for a few particularly enthusiastic veterans who began to teach their life secretaries how to make hammers, everyone else felt that they could not work this way and were easily distracted.

At night, the life secretaries had nowhere to go. It was especially difficult for the veterans who did not have single dormitories at their workplaces. They could not follow the veterans back to the dormitories in Bairen City, so they had to go back to the life secretary school to live in the collective dormitories.

The veterans were extremely dissatisfied with this living situation, and the General Office’s proposal to restart this project was rejected by the Senate. Amidst the roar of “we want a normal family life,” the “Bairen City Veteran Accommodation Regulations,” which had been in effect for more than two years, were completely abolished.

Moreover, Bairen City was originally built to be easily defended, so the area inside the city was small, and it was inconvenient for activities and living. The call for building a new residential area, at least a villa area, was getting louder and louder in the Senate.

After some “research,” the General Office decided to rebuild and expand Bairen City, re-planning the residential and administrative areas. The original residential area would be moved out of Bairen City and rebuilt elsewhere.

According to the plan of the General Construction Company, the old city of Bairen would be used as the administrative center, and only the Senate, government agencies, and key departments such as the telecommunications room would be retained.

The original living facilities, including dormitories, entertainment facilities, and life service facilities, were all moved to the “new city.” The new city was designed and built entirely according to the requirements of a residential area.

According to the plan, the new city was built on the bank of the Wenlan River, upstream of the old city. It was built directly on a high ground on the bank of the Wenlan River.

The new and old cities were connected, with a separate wall and gate in the middle, which was convenient for defense and for the veterans who worked in the old city to commute.

According to Mei Wan’s planning idea, the new city was actually a residential area with five hundred households. He planned to build the veterans’ residences in the form of townhouses—which was more land-saving.

He assigned Zhang Xingpei to be responsible for designing these five hundred townhouses. Mei Wan planned to build each villa with a practical area of about 100 square meters on two floors.

“It’s too shabby,” Zhang Xingpei frowned. “Although it’s impossible to build a magnificent building like a palace or a castle for everyone now, a 100-square-meter building is really not presentable. At least we should build an American-style single-family two-story small wooden house with front and back gardens…”

“Then how big would this community be?” Mei Wan said. “Even so, Ran Yao is not satisfied—he thinks the new residential area is too big and not easy to guard.”

Mei Lin had been looking at the planning map with his chin in his hands. He also spoke up at this time: “Even if we build townhouses, according to this design, three households per building, that’s one hundred and sixty buildings. To be honest, the villa area of this scale in the real estate projects I’ve done is already very large. It’s easy to build the houses, but the interior decoration will probably consume a lot of resources. Not to mention anything else, just the lighting and power distribution inside is a lot.”

“What are your plans?” Mei Wan was not very impressed with his kinsman’s high-minded talk.

“I think it’s better to build apartments…”

Everyone found it hard to accept: because now some high-level native cadres had already moved into townhouses, while the veterans lived in apartments—there was a security consideration before, but now that security is not a concern, it’s hard to justify.

“The veterans are all planning to have three wives and four concubines. If you let them live in apartments, how can they accommodate so many concubines? It’s a wonder they don’t chop you up.”

“Listen to me,” Mei Lin said unhurriedly. “Apartments have a small footprint. Five hundred apartments, if you build three-story buildings, fifty buildings will be enough. Compared with more than one hundred townhouses, the footprint is much smaller. First of all, it’s easy to guard. Secondly, an apartment of more than one hundred square meters can accommodate two concubines. As for more concubines, that’s a long-term plan—will everyone still live in Bairen City in three or five years?”

He predicted that after the first five-year plan was completed, many of the veterans would have been dispersed throughout Hainan Island. Some might even be sent to the mainland and other regions. These people would no longer live in Bairen City. Many houses would be vacant, and the overly large villa residential area would become too deserted, difficult to maintain, manage, and defend.

