BEIJING, Jan. 28 -- More than 77.6 million people had travelled by train as of Monday since the beginning of the Spring Festival travel period, surging 16.3 percent year on year, official data showed.

China Railway Corporation released the figure on its website late Monday.

It predicted earlier that 257.8 million passengers would travel on the country's railways, up 7.9 percent year on year, during the 40-day "chunyun", the travel period around Spring Festival.

Every year, China experiences chunyun, as millions of Chinese go home for family reunions. This year's chunyun started on Jan. 16, and Spring Festival falls on Jan. 31.

Huge flows of migrant workers and college students on winter vacation pushed up train passenger numbers, the railway corporation said.

After years of fast development, China's railways topped 100,000 kilometers in 2013, of which more than 10,000 kilometers are high-speed railways.

China has also worked to facilitate ticket booking, including setting up a website for online booking, which saves queueing times for train tickets.