Spring Festival holiday sees 440m trips

BEIJING - Chinese made 440 million trips during the Spring Festival holiday, which lasted from February 9 to 15, transportation authorities said Saturday.

Railways handled 34.68 million trips with a year-on-year increase of 3 million trips, according to the Ministry of Railways (MOR).

Highway and water-based transport saw 399 million trips, up over 50 million trips compared with 2012, while the number of air-based trips rose 18 percent year-on-year to 6.42 million, the Ministry of Transport said.

Passenger flows peaked on Friday, with 7.4 million railway trips made by travelers returning to work, the ministry said.

The MOR added 783 temporary trains to the tracks to cope with the post-holiday travel rush.

Railway traffic has generally been orderly, the ministry said.