“To many, the Memorial Day weekend is the start of the summer travel season and this year we expect there to be more folks out there traveling for the holiday weekend, definitely more than last year.”
That’s Adrienne Woodland, Spokesperson for AAA the Auto Club Group in Michigan.
And in fact, she says their AAA 2023 Memorial Day Travel Forecast shows more than 1.2 million Michiganders will travel 50 miles or more. That’s 79,000 more than last year and just 36,000 less than before the pandemic, in 2019.
Michigan travel numbers are set to reach the third highest in overall travel, just behind 2018 and 2019. An estimated 1.1 million Michigan residents will drive, which is 62,000 more than last year. Meanwhile, 66,000 are forecast to fly,
“So, both the airports and the roadways are going to be packed this Memorial Day weekend.”
AAA reports despite various inflationary pressures consumers spending is strong and Americans still want to travel…
“And because of that, we’ve seen demand come roaring back and our forecast levels for Michigan are actually the third highest since AAA began compiling these numbers falling behind only 2018 and 2019.”
State holiday travel figures are in-line with national travel numbers which are also still slightly behind pre-pandemic levels.
The Memorial Day holiday travel period is defined as the five-day period from Thursday, May 25 to Monday, May 29.
