COLUMBUS, Ohio – The lowest gas prices in three years will not spur Ohioans to jump behind the wheel this Thanksgiving, according to the holiday travel forecast from the AAA, which predicts about 20,000 fewer people will be on the state’s roadways during the four-day period beginning next Wednesday.
The auto club predicts 43.4 million Americans, including 1.68 million Ohioans, will travel at least 50 miles from home between Nov. 27 Dec. 1, a 1.5 percent decline nationwide and a 1.7 percent drop for Ohio, compared with last year, which is being blamed on renewed concerns about the econnomy.
“While the economy continues to improve, the sluggish pace of the recovery is creating uncertainty in the minds of some consumers,” AAA Senior Executive Vice President and COO Marshall Doney said.
Travel dropped by more than 25 percent during the Great Recession years of 2008 and 2009 when Ohio’s numbers fell to a decade low of 1.5 million travelers. As the economy began to recover in 2010, so did the travel volumes, peaking in 2012 when 44 million Americans and 1.7 million Ohioans flew or drove somewhere for the holiday, Doney said.
The vast majority of travelers will do so by automobile: 38.9 million Americans and 1.5 million Ohioans. Those figures represent a decrease of 1.6 percent nationally and 1.7 percent in Ohio.
Air travel is expected to decline for a third straight Thanksgiving, with 3.14 million Americans, including nearly 122,000 Ohioans flying this holiday. This is a decrease of 3.7 percent nationally and 4.1 percent in Ohio, the AAA reported.
The most popular day to travel is Wednesday, Nov. 27, with 37 percent of travelers leaving on this day while Sunday, Dec. 1, is the second busiest as 33 percent of travelers return home, the auto club said.
The AAA estimates that most drivers will experience the lowest Thanksgiving holiday gas prices since 2010.