上海港的经济区位优越，港口的发展不仅关系上海、长三角，还关系到长江流域、中国沿海乃至亚太和世界航运格局的变化。长江口横沙区域的自然条件经过人工改造具有开发基础，在此论证，是时代发展的需要。利用横沙东滩促淤成陆，建设河口深水大港和新的城区，可以解决上海土地和港航资源开发不足的瓶颈，决定着上海市将在国家建设海洋强国中发挥的作用。海洋新城、深水大港、海洋装备基地的建设，是一个庞大的复杂巨系统工程，除了需要详细的自然条件分析、经济可行性分析、工程可行性分析等，更需要有一个权威的高层设计。

The Shanghai harbor plays an important role in the economic development of the city and the Yangtze river delta, even to the river basin and the coastal zone of the country. As a harbor in an international metropolis, it could bring about the change to the Asian-Pacific and the global shipping setup. It is the need of era development to expound and prove the development of the Hengsha district in the Yangtze estuary. The natural condition of the Hengsha district would support to the future utilization with artificial projects. The mudflat could become land by the induced siltation and enclosure. The new land will resolve the lack of the land and port resources in Shanghai, and establish a new estuarine deepwater harbor and a new city district. The program will also affect China's historic task for comprehensively building itself into a great naval power. The construction of the new marine city, deepwater harbor and marine equipment base is a huge and complicated systematic engineering. Before carrying out the detailed analysis reports on the natural condition, the economic feasibility and the project feasibility, we need an authoritative top design.