The Spring Festival travel rush, or "Chunyun" in Chinese, has been in full swing as families reunite for the traditional holiday in the world's most populated country. Official data showed that over 3 billion trips are expected to be made during the day travel rush that started on Jan. As more cities are linked with the country's high-speed railway network and more technologies and services are introduced, a once slow and crowded journey is becoming an easier and cozier experience.
The word "Chunyun" first appeared in China in the s when an increasing number of rural laborers flocked into big cities to find higher-paid jobs. They would return to their hometowns once a year to celebrate the Lunar New Year with their families. Li Tengfei, a year-old salesman working in the eastern Chinese city of Suzhou, is among the millions of passengers returning home during the holiday.
This year, Li's journey back home took half the time thanks to the operation of a high-speed railway line in his home city of Fuyang in eastern China's Anhui Province. The over hour journey was a nightmare," said Li, who traveled home with his fiancee by bullet train this year. As a major labor export city, Fuyang has a total population of about In December , the city was included in the country's high-speed railway network, witnessing the historic moment of all 16 prefecture-level cities in the province entering the era of high-speed trains.
It is the preferred choice for many passengers," said Wei. The advent of the high-speed railway also shortens the travel time between Fuyang and Chizhou, a city in southern Anhui, where Chen Han, Li's fiancee, is from. It will be easier for my family and friends to visit me in Fuyang thanks to the high-speed train. It feels like the distance has been shortened," said Chen. According to the National Development and Reform Commission, around million trips will be made via railway during the travel rush.
In Anhui alone, more than 15 million trips are expected to be made by train during the period, 7 percent higher than last year.
