Good news for museum fans in Beijing: An annual pass of museum tickets was released last week by the Beijing Museums Association, which will enable visitors to enter 115 institutions in the capital city to either for free or for discounted rates, in 2019.

The annual pass, costing 120 yuan ($17.3), is designed as a pocket book. It also offers a brief introduction to the destination as well as guidance for transportation and contact information. It is sold through post offices, Xinhua Bookstores, ticket offices of museums and the website, www.bowuguan.com.cn.

Most tickets in the booklet can be used for two adult visitors.

"We want to encourage family visits to museums, as children already enjoy free or discounted entry to many museums in Beijing," says Cao Wei, the general manager in charge of promoting the annual pass.

The list of museums in the annual pass includes many historical landmarks in Beijing, which are publicly-owned institutions run by city-level administrators, like the Confucius Temple and the Guozijian (imperial college) Museum, the Zhengyangmen Gate Tower by Tian'anmen Square, and Bell and Drum Towers.

Additionally, the city's most renowned privately-owned museums in Beijing are also included. For example, holders of the pass can visit the China Red Sandalwood Museum-a place displaying luxurious traditional Chinese furniture-for free, and also enjoy access at half price to the Guanfu Museum, the home of the antique hoard of collector, Ma Weidu.

Tickets to the Palace Museum, China's former imperial palace also known as the Forbidden City, are not included in the annual pass, but the pass can be used for the country's top-tier science museums, such as the Beijing Planetarium and National Zoological Museum.

"With the pass, museum operators hope to attract more public attention and they also want their collections to benefit society," says Cao. "The annual pass is an effective way to lower the threshold for entering museums."

If all tickets in the annual pass were purchased individually, it would cost more than 3,000 yuan ($432).

Beijing had 179 registered museums by 2017, making it the city with the second largest number of museums in the world, second only to London, according to statistics from the Beijing Museums Association.

The first annual pass for Beijing museums was released in the 1990s.

Some of the museums which have been added are the Beijing Soap Museum and the China Bee Museum, but some others, like the China National Film Museum, have temporarily quit the program due to renovation.

The annual pass in 2018 included 113 institutions.

Cao has endeavored to produce an annual pass for 15 years. His team also provides a series of auxiliary services.

Cao says: "When people visit museums regularly, they become thirsty for knowledge. So, they will not be satisfied with just a random walk in an exhibition hall."

As a result, Cao has organized more than 100 free lectures for the public since 2016.

The talks focus on traditional Chinese culture and ancient civilizations.

He also leads group tours to historical sites nationwide to echo the current exhibitions taking place in the museums.

He says: "For each lecture, we used to have only a 100-person capacity, so they sometimes sold out within three minutes. People's interest in museums has grown rapidly."

Some frequent attendees of these activities have since become volunteers to promote the museums.

One of them is Zhou Ya.

Speaking about the pass, Zhou says: "It is not only a book of tickets. It is a gateway to a different lifestyle."

She says it could also change the global image of Chinese tourists abroad.

"They (Chinese tourists abroad) are often unfairly labeled as people who just go shopping," she says.

"More visits to museums (at home) will help us nurture a cultural consciousness and make us naturally want to go and see local art when we go overseas."