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on the evening of september 14, the "beijing lantern festival" - the 2024 beijing mid-autumn festival and national day lantern festival opened at the beijing garden expo park, and a lighting ceremony was held. with more than 200 sets of lights in nine theme areas lit up simultaneously, the garden expo park was instantly immersed in a colorful splendor. this also marks the official opening of the beijing lantern festival.

the largest lantern festival in beijing's history, the beijing lantern festival, will soon be lit up at the beijing garden expo park. photo by tao ran, a reporter from the beijing news

the lantern festival has nine theme exhibition areas, including festival songs, beijing avenue, splendid rivers and mountains, beijing trends, colorful children's dreams, beijing opera, glorious china, phoenix dances in the sky, and beijing colorful lifestyle, with more than 200 sets of lanterns on display, including 75 sets of large and medium-sized lanterns, and a total of 100,000 lantern pendants. visitors can immerse themselves in the unique culture of beijing and the charm of traditional chinese culture while appreciating the dazzling lanterns.

"phoenix dancing in the sky" light group. photo by beijing news reporter li muyi

the beijing lantern festival officially opened to the public on september 15 and will continue to be exhibited until october 31. during this period, the daily operating hours are from 16:00 to 23:00, and the lighting time is from 18:00 to 23:00. the lantern festival has a total of 9 theme areas, and will continue to exhibit more than 200 sets of large, medium and small creative lantern groups. in terms of exhibition period, scale, specifications and design of lantern groups, it has created the history of beijing lantern festival.

tourists take photos of the "beautiful symbiosis" light set. photo by beijing news reporter li muyi

the lantern festival is based on the national intangible cultural heritage of zigong lantern craftsmanship, and creatively integrates beijing's traditional customs and culture and the capital's contemporary spirit. while appreciating the bright lights and intangible cultural heritage skills, visitors can also deeply experience the unique charm of beijing's hutongs, beijing life, and beijing customs through different theme areas and different lantern groups.

this lantern festival covers the mid-autumn festival and national day. during this period, the park not only set up various creative lighting groups, but also set up more than 150 catering shops in the two theme areas of jingcai life center and jingcai avenue, covering intangible cultural heritage time-honored food, state banquet food, and internet celebrity food.

travel tips for tourists:

the reporter learned from the transportation department that the "beijing lantern festival" overlaps with the mid-autumn festival holiday and is expected to attract a large number of visitors. in the evening, the traffic flow to the exhibition is concentrated, and the roads around the garden expo park, such as garden expo avenue, meishikou road, and beigong road, are prone to slow traffic.

beijing's transportation department has taken measures to provide citizens with transportation services for the beijing lantern festival. in terms of rail transit, on september 14, 15-17 (mid-autumn festival), 20-22 (friday to sunday), 27-28 (friday and saturday), and october 1-7 (national day), the last upward train at yuanboyuan station on line 14 (terminal jintai road station) will be delayed from 22:43 to 0:00 the next day. the nearby subway transfer stations qilizhuang station on line 9 and xiju station on line 10 are ready to deal with large transfer passenger flows.

before the show ends at night, the transportation department will extend the subway operation hours according to the actual passenger flow. visitors can take metro line 14 and get off at the garden expo park station, exit from exit b2, and walk northwest along garden expo avenue for more than 800 meters to gate 2 of the garden expo park; or take the special bus no. 115 shuttle bus to the north at the bus station to gate 3 of the garden expo park and walk into the park.

for ground public transportation, tourists can take shuttle buses of special route 55 and special route 115. special route 115 shuttle buses will run between the garden expo park station on metro line 14 and gate 5, with subway garden expo park station, gate 3 station, gate 4 station, and gate 5 station. regular bus fares and preferential policies will be adopted. during the lantern festival, the shuttle buses will start running after 15:30 every day, and the transportation capacity will be flexibly arranged according to the flow of passengers entering and leaving the venue.

during the lantern festival, two customized bus routes will be launched, namely beijing west station-garden expo park and fengtai station-garden expo park. visitors can follow the beijing customized bus app to make reservations for customized bus travel.

as for taxis (online-hailing cars), special drop-off areas will be set up around gates 3 to 5 of yuanbo avenue to facilitate travel for passengers taking taxis and online-hailing cars.

in response to the parking problem that self-driving tourists are concerned about, the relevant person in charge of the "beijing lantern festival" introduced that the organizer has expanded three parking lots around the garden expo park, with about 9,000 parking spaces, located opposite gate 4 and opposite the garden museum. at the same time, roadside parking lots have been opened on some sections of the road around the park. in view of the large passenger flow in the scenic area during holidays, it is recommended that citizens and tourists try to travel green.

source: zhidao news