Beijing West Railway Station, the capital's largest station, is expecting a record turnover in passenger flows in July and August, said a station official.

The official estimated the station would see 7.55 million departures in the two peak summer months with a daily average of 122,000 passengers, up 12.8 percent from the same period last year.

The station would arrange one extra inbound and outbound service each on nine routes, bringing the total number of services each day to 121 each inbound and outbound, said the official.

Most of the trains departing from the station stopped at tourist destinations in China's central and western regions. The station had arranged special trains destined for former revolutionary bases such as Yan'an, Jinggangshan, Nanchang and Zunyi to accommodate the growing number of tourists to these areas.

China's railway authorities raised the maximum train speed for the sixth time on April 18 and 286 trains now run at up to 250 kilometers per hour every day. As a result, more tourists would are taking the train to popular destinations such as Chengdu, Chongqing, Kunming, Guilin and Urumqi.

The official said the station had arranged temporary trains to Urumqi, Chongqing and Chengdu to ease the traffic pressure. He estimated that passenger flows would be reach their height in Beijing from July 7 to 15 when college students began to return home.

China's trains carried a quarter of the world's total passenger and freight rail transport last year, but the country has just six percent of the world's operational track, according to the Ministry of Railways.

Source: Xinhua