How to treat Dalian as a new first-tier city?

After all, Dalian used to be a municipality directly under the central government, and now it is a sub-provincial city with rich background and status. But at the end of the traffic, surrounded by the sea on three sides, there is neither strong neighbor nor backup. To put it mildly, you are at the forefront of the development of the three northeastern provinces. To put it mildly, you are alone. You can't count on anyone, nor can you be counted on by anyone. After all, the economic structure of the three northeastern provinces was the same before, so the situation is the same in the face of changes. Dalian is nothing more than a maritime advantage, and it can also face Tianjin and Yantai across the sea in Bohai Bay. The rear area that really needs to rely on has not received sufficient support and help. As one of the dual-core cities in Liaoning Province, Shenyang bears more responsibilities, and the only resources in the province can only guarantee one of them. Now Dalian may sacrifice more opportunities and investment in order to strive for Shenyang to become the next national central city, and once Shenyang is restored, it will only improve the first place. Although this is beneficial to the long-term economic development of the province, for Dalian itself, it means more competition. From the Bohai Economic Belt, to the construction of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei urban agglomeration, to the integration of green smoke and prestige, the whole Bohai Sea still has a good concept. The rise of such a large-scale regional economy is still good for an established coastal city like Dalian. From the perspective of talents and investment in the short term, even Qingdao, which has developed significantly faster than Dalian in recent years, is facing severe challenges. It used to attract talents from the Yangtze River Delta and the Pearl River Delta, but now the rapid development of several strong cities in the central and western regions has attracted a lot of attention. So how do northern cities like Dalian judge the turning point of development? Population inflow rate is the most intuitive indicator and weather vane. If Dalian can continuously and steadily usher in the net population growth during the increasingly severe population competition, then it proves that the development is improving.