Americans accounted for 10% of travel in 2016 and nearly 29% of domestic overnight trips, a report says
With widespread concerns about travel to America, especially in light of the travel ban, many have asked: where are Americans going?
Travellers born outside the US accounted for almost 11% of all US international trips in 2016, according to the latest data by the travel industry intelligence group Phocuswright. Last year marked a decline, in contrast to 2015’s boom in travel to the US from those outside the country, which helped offset a 5% fall in domestic trips.
Bob Vitale, head of industry trends at Phocuswright, said this was largely due to the travel ban on those wishing to visit a majority-Muslim nation. “We can attribute this to the Trump administration policy, as a 6% decrease is already very significant, and the magnitude is going to continue to grow,” he said.
Phocuswright said the country’s biggest overseas markets for travel are Mexico and Canada, which accounted for some 7.5% and 7.1% of total trips, respectively. In total, those two countries accounted for more than 7.5 million trips in 2016. “Most of those trips were shorter in duration, for those who don’t need any private transfers,” Vitale said.
The data shows Americans account for just under 29% of domestic overnight trips. While the world’s busiest airports ranked in the top five for a large proportion of those trips, for those moving through domestic airports, a majority were between 45 minutes and an hour long.