Good morning, and welcome to the Essential California newsletter. It’s Monday, Oct. 25. I’m Justin Ray.
California is home to some of the most popular tourist destinations. Millions of people from across the world come to the Golden State to see Disneyland, the Golden Gate Bridge, Yosemite National Park, and so much more.
However, the pandemic obviously meant tourism was going to suffer. April 2020 was the single worst month in the pandemic for California travel spending, according to Visit California, the nonprofit marketing group for the state. California residents spent only $2 billion. For comparison, residents spent $12.2 billion in July 2021.
The pandemic impacted tourism unevenly across the state. It might sound odd, but rural areas fared well during the pandemic, as city folks escaped living in close proximity to others. In fact, some popular rural California destinations ranked among the most searched-for spots on Airbnb, the company told the Guardian in Sept. 2020.
I looked into how California’s tourism recovery compares to its rival, Florida, and what the industry’s future looks like for the state.
CA vs. FL: A war for tourism
My colleague Hugo Martín previously reported on the battle between California and Florida when it comes to tourism. The two states had very different strategies for handling the pandemic: California adopted aggressive policies like social distancing and closures to prevent the spread, while Florida didn’t.
As a result, California had fewer infections. But Florida did manage to surpass California in three key tourism vitality indicators: total travel spending, hotel occupancy rates and the number of airline seats on planes bringing in visitors (however, at no point did Florida bring in more revenue than California).
In May, ahead of Memorial Day weekend, Los Angeles International Airport broke a 2021 record for passenger traffic. However, Visit California said in a Sept. 2021 report that both lodging demand and airline travel remain below 2019 levels.
An estimated 31.7 million people traveled in Florida in the second quarter of 2021 (between April 1 and June 30), according to Visit Florida. But there’s the thing: this number is only 2.2% below the number of people who visited during that period in 2019.
How California plans on helping the tourism industry
In order to drum up business, the state invested in a $95-million, one-time stimulus that supported Visit California, which in turn has started, among other things, “Calling All Californians.” The marketing campaign is meant to encourage residents to explore their own state.
California used a similar strategy following the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks — a time when Americans didn’t trust flying on a plane. Immediately after the attacks, California saw a 50% drop in tourism. But the state was able to patch up a significant portion of the losses by the end of the year with a campaign focused on those who are already here.
For tourism, there is a big day on the horizon: The U.S. will open its borders to vaccinated foreign travelers starting Nov. 8. The hope is that California’s tourism industries will regain footing with international visitors.
Visit California estimates that the tourism economy will surpass pre-pandemic levels in 2024.
And now, here’s what’s happening across California:
Note: Some of the sites we link to may limit the number of stories you can access without subscribing.
California’s job growth slowed last month, and its unemployment rate remained high as the state, still pummeled by the coronavirus’ Delta variant, struggled to recover economic momentum. California payrolls saw a net gain of 47,400 jobs last month for a total of 16.67 million. That was well below the 94,700-job rise in August, or the 101,500 additional positions the state averaged from February through September this year, state officials reported. In related labor news: After decades of stagnating wages and diminishing pension and healthcare benefits, followed by a grueling 19 months working long hours during the COVID-19 pandemic, many American workers are fed up. And a small but growing number are organizing. Los Angeles Times
Heavy rain unleashes mud, debris flows in Northern California areas burned by wildfire. Emergency response officials have been bracing all week for the worst days of the storm — and it finally arrived late Saturday evening. Light scattered showers in Northern California, already burned out by a summer of fire, morphed into an increasingly heavy downpour overnight. By Sunday morning, the torrential rainfall had shut down at least one critical highway as mud, rocks and unshackled debris flushed down denuded hillsides. Los Angeles Times
No comments:
Post a Comment