Golden Week crowds in China cast spotlight on safety at tourist destinations

Travel rush brings in vital spending but also exposes the sector's ageing infrastructure and uneven enforcement

- Michelle Ng

Before Beijing's Happy Valley amusement park opens each morning, its employees conduct security checks and run "empty car" tests on roller coasters inspections that will be repeated more often throughout the day as the park braces itself for an influx of visitors during China's Golden Week holiday.

Between Oct 1 and 8, hundreds of millions of Chinese will be travelling across the country, creating a surge that could overwhelm popular tourist sites such as the Great Wall and reviving longstanding concerns over overcrowding and safety.

On Oct 1 alone, passenger trips totalled 335.8 million, according to the Ministry of Transport.

From Hangzhou's West Lake to Mount Hua in Shaanxi province, famed for one of the world's steepest hiking trails, tourist hot spots across China have stepped up precautions, from using tools such as Al-powered real-time crowd monitoring to deploying heavier security patrols so they can keep the holiday rush under control.

China's domestic tourism boom, which has almost entirely bounced back from the pandemic-induced slump, is both an economic lifeline and a stress test, analysts said.

While the Golden Week travel rush brings in the vital tourist spending China needs to bolster its sluggish economy, it also exposes the fault lines of an industry where ageing infrastructure, uneven enforcement and gaps in emergency preparedness collide with soaring demand.

Ms MingYii Lai, a strategy consultant at Daxue Consulting in Shanghai, said safety rules are more rigorously enforced at flagship 5A-rated attractions, which tend to draw the most crowds, but conditions vary widely at less-developed sites.

"Ageing infrastructure and gaps in enforcement are particularly serious at lower-tier or privately operated sites, as well as in newly developed rural areas, where oversight is often weaker," she added.