Tibet tourism rises 60 percent last year, increasing pressure on transport, environment

Tourist arrivals in Tibet soared 60 percent last year to 4 million visitors, forcing the government to add hundreds of new tour buses to allay transportation strains, official media reported Sunday.

Tourism in the remote Himalayan region has roared ahead since the opening of a direct rail route to its capital Lhasa in 2006. An additional 775 tourist buses were recently added to the region's fleet, Xinhua said, bringing the total to 2,777.

The growth of tourism is part of an overall push to develop Tibet's economy, one that critics say is leaving Tibetans behind and threatening the fragile environment of the plateau _ the source of rivers that feed hundreds of millions of people in Asia.

In one sign of growing bottlenecks, Chinese state media has repeatedly reported on worsening traffic in Lhasa, an ancient city of Buddhist temples and stone buildings now largely subsumed by modern roads and infrastructure.

However, the government has dismissed criticism of its development policies as unfounded, accusing opponents of favoring the return of exiled Buddhist leader the Dalai Lama and Tibet's independence from China.