Since the "11th Five-Year Plan", Nantong has carried out a strategy to link the Yangtze River with the Yellow Sea to promote the development of all means of transportation including highways, railways, ports, and aviation under the leadership of the Ministry of Transport, provincial Party and provincial government..

Since the beginning of the "11th Five-Year Plan" , the costs of highways, fairways, and stations have increased to a new high, with 2.8 billion yuan in 2006, 5.3 billion yuan in 2007 and 4.3 billion yuan in 2008, adding up to 12.4 billion yuan over the three years (not including 8 billion yuan for the main Suzhou-Nantong Bridge). The figure came close to the total investment during the "10th Five-Year Plan" period, and was three times the total of that from 1949 to 1999.