The Sui dynasty linked earlier waterways into a single inland navigation running roughly 1,800 kilometres from Hangzhou north toward Luoyang and Beijing, later extended under the Yuan. It carried grain tribute, troops and goods, integrating the rice-rich Yangtze delta with the northern capitals. Canal junctions and termini such as Yangzhou, Suzhou, Hangzhou and later Tongzhou grew into major commercial cities. The system remains the longest and oldest artificial waterway in the world.
It bound a continental empire into one economy and seeded a chain of canal cities, making infrastructure rather than the wall the spine of urban China.
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