Changzhou in the context of "2020 Chinese census"

Jiangsu is a coastal province in East China. It is one of the leading provinces in finance, education, technology, and tourism, with its capital in Nanjing. Jiangsu is the third smallest, but the fourth most populous, with a population of 84.75 million, and the most densely populated of the 22 provinces of the People's Republic of China. Jiangsu has the highest GDP per capita and second-highest GDP of Chinese provinces, after Guangdong. Jiangsu borders Shandong in the north, Anhui to the west, and Zhejiang and Shanghai to the south. Jiangsu has a coastline of over 1,000 kilometers (620 mi) along the Yellow Sea, and the Yangtze flows through the southern part of the province.

Since the Sui and Tang dynasties, Jiangsu has been a national economic and commercial center, partly due to the construction of the Grand Canal. Cities such as Nanjing, Suzhou, Wuxi, Changzhou, and Shanghai (separated from Jiangsu in 1927) are all major Chinese economic hubs. Since the initiation of economic reforms in 1990, Jiangsu has become a focal point for economic development. It is widely regarded as one of China's most developed provinces, when measured by its Human Development Index (HDI). Its 2021 nominal GDP per capita reached CN¥137,300 (US$21,287), becoming the first province in China to reach the $20,000 mark.

The Jiangyin dialect (Chinese: 江阴话; pinyin: Jiāngyīnhuà) is a Northern Wu Chinese dialect spoken in the city of Jiangyin in Jiangsu province. The Jiangyin dialect is a member of the Wu Chinese Taihu Wu family of dialects, which means the inhabitants speak a dialect similar to that of nearby Wuxi, Changzhou, Suzhou, and Shanghai. The Jiangyin dialect itself is of the Piling variety, related to the Changzhou dialect. The Jiangyin dialect has the highest degree of mutual intelligibility with the dialects of the closest neighboring cities of Changzhou and Wuxi but also has a fairly large degree of mutual intelligibility with the dialects of nearby Suzhou and Shanghai. As one travels south towards Wuxi away from the urban center of Jiangyin, the Jiangyin dialect increasingly sounds closer to the Wuxi dialect.

A book called A collection of Jiangyin dialect has been published.

Taihu (Chinese: 太湖), also known as Lake Tai or Lake Taihu, is a lake in the Yangtze Delta and the third largest freshwater lake in China. The lake is in Jiangsu province and a significant part of its southern shore forms its border with Zhejiang. With an area of 2,250 square kilometers (869 sq mi) and an average depth of 2 meters (6.6 ft), it is the third-largest freshwater lake entirely in China, after Poyang and Dongting. The lake contains about 90 islands, ranging in size from a few square meters to several square kilometers.

Lake Tai is linked to the Grand Canal and is the origin of a number of rivers, including the Suzhou Creek. The major cities around Taihu Lake include Suzhou, Wuxi, Changzhou and Huzhou. These urban areas form the core of the lake's cultural and economic region. University-led hydrological and ecological studies note that these four cities are the primary urban centers surrounding the lake.

The Shanghai–Nanjing intercity railway or Huning intercity railway (simplified Chinese: 沪宁城际铁路; traditional Chinese: 滬寧城際鐵路; pinyin: Hù–Níng Chéngjì Tiělù) is a 301-kilometer (187 mi)-long high-speed rail line between Shanghai and Nanjing, the capital of Jiangsu province. Hù and Níng are shorthand Chinese names for Shanghai and Nanjing, respectively. The Huning intercity high-speed railway largely follows the route of the preexisting Nanjing-Shanghai section of the conventional Beijing–Shanghai railway and the Beijing–Shanghai high-speed railway. Construction of this high-speed railway began in July 2008. The line went into test operations in early April 2010, and opened for full service on July 1, 2010. The line has a design speed of 350 km/h (217 mph). The journey time between the two cities has been shortened from 120 minutes to 73 minutes on nonstop trains.According to the arrangements of related departments, 120 pairs of trains are operating on the line, and the time interval between services is 5 minutes at the shortest.

The railway links major cities in the Yangtze River Delta, including Suzhou, Wuxi, Changzhou, and Zhenjiang, effectively making the southern Jiangsu city-belt operate like a single metropolitan region.

Jiangnan is a geographic area in China referring to lands immediately to the south of the lower reaches of the Yangtze River, including the southern part of its delta. The region encompasses the city of Shanghai, the southern part of Jiangsu Province, the southeastern part of Anhui Province, the northern part of Jiangxi Province and Zhejiang Province. The most important cities in the area include Anqing, Changzhou, Hangzhou, Nanjing, Ningbo, Shaoxing, Suzhou, Wuxi, Wenzhou, Yangzhou and Zhenjiang.

Jiangnan has long been regarded as one of the most prosperous regions in China due to its wealth in trade and very high human development. Most people of the region speak Wu Chinese dialects as their native languages.

Taihu Wu (吳語太湖片) or Northern Wu (北部吳語) is a Wu Chinese language spoken in much of the southern part of the province of Jiangsu, including Suzhou, Wuxi, Changzhou, the southern part of Nantong, Jingjiang and Danyang; the municipality of Shanghai; and the northern part of Zhejiang province, including Hangzhou, Shaoxing, Ningbo, Huzhou, and Jiaxing. A notable exception is the dialect of the town of Jinxiang, which is a linguistic exclave of Taihu Wu in Zhenan Min-speaking Cangnan county of Wenzhou prefecture in Zhejiang province. Speakers in regions around Taihu Lake and Hangzhou Bay, are the largest population among all Wu speakers. Taihu Wu dialects such as Shanghainese, Shaoxing and Ningbo are mutually intelligible even for L2 Taihu speakers.

Changzhounese (simplified Chinese: 常州话; traditional Chinese: 常州話; IPA: [z̥ɑŋ.tsei.ɦu] (pronunciation in Changzhounese)) is a variety of Wu Chinese, a Sino-Tibetan language family. It is spoken in and around the prefectural centre of Changzhou, Jiangsu. Being a Northern Wu variety, it shares many similarities with the Shanghainese and Suzhounese. It is not at all mutually intelligible with Mandarin, China's official language. It is much more closely related to the neighboring variety in Wuxi with which it is mostly mutually intelligible.

Phonetically, Changzhounese makes use of a number of voiced (or slack voiced) initials, namely [b̥ d̥ ɡ̊ d̥z̥ d̥ʑ̊ v̥ z̥ ɦ̥], that are not found in Mandarin as well as a larger number of vowel sounds, namely [ɑ ɐ ɔ o æ ə ɨ ɨʷ ɛ ɤɯ e i u y]. The tone system also is of greater complexity, using 7 tones based on traditional analyses. It also has a more complex tone sandhi than that of most other Chinese varieties.