China welcomed in the Lunar New Year at midnight as its transport system struggled under the weight of hundreds of millions of passengers making a final dash home for a week-long holiday.

A vendor sells stuffed toy monkeys at the Temple of the Earth in Beijing on the eve of Chinese New Year, January 21, 2004. Residents in China's capital flock to temple fairs during the New Year of the Monkey, which starts on January 22, to enjoy performances of martial arts, acrobatics, folk dances and fashion shows. [Reuters]

In the capital city of Beijing, the country's first man in space, Yang Liwei, was the star of an hours-long, lavish broadcast on state CCTV television to count in the Year of the Monkey.

Wearing his trademark blue astronaut suit, Yang emerged two minutes before midnight on the special New Year program and said, "We salute our great motherland." The astronaut, who in October orbited the Earth 14 times in China's first manned space mission, also handed out autographs to enthusiastic members of the audience.

The government-set seven-day New Year holiday, called the Spring Festival, is for many among China's population of 1.3 billion a yearly chance to reunite with relatives at homes, to get together with friends, and for many to map out personal or family plans for the new year.

The holiday sees hundreds of millions of people travel throughout the country, with the government estimating 1.89 billion trips to be made over the holiday period -- the largest mass movement of people in the world and bigger this year than ever before.

The rush comes with fears over Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in many people's minds. Stringent check-ups are in place at major travel points, particularly southern Guangdong province, where the virus originated in late 2002.

Trains and other modes of transport are being disinfected daily to prevent SARS, which has been detected in three patients so far this year, from spreading, as a cold snap grips the country. By Wednesday, all three have been released from hospital, because this year's SARS thread is not that lethal.

On any given day, China carries almost a quarter of global railway traffic on tracks that account for 6 per cent of the world's total, and the Lunar New Year peak is taking its toll, with daily passenger flow up some 35 percent.

The Railway Ministry has added more than 4,000 standby railway cars and halted many freight trains, but still it cannot cope, with train tickets remaining one of the few scarce commodities in China.

While trains are popular for their safety records and low ticket costs, most people travel by bus, as migrant workers and students head to their home villages in often remote locations across the continent country.

And in a new trend this year, many people are driving themselves as China's new found wealth has allowed a growing number of Chinese to realize their dreams and own a car, while a new network of national highways allows them to get where they want to go.

Extra cash in the pocket is also seeing more people breaking ranks and traveling overseas, side-stepping the tradition that the Spring Festival period is spent at home with relatives, eating and drinking.

Planes were feeling the strain despite an extra 323 flights being added daily to schedules for the duration of the official travel period that runs until February 15.

According to a Beijing survey of some 60,000 Chinese, 65.3 per cent were heading home to be with family, 13.8 per cent were staying put and 7.2 per cent said they would travel abroad or domestic scenic spots for pleasure. Some 13.8 per cent have to work.

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