Photo:VCG

China's railway passenger flow is expected to surge by 6.1 percent on Saturday, the first day of the 2021 May Day holidays, compared to the same day in 2019, as the country's tourism and consumption spiraled up to exceed pre-COVID-19 levels as the mass vaccination program is proceeding forward, data from the China Railway showed. 

The country's railway systems are estimated to make 18.3 million passenger journeys on Saturday, up 6.1 percent compared with the same period in 2019, according to data China Railway sent to the Global Times. 

Most of the passengers either take a tourism trip or visit their relatives during the holidays, data showed. 

This also exceeded the system's earlier estimation of 17 million passenger trips by railway on Saturday. In total, the company expected about 106 million trips to be made from Thursday to May 6 by railway in China, up about 0.8 percent compared to the same period in 2019.

The data pointed to a steady rally in China's tourism sector, with Chinese people rushing to travel after being locked at home for the past few holidays from early 2020 onwards as a result of the coronavirus. 

At around 11 am, China's Badaling Great Wall released an early warning saying that its online ticket reservations from Saturday to Monday reached 48.75 thousand people, reaching its upper limit for tourists under pandemic-control requirements. A video was also circulating on China's twitter-like Weibo showing a sea of people squeezing their way up the Great Wall.

The rebound of China's travel market coincided with the country's steady promotion of COVID-19 vaccination. As of Friday, more than 200 million COVID-19 vaccine shots have been administered in the Chinese mainland. Vaccine services won't grind to a halt during the May Day holidays.

Global Times