U.S. Destinations Rush Plans to Welcome Return of International Visitors
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In an ordinary tourism year, the visitor revenue numbers that the U.S. Virgin Islands is experiencing would be great, particularly after a rebound from 2017 twin hurricanes. In the middle of a pandemic year, however, they are extraordinary perhaps as extraordinary as the territory’s overlooked ability to keep Covid infections well below five percent.
In 2020, the USVI received 415,749 air arrivals or just a 35.1 percent reduction from 2019. By contrast, the rest of the Caribbean experienced 65.5 percent stayover decline.
Hotels are currently at over 90 percent occupancy, according to the U.S. Virgin Islands Department of Tourism, and average daily rates climbed 43.3. percent in 2020. February 2021 hotel tax revenues reached $1.85 million or only a 28 percent decline from $2.5 million in February 2020.
More travel executives get their mission-critical industry news from Skift than any other source on the planet.Tell me more
Tornadoes, a pandemic, a George Floyd rally that turned violent, a bombing, and this week, floods. It’s enough to send any major city’s visitor economy crumbling, not to recoup in years.
But Nashville, a destination with one of the highest demands for hotel rooms in the U.S. pre-Covid, remains optimistic about the future of its tourism industry. Music City has begun experiencing a rebound this month. There’s the city’s high vaccine uptake expected to reach 40 percent by the end of April, bringing it closer to herd immunity plus Covid fatigued Americans on spring break.
More travel executives get their mission-critical industry news from Skift than any other source on the planet.Tell me more
Since the pandemic began, travelers have flocked to the tens of millions of acres of land the U.S. federal government owns in the American West. But the challenge of how to balance the influx of visitors with managing these often-fragile ecosystems remains daunting, panelists at the Skift Short-Term & Outdoor Summit said Thursday.
These lands, much of which is overseen by the Bureau of Land Management, are separate from those managed by the National Park Service. They lack some of the infrastructure of Park Service-managed territories, with fewer law enforcement resources, trail markings, and restroom facilities.
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