The Long Triangle region is expected to send 97 million passengers for railway Spring Festival travel in 2025. The first extra passenger train was operated today.
On January 7th, passengers were queuing up to board the first temporary passenger train K1248 for the Spring Festival transportation in the Yangtze River Delta in 2025. Photo by Qian Xihong.
On January 7th, reporters from The Paper (www.thepaper.cn) learned from China Railway Shanghai Group Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Shanghai Railway Group”) that at 12:17 p.m. on the same day, the first temporary passenger train K1248 for the Spring Festival transportation in the Yangtze River Delta in 2025 departed from Ningbo Station for Chongqing North Station. The train carried 357 passengers from the departure station and began their Spring Festival homecoming journey.
The K1248 train passes through Hangzhou, Yingtan, Pingxiang, Huaihua, Chongqing North and other stations, with a total journey of 2128 kilometers and a scheduled running time of 32 hours and 38 minutes. As of 12:00 p.m. on January 7th, the first K1248 train had sold 1206 tickets, with a seating rate of 103.3%. Most of the passengers’ destinations were Huaihua, Chongqing and other places.
The railway Spring Festival transportation in 2025 will start on January 14th and end on February 22nd, lasting for 40 days. On January 7th, there were still 22 days to go before the Spring Festival in 2025, and long-distance passenger flow in the Yangtze River Delta to destinations such as Yunnan, Guizhou, Sichuan, and Chongqing had already started. In order to meet the needs of passengers returning home ahead of schedule, Shanghai Railway Group will organize the operation of temporary passenger trains from now on.
This year, the daily passenger flow in the Yangtze River Delta to Yunnan, Guizhou, Sichuan, and Chongqing is around 34,000 passengers. After the Spring Festival transportation starts, the passenger flow in the first week (January 14th to 20th) may double. The reporter learned that the Yangtze River Delta railways are expected to send 97 million passengers during the 40-day Spring Festival transportation in 2025, with a daily average of 2.425 million passengers, a year-on-year increase of 5.1%, which is a record high. The railway departments in the Yangtze River Delta have increased transportation capacity by adding passenger trains on peak schedules, with a focus on supplementing transportation capacity to popular destinations such as Northeast China, Yunnan, Guizhou, Sichuan, Chongqing, Changsha, Wuhan, Zhengzhou, and Nanchang to cope with the large passenger flow during Spring Festival travel.
