Abstract: Yangtze River is an important golden channel in China. The riverbank of Yangtze River is a valuable natural resource and its utilization is of great significance for both economic and social development in the areas along the Yangtze River, especially the three cities in Middle Jiangsu Province. These three cities are located in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River with abundant riverbank resources. The total length of riverbank is 438.4 km in Middle Jiangsu reaches of the Yangtze River with stable riverbank and flat open hinterland. Huge advantages of resources and geographic advantage make the exploitation of riverbank vital to the economic development in Middle Jiangsu Province. Recently, the riverbank utilization along Middle Jiangsu reaches of the Yangtze River has developed fast. Therefore, in this article we chose three cities, i.e., Yangzhou, Taizhou, and Nantong, as study object, compares and analyzes the law of the development and changes of their riverbank use based on the utilization data of the riverbank of Yangtze River in 2002 and 2008. The results indicate that, since 2002, the riverbank use rate in the three cities has increased substantially, and the length of riverbank has experienced a sharp increase as well. The type of riverbank tends to be richer. The growth of industrial riverbank resources and living service riverbank resources are the most significant. From the perspective of internal growth of riverbank use, the type of industrial riverbank use is more diverse, large grain and oil processing, paper making and equipment manufacturing are newly added; metal manufacturing, metallurgical, ship building and construction materials have a huge growth of above 200%. Besides, among living service riverbank resources, the growth of pollution treatment riverbank is the largest while the growth of tourism-leisure riverbank and water intake riverbank are more than 100%. Among the newly exploited riverbank resources, the industrial riverbank resources account for the largest proportion, the port riverbank resources and the living service riverbank resources take the second and third place. Each type of the newly developed riverbank resources originates mainly from the unexploited riverbank resources. Existing types of riverbank resources transform to industrial types and unexploited riverbank resources for the most part. All these changes of riverbank utilization are by no accident but the inevitable results of many reasons, such as the port construction requirements in Middle Jiangsu Province, accelerating process of basic industries along the Yangtze River and the integrative development of port and industry and city. Of course, the most direct cause is no doubt the guidance of government's planning and policy that make the development of industries and the riverbank utilization along the Yangtze River more reasonable and mature. The study on changes of riverbank use can help us understand the level and pattern of riverbank utilization, thus leading more rational plans and more reasonable exploitation of the riverbank resources. In the future, with the changes of the socio-economic background, the three cities in Middle Jiangsu Province should integrate the riverbank resource further, transform the development mode, and make sure that limited riverbank resource can exert maximum benefits.

Key words: type of riverbank use, driving force, the three cities in Middle Jiangsu