Number of Highway Passengers Increasing in China

Statistics show that the number of highway passengers in China totaled 7.09 billion in the first half of this year, up 9.7 percent from the same period last year.

This shows that more and more people are choosing to travel by bus, sources with the related department of the Ministry of Communications said.

China has invested heavily in highway construction in recent years. According to statistics, the country's total length of highways and expressways open to traffic at the end of 2000 were 1.4 million km and 16,000 km respectively.

Sources said that expressways between major cities and comfortable luxury buses are the main factors attracting more passengers.

Compared with the same period last year, the proportion of highway passengers in the total number of passengers using public transportation in China was up by 0.8 percent, statistics show.






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