Passengers are seen at Ningbo Railway Station. [Photo/cnnb.com.cn]

As the Spring Festival travel rush kicked off on Jan 26, Ningbo, located in East China's Zhejiang province, experienced a significant upswing in population mobility, accompanied by a noticeable shift in destination preferences.

Recent travel pattern data released by Baidu Maps reveals that the scale of population leaving the city during the period from Jan 26 to Feb 6 has hit a five-year historical high.

On regular working days, the primary destinations for outbound travel of Ningbo residents are typically located in the provinces of Jiangsu and Zhejiang, as well as the municipality of Shanghai. However, this pattern undergoes a yearly transformation during the Spring Festival travel rush.

For instance, on Jan 23, just before the holiday travel rush, 44 percent of those departing Ningbo headed to other cities in Zhejiang. Yet, on Feb 6, 77.86 percent of travelers from Ningbo moved to areas outside Zhejiang, with labor-exporting provinces of Anhui, Henan, and Jiangxi collectively accounting for 38.16 percent of the total. In other words, for every five travelers leaving Ningbo, two are heading to these areas. Furthermore, Hunan, Hubei, Guizhou, Sichuan, and Shandong provinces also featured among the top 10 outbound destinations from Ningbo.

In terms of city distribution, the top 10 most popular destinations for travelers leaving Ningbo on the same day were Taizhou, Fuyang, Hangzhou, Shaoxing, Shangqiu, Shangrao, Bozhou, Shanghai, Zhoukou, and Suzhou. Travelers heading to these 10 cities accounted for one-third of the outbound population from Ningbo during the same period.

The nation's transportation authority has forecasted that this year's travel rush period, lasting from Jan 26 to March 5, is expected to handle approximately 9 billion trips.