Passengers line up to board the K1248 train at Ningbo Railway Station on Jan 7. [Photo by Qian Xihong for Tide News]

The K1248 train departed from Ningbo Railway Station on Jan 7, marking the start of the 2025 Spring Festival travel rush in the Yangtze River Delta region.

Carrying 357 passengers bound for Chongqingbei Railway Station, the train began its 2,128-kilometer journey through cities including Hangzhou, Yingtan, and Huaihua.

For many Chinese, the Spring Festival travel rush, or chunyun, is not just the beginning of Chinese New Year, but a journey of reunion, joy, and tradition.

With Spring Festival still 21 days away, China Railway Shanghai Group has moved quickly to deploy temporary trains to handle the growing demand for early travel.

According to railway authorities, routes from the Yangtze River Delta to regions like Sichuan, Chongqing, and Yunnan are seeing heavy traffic, averaging 34,000 passengers per day. Officials project these numbers could double during the first week of the official travel season beginning on Jan 14.

This year's 40-day Spring Festival travel rush is expected to set a new record, with 97 million passengers forecasted to traverse the Yangtze River Delta's rail network, a 5.1 percent increase over 2024.

To address this surge, rail authorities are adding about 400 extra pairs of trains and boosting capacity on high-demand routes to key destinations like Wuhan, Zhengzhou, and Nanchang.