SHANGHAI, Oct. 19 -- RESIDENTS aged 70 or more will have an extra present to celebrate the Double Ninth Festival today.

The Double Ninth Festival is a traditional Chinese festival for the elderly, and today they will be entitled to free travel on the city's public transport in the non-peak hours.

And the other 12 million regular daily commuters will also get a present - the current transit fare discount will soon be doubled for all those holding public transport cards.

This was announced yesterday by local government spokeswoman, Jiao Yang, who said that Metro commuters will be able to enjoy the transit fare discount with bus travel from Saturday October 27.

Jiao also announced plans to further cut public transit costs and offer more extensive discounts from next year.

At present commuters using public transport cards enjoy a 0.5-yuan (seven US cents) discount on their fares if they catch a bus within 90 minutes of the previous ride.

This discount started on some bus routes towards the end of last year and now almost all of the transit bus lines running inside the Inner Ring Road area offer the saving.

Starting tomorrow, the discount would be doubled to one yuan and the city's five Metro lines will also be offering the discount.

Testing and upgrading electronic systems to read the transport cards on the buses and Metro lines has already started, and quite a few transport card users have enjoyed the one-yuan discount.

The new discount does not apply for commuters changing Metro lines, however.

Shanghai citizens, aged 70 and over, can enjoy free rides on the Metro and buses outside of the rush hours (7am to 9am and 5pm to 7pm) on weekdays and around the clock on weekends and holidays.

The Maglevs, airport shuttles and tourist buses are not part of the free rides for the elderly.

Elderly people wanting to enjoy the offer have to show their red social security card.

Those who have not applied for the new cards yet can use their current social security cards or ID cards but only until the end of the year.

Shanghai has more than 1.55 million residents aged 70 and above, accounting for 11.2 percent of the city's total population.

Jiao said that transport authorities would increase policing next year to "further cut public transit costs."

One of the discounts to be introduced next year is for the ceiling fares for long-distance hauls on buses running from the city to the suburbs - down four yuan from seven yuan.

As well the discount fares will cover all local buses across the city.

"The latest improvements to the public transit fare system are considerable and will result in a substantial reduction in costs for local commuters," the spokeswoman said.

An average 7.5 million people take transit buses every day while the five Metro lines serve more than 2.1 million riders daily.