China is expected to face another two waves of railway travel rush in the coming three weeks with tens of millions of people going back to work after their family reunions during the Spring Festival, or the Chinese Lunar New Year holidays.

The two travel peaks would fall between Feb. 3 and 7, and Feb. 14 and 17, respectively, the Beijing Youth Daily quoted the Ministry of Railways as saying on Tuesday.

In the national capital Beijing, the railway department would face even greater pressure than it did before the Spring Festival, which fell on Sunday, the ministry said.

The average daily passenger flow for Beijing railways to handle before the Spring Festival exceeded 300,000 people, the ministry estimated.

The Beijing railway authorities had advised passengers to avoid the upcoming railway rush by taking coach buses or using "outflanking tactics," which means to first go to neighboring cities by train and then come to Beijing by bus, according to the newspaper.

This year's Spring Festival travel rush, also known as "Chun Yun" or "Spring Transportation" literally, began on Jan. 14. During the 40-day peak season from Jan. 14 to Feb. 22, a record number of over 2 billion passengers, including migrant workers, students and tourists, will travel to and fro by train between cities for purposes of family reunion and tourism.

Initial statistics showed that by Jan. 27, more than 49 million people had traveled by railways, 4.862 million more than in the previous year.

The daily average passenger flow was 3.528 million people, 347,000 more than in the previous year. The number on Jan. 21 also hit a pre-festival historical high of 3.74 million, the railways ministry said.

China has added 6,620 trains to the rail network since the beginning of the "Spring Transportation," an increase of 997 compared with the previous year.

Source: Xinhua