China's railways set passenger traffic record on first day of May Day holiday

According to data from China State Railway Group, on Friday, the first day of the five-day May Day holidays, China's railway network served a record number of passengers — 24.844 million people.

With 1,222 additional passenger trains scheduled, Saturday's passenger volume is expected to reach 19.7 million.

As of 8:00 a.m. on Saturday, a total of 117.18 million train tickets for the May Day holiday period had been sold through the 12306 railway ticket booking platform.

China Railways forecasts that during the May Day holiday period — an eight-day peak travel season from April 29 to May 6 — the national railway network will serve 158 million passengers.

Railway authorities are closely monitoring passenger flows and dynamically increasing transport capacity in response to demand.