Chinese Local Governments to Restrict Hazardous Chemicals Transport during Spring Festival

The largest human migration takes place in China each year during the Chinese Lunar New Year festival period. Hundreds of millions of people travel by cars, buses, trains, and airplanes to head back home during the Spring Festival. The great migration usually lasts for 40 days and places great pressure on the transport system across the country. For example, during the Spring Festival of 2017, 3 billion trips were made, among which 2.5 billion were by road.

The Spring Festival Migration starts on Feb 1st this year and will last until Mar 12th. To ensure safety during the great migration, many provincial governments have carried out special measures on the transport of hazardous chemicals and dangerous goods during this period.

• Shandong province will prohibit the running of vehicles for hazardous chemicals transport from 19:00 Feb 14th to 6:00 Feb 22nd.

• Sichuan province will stop accepting and issuing transport permits for highly toxic chemicals from 00:00 Feb 12th to 24:00 Feb 23rd. For the transport of small amounts of indispensable highly toxic chemicals, the traffic police department will arrange special route and hours and try not to affect the migration. 

• Shaanxi province requires provincial inspection stations on highways to implement 24 hours non-stop service during the migration period. The inspection on hazardous chemicals vehicles will be the top priority.

• Chongqing has begun a special inspection campaign on hazardous chemicals transportation. The inspection will focus on the qualification of the drivers and supercargoes, the functionality of the GPS of the vehicles, over speed driving and fatigued driving, and the safety system of the vehicles such as tires, brakes, fire distinguishers, etc.

• Hebei province declared that the 221 traffic police stations across the province have already entered Spring Festival Migration status and will pay close attention to the transportation of hazardous chemicals. The goals during the migration period are to prevent longtime traffic jams and to eliminate traffic accidents.