Chinese tourists to hit the road for National Day break

People are expected to make 560 million road trips in China during the National Day holiday, according to the Ministry of Transportation.

The holiday, which this year has been merged with Mid-Autumn Festival to create a Golden Week, will run from Oct 1 to 8, one day more than usual.

As a result, traffic on the nation's highways is forecast to rise by 10 percent compared with last year, Wu Chungeng, a ministry spokesman, said on Thursday.

"We're expecting an average of 70.2 million road trips a day over the eight days," Wu said, adding that an estimated 15.9 million trips will also be made by water, up by 5 percent year-on-year.

To ensure sufficient services for tourists, transport authorities will put more than 840,000 passenger vehicles with a total of more than 1 million seats into operation, Wu said.?

Jiang Chenglong contributed to this story.?