How to Survive in the Roanoke Colony

"So, how many feet wide should the road be..."

"We'll set it in the metric system."

"..."

Of course, Kin Issei preemptively blocked other kinds of digging.

He was truly an angel of the unit system.

==

Originally, roads in this era generally didn't need to be that wide. How big can a cart be, and how much traffic could there be to necessitate a 12-lane road?

"About... this wide?"

"Not even close! It should be wide enough for four of Nemo's Porters to pass side by side!"

But... in our community, the situation is different.

First, most of the carts are as big as a Porter.

More precisely, they're as wide as a Porter.

This is because the first roads in this community were naturally formed by Hijets and Porters passing through. The width of the road wasn't determined by the width of carriages; rather, the width of carriages was determined by the width of the road.

The second reason is a bit absurd.

People saw the Porter and thought it was cool, so many copied it.

...Surprisingly, this is true.

Anyway, given these circumstances, we have to build roads based on the Porter.

"So roughly matching the width of the Porter, at 10 feet..."

"We'll go with 3 meters."

The yard-foot system is cut. There are no heretics in our church. Except those who use yard-foot-pound.

After condemning those evil pagans, everything became neat. Indeed, the metric system is divine.

The width of the road was decided to be 12 meters. Some might think this is too wide for a road of this era, but I looked a bit ahead.

I wanted this road to be used even when dozens of cars and carriages would pass through later.

We can't lay a road connecting Chesapeake and Croatoan from the beginning. After all, we need to connect with bridges before deciding whether to lay roads or not.

For now, I want to focus on transportation near Chesapeake, a city that has grown considerably with a population in the tens of thousands.

First, we plan to build roads along the coastal area extending west and north of Chesapeake, and lay a road connecting from Chesapeake port to the heart of the city.

...Come to think of it, it's like Tokyo subway lines 2 and 1. Indeed, is Japan still my spiritual homeland?

Anyway, we don't need to do anything grandiose like laying cement to pave roads. We're already busy building breakwaters, and it takes too much effort.

As is common in rural areas, we finished paving by digging the ground a bit deeper and filling it with decomposed granite. This should be good enough for water drainage and smooth enough to not be uncomfortable for travel.

A lot of sand and gravel come out from various places as we build mines. And this sand and gravel are either used directly for laying roads or go into concrete aggregate.

By hardening concrete to make tetrapods, which will be loaded onto the soon-to-be-built salvage ship, they will immediately form a breakwater, and as waves are blocked, the road will advance again.

On the other hand, after establishing mines, we promote the efficiency of the process just mentioned by running various ironworks, cement factories, and steamboats with the coal produced there.

Everything is... interconnected.

Even those who were watching without joining a monastery, saying things like 'Manual labor is a bit...' willingly participate in such public works. And new immigrants who are initially bewildered join in because everyone else is doing it.

...Hmm.

The community seems to be running reasonably well.

As we build cement factories and accumulate know-how on concrete pouring and curing, we'll probably be able to build large structures with concrete in the future.

If I reveal the secret of the future artifact [reinforced concrete], everyone will react with amazement, saying, "What! The thermal expansion coefficient of rebar and concrete is identical! How, how could this be!" and be moved by me.

...

...

...

Yes.

Everything is running smoothly. Thanks to various future technologies and future knowledge.

In fact, I haven't done much.

Even when I vaguely mumble things like "I think it might have been something like this...", people proceed with the work on their own. And with surprising efficiency.

...No.

I'm starting to get a feel for it. I'm beginning to understand how haphazard technological development and improvement can be.

Isn't there a famous anecdote? The story of Edison trying 7,000 different filament materials over a year to find efficiency for the light bulb.

If I were to compete with Edison, I would immediately look for bamboo charcoal to use as a filament. Because I know that's the answer. Or I might use tungsten right away.

Moving with history as an answer key allows for rapid progress.

In the world inside my head, in a world yet to come, people have already tried tens of thousands of times over hundreds of years.

And the information about that answer key...

Only I have a monopoly on it.

"..."

Those educational comics, the books in the library, and even the detailed catalog of 'Immortal Kingdom' can only be read and understood by me.

"..."

Before the issue of right and wrong, I considered how widely the knowledge in one person's head could be utilized and change the world.

There are great limitations to what a single person from the future can do.

I am not an omnipotent genius. I cannot achieve results beyond the fragmentary knowledge I possess.

Even if I alone learn future knowledge in a secret library, if I can't think of how to apply it, even the most useful knowledge and technology will be buried and disappear.

I especially feel this point in this development project. What if I presented the screw-propelled ship to various shipwrights and requested continuous research? Would the development of a screw-propelled ship still be impossible?

I can't do bigger things alone.

It's impossible by myself.

Our community has always been protected through technological superiority ahead of the outside world. Whether it's 21st-century products I directly brought, or results made here with future knowledge.

Lexan sheets, new muskets, war tractors, etc.

Also, our community is maintained through that technological superiority. If our agriculture didn't have tractors, the entire industry of our community would probably collapse instantly.

Such superiority has helped us stand here, overcoming the waves of history until now.

We always need technological breakthroughs. We always need to stay ahead of others. Only then can we be safe.

And if I can't guarantee such results by struggling alone?

If this breakwater protecting the community now collapses under bigger waves someday?

...

...

I reached a conclusion.

Knowledge must be shared.