Chinese railways expected to carry more passengers

BEIJING - Railway passenger traffic continued to rise on Sunday, the fourth day of a week-long Chinese Lunar New Year holiday, according to the China Railway Corporation.

Some 9.02 million passenger trips are expected to be made through China's railway network on Sunday, up from 7.07 million trips made Saturday, the company said.

The railway system added 333 trains to meet the rising demand mainly from short family visit trips and tourism trips.

From Thursday, Chinese people began to enjoy a seven-day Lunar New Year holiday. A 40-day period of heavy passenger traffic, known as "chunyun," spans from Feb 1 to March 12.

During the 40 days, about 390 million passenger trips were expected to be made on railways, up 8.8 percent from the previous year's chunyun, according to the company.