Shenzhen's railway authority today starts selling long-distance tickets for the Spring Festival travel season between Feb. 3 and March 14, and airlines have also reminded people to book festival flight tickets as early as possible.

From today through Feb. 9, people can book train tickets by telephone four to 10 days ahead of their travel time, according to the railway authority.

The ticket-booking hotlines are 9510-5160 and 9602-0086, and operate between 7 a.m. to 9 p.m.

People who have successfully booked tickets need to pick them up at one of 29 designated ticket offices in the city by midnight the next day.

The ticket offices operate between 8 a.m. and midnight.

People can also dial 9602-0088 or 9510-5105 to book seats on long-distance trains departing from Guangzhou, but need to pick up the tickets in Guangzhou.

Meanwhile, Shenzhen Airlines and China Southern Airlines remind people to buy air tickets as early as possible, as seats on some flights are running out.

Most tickets for regular morning flights to inland cities of Changsha, Wuhan, Nanchang, Hefei and Nanyang after Feb. 13 have already been sold, although there are still many seats available on the extra flights and regular afternoon flights, according to China Southern Airlines.

Shenzhen Airlines said tickets for many flights to Wuhan, Changsha, Changde, Xiangfan and Yichang had sold out. The company plans to launch extra flights with more than 10,000 seats for the period Feb. 17- 21.

Shenzheners are expected to make 1.2 million trips by air, up 7 percent from last year. They are expected to make nearly 2.42 million trips by train, up 5 percent from a year ago.

Editor: Yan