PSP expects up to six million border crossings over 10-day CNY holidays

The Public Security Police Force (PSP) has said they are expecting some 5.5 to 6 million border crossings over the period of 10 days of the Chinese New Year (CNY) holidays from February 9 to 18.

This forecast was made yesterday by the director of the Public Relations Department of PSP, Lei Tak Fai, during a presentation of the contingency plan for the expected high number of crossings over the holiday period.

According to Lei, the PSP expects some 550,000 to 600,000 people crossing the border per day over this period, which will match the figure obtained back in 2019 or be even higher (+3%).

The police also said they expect the peak of entry of visitors to be reached on the third day of the new year (February 12), stating that the force is already implementing several measures to face the expected hike, to keep the public order and control the flow of people and vehicles.

Measures are also being enforced at the border control checkpoints to accelerate the process of border clearance and avoid congestion.

Lei also said that the police authorities will be in close contact with their counterparts of the mainland and Hong Kong to ensure a smooth operation on all sides.

More police and equipment to enforce crowd control measures are also being deployed to the most popular tourist attractions as well as the surrounding areas of the border posts.

The same official also said that the force will pay special attention to Taipa Village as this area will be targeted with a new pedestrian-only zone for the celebrations, which will force detours of traffic and changes on bus routes.

The area affected will be Old Taipa Village, with the traffic to be detoured at Rua de Fernão Mendes Pinto before the Former Iec Long Firecracker Factory into the area of the Carmo Swimming Pool, allowing the street to become pedestrian only up to the Luso-Chinese School of Taipa.

This arrangement will take place every day from February 10 to 18 between 12 p.m. and 7 p.m.

Due to the high number of people, crowd control measures have already been implemented yesterday afternoon at the area of the Ruins of St. Paul’s between 3:30 and 5:45 p.m.

The high flow of pedestrians around the Avenida de Almeida Ribeiro, Avenida do Infante D. Henrique, and the crossroad with the Avenida da Praia Grande also forced the PSP to special control measures in the afternoon and early evening yesterday.

In 2019, Macau saw over 1.2 million visitor arrivals during the seven-day Chinese New Year Holiday, the highest tally yet, according to government data. The figure amounts to an average of 171,428 arrivals per day.

Last year, Macau had 451,047 visitor arrivals in the seven days that the mainland counts as the Chinese New Year holiday. The tally was up 297% on the previous Lunar New Year, which fell in early February 2022.