AAA expects a significant rebound in the number of Americans planning to travel this Memorial Day holiday weekend. And that includes those in Michigan.
More than 37 million people are expected to travel 50 miles or more between May 27 and May 31. That’s a 60% increase from last year, when only 23 million traveled, the lowest on record since AAA began recording in 2000.
In Michigan, more than 1 million residents are forecast to take a trip during the holiday weekend. That’s almost a 57% increase from last year, when fewer than 700,000 residents traveled, due to the pandemic. Here’s Adrienne Woodland, spokesperson for AAA-The Auto Club Group in Michigan.
“You know, it’s a year’s worth of pent up demand, and it’s being unleashed this summer. And it’s setting the stage for what should be a busy holiday weekend and a busy summer.”
Woodland adds a huge increase in air travel is expected as well, following an historically low year of air travel in 2020. This Memorial Day will see nearly 2.5 million Americans boarding airplanes. That’s nearly six times more than last year. However, even with those numbers, most travelers will hit the road instead. And with the high numbers on the roads, Woodland says not only should you prep your car for travel, but your wallet also. Michigan’s prices were already trending higher this week.
“Within the last week, we’ve seen a double-digit spike in gas prices in Michigan. And a lot of that was due initially to tightening gas supplies in the Midwest. And now, we also have the situation with the Colonial Pipeline. This outage could contribute to price increases. Fortunately, for Michigan the majority of Michigan gas stations should remain well supplied, because the state is not serviced directly by the pipeline.”
You can find more info about Memorial Day travel, at AAA.com.
