About 7.54 million people are expected to travel into and out of Hong Kong during the Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day festive period.

The Immigration Department said today this is an increase of 19.6% over the same period last year. There will be about 5.8 million travellers passing through land boundary checkpoints, up 21.3%.

The peak period of cross-boundary traffic will be September 27 and October 10. It is estimated that about 3.64 million passengers, an average of 260,000 daily, will use Lo Wu checkpoint, representing 60% of total estimated cross-boundary passenger traffic. The figure is up 6.4% over last year.

290,000 National Day travellers expected

The number of departing passengers at Lo Wu may reach a peak of 170,000 on September 28, while peak arrivals will be on October 3, with 190,000 people returning. Highest daily traffic is expected to reach 290,000 on October 1.

To cope with the extra demand, the department has arranged for 360 officers to reinforce boundary and sea checkpoints. Hong Kong and Shenzhen authorities will also strengthen co-operation and liaison to ensure smooth and orderly movement across the boundary.

A Joint Command Centre will be formed at Lo Wu to handle incidents and oversee traffic conditions.

Those holding non machine-readable multiple Re-entry Permits issued before December 17, 2001, are advised to apply early for a free add-on machine-readable label, to shorten their immigration clearance time.

Applications can be downloaded from the department's website.