(Photo source: China Daily)

However, she knows that when the new Line 10 opens, her journey will be a lot less stressful.

"I really wish I could take the subway. It's faster and less painful," she said, doing her best to avoid the crowds and passing buses.

Scheduled to open in June, Line 10 will provide a high-speed link for commuters - and their elderly relatives - between Bagou in the west and Jinsong in the south.

On Friday afternoon, Zhou Zhengyu, deputy director of the Beijing municipal committee of communications, joined a group of journalists to try out the new route.

The 15.5-billion-yuan (2.18 billion U.S. dollars), 25-km line, along with two other routes linking the airport and the Olympic Green, will open in June, once testing has been completed - just in time for the millions of Olympic visitors, he said.

"But we won't slow down our construction plans once the Games have finished," Zhou told China Daily inside one of the line's new carriages.

"In fact, we will accelerate our development plans to provide an even better service for the people of Beijing."

Since the opening of Line 5 in October, the number of passengers using the subway has risen by more than a third, he said.

By 2015, Beijing's metro will stretch more than 561 km and feature 420 stations, Zhou said.