Spring festival travel rush starts

Passengers check in at Shenzhen North Railway Station yesterday. Sun Yuchen

Train K4286, carrying 2,230 passengers from Shenzhen to Bazhong, Sichuan Province, left Shenzhen West Station at 1 a.m. yesterday, marking the start of the travel rush of the 2019 Spring Festival transport season.

During the 40 days, Shenzhen Station, Shenzhen West Station and Shenzhen East Station will operate 70 pairs of trains, including 27 pairs of temporary trains, to transport travelers for the holiday.

The Spring Festival holiday is the most important traditional holiday for family reunions.

Shenzhen North Railway Station will operate an average of 334.5 pairs of trains a day and estimates it will handle 10.87 million trips, an increase of 17.8 percent over the previous year. The railway station estimated that the peak will arrive the week before the Spring Festival, which falls on Feb. 4. During the pre-festival period, Shenzhen North Railway Station will handle 2.72 million passengers.

At a ceremony marking the start of the Spring Festival travel rush, the railway police said they will deploy 292 officers and three robots to ensure the safety of travelers, and curb ticket scalping, pickpocketing and other violations and crimes.

The robots can be put in automatic and manual modes and will be used for patrols. A net gun can be used by officers to shoot out a net to capture a suspect within 10 meters. It is also equipped with a fire extinguisher.

The third type of robot can stretch out its arm within a radius of 1 meter. The robot’s forearm can generate a 40,000-volt current to numb and disable the offender without necessarily causing physical damage.

At a ceremony in Longgang, migrant workers left for family reunions on free buses organized by the district. It is the fourth year that the district has given free tickets to workers. The bus routes covered 15 cities in seven provinces.

On the first day, China Southern Airlines handled 20,000 passengers, 10 percent of whom were children.

The first flight to Wuhan departed at 4:35 a.m. with a record 98 percent of the seats occupied. The airline’s Shenzhen company will add 1,170 flights, some of which will fly in the wee hours.

The Shenzhen transport commission estimates the city’s rail, air and bus services will handle 16.68 million trips, an increase of 3.78 percent over the same period last year.