Spring Festival travel rush has entered the second half of 2024. According to the data released by the Ministry of Transport, as of February 16th, there were 5.092 billion people moving in Spring Festival travel rush in the first 22 days this year.
What is the concept of this number? According to the statistics of the Ministry of Transport, in 2023, in 40 days in Spring Festival travel rush, there were 4.733 billion people moving across the country, which has been the highest in the past. Looking further ahead, from 2015 to 2020, during the period of Spring Festival travel rush, there will be about 3 billion people moving around the country.
This year, it took only 22 days for Spring Festival travel rush to surpass previous years in an all-round way. According to the forecast of the Ministry of Transport, when all 40 days have passed, it is estimated that there will be 9 billion people moving across the country, more than the global population of 8 billion.
There are many changes behind the amazing figures, including joy and reflection.
Source: Ministry of Transport
First, the hidden economic vitality in the figures
In the first 22 days of this year in Spring Festival travel rush, the national railways have sent nearly 261 million passengers, an increase of 24.59% compared with the same period in 2019.
With the improvement of people’s income and the development of China railway network, more and more people choose to travel by rail.
According to the information released by China State Railway Group Co.,Ltd., by the end of 2023, the operating mileage of China railway reached 159,000 kilometers, including 45,000 kilometers of high-speed rail. In 2023, 3,637 kilometers of new railway lines were put into operation in China, including 2,776 kilometers of high-speed rail, and the "eight vertical and eight horizontal" high-speed rail network became more and more dense. In particular, a number of new lines and stations such as Guinan High-speed Railway, Lixiang Railway and Chuanqing Railway in the western region have been put into operation, and people in some remote and ethnic areas can finally go home for the New Year by train.
In terms of civil aviation, in the first 22 days of this year in Spring Festival travel rush, the national civil aviation sent 46.792 million passengers, an increase of 18.65% compared with the same period in 2019.
In 2023, civil aviation accelerated its recovery, and the aviation companies of the three central enterprises greatly reduced their losses, and some private aviation companies have made profits.
According to the data released by the Civil Aviation Administration, during the Spring Festival holiday this year, 137,000 flights were guaranteed nationwide, an increase of 4.9% over 2019. Among them, the daily average number of domestic passengers is 14,138, an increase of 17.7% compared with 2019.
The biggest structural change in Spring Festival travel rush this year comes from road transportation. According to the previous forecast data, among the 9 billion passengers, there are about 7.2 billion passengers traveling on expressways and ordinary national and provincial trunk lines, accounting for 80% of the total personnel flow.
The data of the first 22 days in Spring Festival travel rush this year also showed that the number of non-operating passenger cars on expressways and ordinary national and provincial trunk lines was about 4.199 billion, an increase of 33.3% compared with the same period in 2019.
In the data, "non-operating passenger cars on expressways and ordinary national and provincial trunk lines" actually refer to private cars. More and more people own private cars, which is a reflection of economic development. According to the data, in 2023, the automobile industry in China officially entered a new era of production and sales of 30 million vehicles, and the number of motor vehicles in China reached 435 million.
On the whole, the flow of people will produce consumption and economic cycle. The flow of 9 billion people has undoubtedly injected a strong impetus into China’s new year tourism market and consumer market.
Second, is it inevitable that the bus will accelerate its "demise"?
According to the statistics released by the Ministry of Transport, the waterway passenger traffic and the highway commercial passenger traffic showed a "cliff-like" downward trend, which was basically "folded in half" compared with 2019.
The slow speed of water transportation is understandable to be replaced by other modes of transportation, but the commercial passenger flow on the highway mainly refers to passengers who take buses. The theoretical speed of buses is not much slower than that of private cars. Why is it falling so fast?
In this regard, many passengers who have taken the bus said that the main reason is that the bus is "dirty, chaotic, poor and bumpy".
Another reason is that after the epidemic, passengers pay more attention to privacy, and private cars are obviously better than buses in this respect.
However, considering the rapid growth of railways and civil aviation as public transportation, the second reason may not be as "fatal" as the first one.
As can be seen from the data, the base of bus passenger flow is not small, which is more than that of civil aviation and railway passenger flow combined.
Buses are accelerating "extinction", and these passengers can only flow to railways and civil aviation, or become private cars several times.
At present, railways, civil aviation and highways can’t undertake this batch of passenger flow well. During the Spring Festival travel rush this year, private cars on the road blocked the road into "pig liver red"; Air tickets and train tickets are difficult to buy, and all kinds of "second light"; Many people buy short rides when they can’t buy tickets, and stand all the way home, which makes the china railway high-speed train as crowded as the subway during the rush hour, so that it is difficult to breathe. It even takes an hour for the flight attendants to cross a carriage …
Someone asked, why don’t railways and civil aviation increase trains and flights? In fact, during the rush hour in Spring Festival travel rush, the online rate of railway trains reached 100%, and the utilization rate of airlines’ aircraft was close to 100%.
Of course, we can ask the railway and civil aviation to continue to develop, but after all, Spring Festival travel rush is special. If we simply want to meet the needs of Spring Festival travel rush, the railway and civil aviation capacity will be greatly wasted in peacetime outside Spring Festival travel rush, which will make enterprises fall into a loss-making dilemma.
In fact, if we turn our attention back to the highway, so many private cars will exceed the carrying capacity of the highway. As a public transportation, bus can not only relieve the pressure of road congestion, but also conform to the initiative of green travel.
If the bus service can be upgraded, perhaps many people’s trip to Spring Festival travel rush will not be so embarrassed as to be stuck in the road or crowded with trains like a subway for a long time.
Third, you should also be prepared to "go and go"
Among the 9 billion people’s movements in Spring Festival travel rush this year, the proportion of tourists is not low. Some people "just leave" and set off after booking a ticket to Hainan. As a result, when they bought a return ticket at the end of the holiday, they found that there were only a few business class tickets of 10,000 yuan left.
"Go to 1000 yuan and come back 10,000 yuan" is a true portrayal of some people’s holiday travel.
However, I believe that more people have booked their return tickets before departure. For example, some friends around the reporter flew to Hainan to fly to 1000 yuan for a return trip of 2,000 yuan.
It is foreseeable that the Spring Festival holiday is hot, it is difficult to book hotels during peak hours, and it is difficult to buy air tickets and train tickets. It is best to avoid some popular destinations when traveling during holidays. Even if you want to "follow the crowd", you should make plans and preparations to avoid the embarrassment of not being able to book a hotel or buy a ticket temporarily and not going home.
"Go and leave" doesn’t mean to think about other things at the destination first, but to arrange the trip immediately after "go" and then "go".
Considering the general environment of Spring Festival travel rush this year, popular tourist destinations should be avoided as much as possible. Instead of "leaving without preparation" and then being stuck in a dilemma during the trip, it is better to rest at home and feel more happy.