“If a 100-plus-square-meter apartment can’t accommodate the veterans’ future concubines, a 100-plus-square-meter townhouse can’t either. You know, many people are planning to build palaces, mansions, castles, and manors. We can’t build five hundred manors in Lin Gao, can we?”

The veterans would not regard Lin Gao as their future permanent residence. This place would only be a “holy land” in the future. In terms of living environment, there were many places on Hainan Island that were much better than Lin Gao.

“At that time, an apartment in Bairen City will only be a symbol of status. I think that when the veterans stationed abroad come back, they will only stay in luxury hotels or the General Office’s guesthouses, and they won’t necessarily go back to their apartments.”

Instead of building a half-baked residence now, it’s better to lower the standard and save some resources and land. As long as the housing needs for the next three to five years are met. Besides, the veterans’ current need is just a small nest where they can live with their life secretaries, girlfriends, and wives.

This argument moved Mei Wan—Mei Lin’s analysis was very clear: the veterans’ ultimate goal for their residences was palaces, mansions, castles, manors, sea-view villas, and the like. Not to mention townhouses, even the wooden-structured American-style single-family houses designed by Zhang Xingpei might not be able to satisfy the veterans.

In addition, the General Construction Company was seriously lacking in various decoration materials and building materials. Even if they built villas, they could only be decorated in the Ming style.

“I’m just afraid the veterans won’t be happy.”

“Let’s publicize the plan. We won’t make a mistake,” Mei Lin continued to advise. “The residences should be designed to be comfortable and practical, and the veterans will definitely accept it.”

After some discussion, they decided that the standard veteran apartment would have a configuration of three bedrooms, one living room, one bathroom, and one kitchen, with a practical area of about 90 square meters.

Mei Lin said, “One room for the veteran, one for the life secretary, and one for spare.”

Because Zhen Qian had experience in designing residences, the specific design work was handed over to her. She suggested that it was not necessary to build all of them according to the scale of three bedrooms and one living room.

“It’s difficult to make effective use of space with a uniform structure. Besides, some veterans don’t necessarily need such a large house. For example, people in the agricultural sector basically live in farmhouses. If you give them a house, they won’t come to live in it. So we should set up small-sized units to facilitate those veterans who don’t live in the residential area much.”

“Yes, for people like Wu Nanhai, I’m afraid three bedrooms and one living room is not enough,” Mei Wan said sourly.

Everyone laughed, feeling both envious and resentful.

Zhen Qian pouted, “You guys are only interested in this!” She then talked about her design plan: both large, medium, and small-sized units would be built, with large-sized units being the main ones.

“The structure will be a brick-concrete structure, with reinforced concrete precast floor slabs, which is in line with our productivity level,” Zhen Qian said. “In terms of decoration materials, plumbing and hardware are no problem, all can be self-produced. Sanitary ware and tiles can also be supplied. What is lacking is mainly industrialized flooring, paint, and coatings. If we don’t care, we can make do with what we have. Only wires, electric lights, and switches are first-level controlled materials. It depends on whether the Planning Commission is willing to allocate materials, but gas and running water should be able to be supplied to the households.”

“For lighting, gas lamps will be fine,” Mei Lin said. “They are brighter than candles or oil lamps, and they are clean and convenient to use.”

“It’s also convenient to lose your life—aren’t there enough deaths caused by gas water heaters?” Mei Wan expressed his concern. “I think it’s fine to use gas for street lamps, but it’s not as safe as electric lights for direct indoor lighting.”

“This depends on whether the Planning Commission agrees or not, but if everyone used to have electricity in the dormitories, and now they don’t have it in the apartments, I’m afraid Wu De wouldn’t dare to object,” Zhen Qian said.

Everyone discussed the details again. In addition to the housing, there would also be a public garage, a fitness center, and a logistics service center. The latter hired a group of reliable maids to wash clothes, cook, and clean for the veterans—all of them were native women who had undergone the strictest political security review. In the past, this institution also existed, but it was located outside Bairen City, which was very troublesome for service. This time, it was officially moved into the new city.