It's been a watershed year for air travel, and the Thanksgiving holiday season was no exception.
According to Transportation Security Administration data, 3.09 million passengers were checked in on Dec. 1, a new record and only the second time that number has surpassed 3 million. The previous record was set on July 7, when 3.01 million passengers were counted following the July Fourth holiday.
This continues the trend of holiday weekends setting TSA check-in records, as the Memorial Day and Labor Day weekends also reached all-time highs.
More than 2.8 million passengers were checked in by the TSA on Nov. 30 and Dec. 2 as well.
Emmy Hise, senior director of hospitality market analytics at CoStar Group, said U.S. hotel occupancy slightly increased year over year during the week of Thanksgiving.
"For the week of Thanksgiving, hotel occupancy was fairly aligned with last year’s levels. Peak occupancy was on Black Friday. The most significant year-over-year occupancy gains were from economy-class hotels on Friday and Saturday, likely boosted by those who chose to travel by car for the holiday," Hise said.
Corporate travel, conferences and conventions are generally muted around major holidays such as Thanksgiving, she said.
Preliminary CoStar hospitality data shows that hotel occupancy was up 1.5% in the month of November. While it's an increase over last year, it's lower than it has been in recent memory, Hise said.
"However, [hotel occupancy] did not break records like the TSA checkpoint travel numbers. From 2017 through 2019, November hotel occupancy was above 61.7%. Preliminary data says November occupancy is slightly below 60%," she said.