Every university student is sure to get a seat for their train journey home this coming Spring Festival, said Liu Lianqing, director-general of the Shanghai Railway Bureau, yesterday.

Nearly 100,000 university students nationwide are expected to return home during the peak period starting on January 17.

In a bid to ease the annual ticket crunch, the Shanghai Railway Bureau started a group-ticket ordering system in mid-December of last year.
 
The bureau also set up group-ticket sales outlets in Pudong and Puxi on January 7 and 10 respectively, and added 18 more ticket-sale outlets to ensure that every university student can get a ticket home.

The bureau has handled more than 50,000 group railway tickets for university students to date and the remaining tickets will be sold before the Spring Festival, Liu said.

The Songjiang railway station will be included in the Shanghai's railway ticket sales network on January 17 to benefit students from the Songjiang University City, a conglomerate of several large universities.