A new subway route that connects Shanghai and Jiangsu province will boost economic integration in the region and encourage more people to take the metro, experts said.

The route, an extension of Shanghai's subway line 11, opened on Wednesday for a trial run linking the country's commercial hub and Jiangsu's Kunshan, a booming county-level administration.

"It integrates people living and working in the Yangtze River Delta region and boosts regional development," said Yu Hongsheng, director of the Urban Development Research Center under the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences.