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New Year chaos

January 11, 2012

Half of the Chinese population now lives in cities. Once a year, former peasants go back to their villages to see their families. In terms of transport, it's a logistics nightmare.

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Passengers wait in lines to board their train at a railway station
China's train stations are swamped ahead of the Spring Festival next weekImage: Reuters

Beijing West is one of four big railway stations in the Chinese capital. Ahead of this year's Spring Festival, crowds have gathered as thousands try desperately to get hold of tickets. Military police with megaphones have been deployed to keep order.

New Year is the most important holiday in China and it is especially significant for migrant workers in cities who rarely get another chance to go home and see their families.

Mrs Zhang is frantic: "I am very worried I won't get a ticket. I want to be home by the 22nd," she says, wrapping herself up in a thick white coat to protect herself from the biting cold. Home for the 38-year-old is Nanchang in the southeast - a 20-hour trip from Beijing.

Logistic nightmare

Migrant workers wait to go home
Migrant workers only get a chance to go home once a yearImage: Reuters

Those wanting to travel are not the only ones who are stressed - the ticket sellers cannot cope with the demand and the fact that tickets can now be bought online or over the telephone has not eased the situation as much as the authorities had hoped.

"We have worked hard," China's deputy minister Hu Yadong recently said in an address. "But the main problem is that there simply are not enough tickets for everybody wanting to travel and we can’t solve that. There are also problems with the electronic booking system. Many people are suffering and we would like to apologize."

However, another reason why there are not enough tickets this year is that the government has invested billions into the high-speed rail network but neglected regular trains.

Neither the authorities, nor passengers are talking about this though. Mrs Zhang, who was not able to get through to the hotline and says she is not educated enough to use the Internet, plans to be standing in line at 5 a.m. tomorrow morning. "If there are no tickets, I don't know how I'll get home."

According to statistics, each Chinese person makes at least one round trip during the Spring Festival - that's some three billion journeys and twice as many as 10 years ago when there were fewer migrant workers and less mobility.

Next year is likely to be even more chaotic.

Author: Ruth Kirchner / act
Editor: Darren Mara

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