Experts: Long Islanders, U.S. on record pace for holiday travel

  A triple bill of falling fuel costs, a long holiday weekend, and those staples of the COVID-19 pandemic — remote jobs and more flexible work schedules — have Long Islanders looking to take early summer trips in record numbers, according to travel experts.

AAA Northeast projects 5.74 million people — 7% more than in 2023 — will pass through airports in the metropolitan area and nationwide next week ahead of the long July Fourth holiday weekend. Kennedy Airport is expected to serve as a major travel hub, according to Lindsay Schwimer, a consumer travel expert for the travel booking platform Hopper.

Another 60.6 million travelers will take to the road, according to AAA Northeast, 3 million more than last year.

“We anticipate this July Fourth week will be the busiest ever,” said Alec Slatky, managing director of public and government affairs for AAA Northeast.

“Summer vacations are in full swing,” Slatky added, “and with the flexibility of remote work, more Americans are taking extended trips around Independence Day.”

Kennedy Airport, which ranked seventh from July 3 to 9 last year for travelers, is projected to move up two places for the same period this summer, with nearly 5,000 flights expected to depart, Schwimer said.

Some Long Island travel agents have reported a surge of clients looking to travel within the next week to 10 days and insist it's only the beginning of a summerlong rush.

In the past four weeks, the Transportation Security Administration has reported its five busiest travel days ever at airports across the country. The agency has predicted that on Friday, more than 3 million people will head to airports.

All told, 70.9 million people — 3.5 million more than 2023 — are projected to travel from Saturday through July 7, according to AAA.

For those Long Islanders taking to the air, the most common barrier between them and a stress-free adventure will be tardiness, according to Carol McParland, who owns Baldwin-based Superior Travel. With so many flights fully sold and last-minute tickets hard to come by, McParland said, a missed plane is sometimes all it takes to ruin or put a serious dent in vacation plans.

“We always tell people to get to the airport three hours before their flight,” McParland said. “It's better than standing in line stressed that you are going to miss your flight.”

Schwimer agreed.

“Flights departing after 9 a.m. are two times more likely to be delayed than flights between 5 a.m. and 8 a.m.,” she said.

Airfare prices are lower this year, with domestic tickets down 18% and international fares 7% cheaper on average compared to 2023, Schwimer said.

“Airlines have come back to what their normal capacity level was pre-pandemic and jet fuel prices are down,” she said. “It's all contributing to lower domestic airfare prices, and they're now at what we normally see in the summer.”

Travelers should avoid driving between the traffic-heavy hours of 2 and 7 p.m. from Wednesday through July 7, according to projections by INRIX, a Kirkland, Washington-based traffic analytics company.

Rental car company Hertz predicted Friday, Saturday and next Wednesday will be its busiest time leading up to the July Fourth weekend.

The price of renting a vehicle will likely average $48 per day nationally, according to Schwimer.

And 4.6 million people are expected to travel by other modes of transportation — primarily trains, buses and cruise ships — projected at 9% higher than last year, but still below the pre-pandemic number of 4.79 million in 2019, according to AAA.