Summer travel reshapes cultural tourism landscape

China's summer travel rush is in full swing. The national railway operator expects to handle 1.01 billion passenger trips over 62 days, and aviation bookings have hit new highs. Beyond the sheer numbers, the boom is reshaping the country's cultural tourism landscape.

In the first three days since the rush began on July 1, national railways carried more than 38 million passengers, according to China State Railway Group.

Aviation data platform Umetrip showed over 27 million domestic flight bookings for July as of July 6, up 89 percent from a week earlier. International bookings exceeded 5.9 million, up 19 percent. On July 5, travel platform Qunar recorded searches for summer flights doubling from the previous day, setting a new daily record for the season.

Tourists visit the Mingsha Mountain and Crescent Spring Scenic Area in Dunhuang, Gansu province, on July 19. ZHANG XIAOLIANG/FOR CHINA DAILY

The real story is not how many people are traveling, but where they are heading. Incremental traffic is flowing more to smaller cities rather than traditional tourism hubs. Flight bookings to Qinhuangdao in Hebei province surged 2.2 times, while Yili, in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, emerged as the top self-drive destination with popularity up 6.5 times, according to Qunar.

Airlines have responded by adding routes to match the shift. China Eastern Airlines has increased Shanghai-Urumqi round-trip flights by 51 percent and seating capacity by 30 percent. After its Shanghai-Yining route was relocated to the Hongqiao hub, flight frequency surged 130 percent year-on-year and now operates daily.

"Unlike the rapid recovery period of the past two years, this summer rush marks civil aviation's transition from full recovery to high-quality development. The market logic is shifting from competing on capacity to competing on efficiency," said an expert with flight data platform Flight Manager.

What draws travelers to these lesser-known places is increasingly cultural rather than scenic. Searches for intangible cultural heritage destinations rose 71 percent from the previous month as of June 12, according to travel platform Tongcheng, which noted that travelers are flocking to Jingdezhen in Jiangxi province, Quanzhou in Fujian province and Dali in Yunnan province, drawn by the idea of "traveling to a city for a craft".

Research tours have evolved from sightseeing to immersion, with industrial tourism searches surging 2.3 times, according to Qunar. Regional carriers are tapping the trend: China Express Airlines has launched themed products including Silk Road research tours in Dunhuang and Jiayuguan in Gansu province, and red tourism routes in Yan'an, Shaanxi province, while Juneyao Airlines has resumed flights to cultural destinations like Dunhuang, Jiayuguan and Xining.

"Travelers increasingly value the experience itself, and airlines are responding with differentiated products that weave local culture into the journey," said Li Xiaojin, director of the Aviation Economics and Improvement Research Institute at Civil Aviation University of China.

Active policy support underpins this cultural turn. In June, eight government departments, including the Ministry of Commerce and the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, issued joint measures to promote rail-tourism integration and expand service consumption.

Themed tourist trains are now running regularly. These include a panda-themed train through Sichuan province, a "Yangtze Delta Star" route, and a "Yichun" forest wellness train to Heilongjiang province, among others, China Railway announced.

The fusion extends to aviation as well. "Many airlines have shifted from focusing solely on trunk routes to coordinating trunk and branch services, and from pure price competition to differentiated products and services," Li said.

The reshaping extends beyond China's borders. The outbound market is surging, and the FIFA World Cup 2026 co-hosted by the United States, Canada and Mexico provided an extra boost. China Southern Airlines now operates seven North American routes with 38 weekly flights to meet demand.

(China Daily)