Delta variant impacting Tucson tourism over holiday weekend

[ad_1]

TUCSON, Arizona (KOLD News 13) – Restaurants and resorts look forward to a busy Labor Day weekend after a year of little to no travel. While visitors are keen to travel, Visit Tucson said it’s a hit or miss this weekend due to concerns about the Delta variant.

“People who make travel decisions still want to travel, but the challenge for Visit Tucson and the Tucson travel market going forward is group travel,” said Dan Gibson, senior director of communications for Visit Tucson. “Conventions, corporate groups, things like that.”

During the summer, Gibson said they would try to attract Arizonans from across the state to visit Tucson. With the school back up and running before Labor Day, Gibson says that Arizonans usually stay home over the holiday weekend rather than making those trips.

“As soon as the kids go back to school, the time will come, the parents will be locked up and ready to get back to this routine,” Gibson said.

Resorts, on the other hand, are seeing an increase in visitors coming from across the country. Cooler temperatures have attracted many guests and helped make up for lost business. Gibson said even some locals are choosing to stay at resorts rather than travel.

“We’re seeing hotels near full capacity, a lot of them are at full capacity, you will have busy times in a lot of these hotels, we’re just not running at full capacity,” said Gibson.

Gibson said it all boils down to getting more people vaccinated and working to stop the spread of COVID-19. He said both are vital to getting businesses back to normal, given that tourism has a $ 2.2 billion impact in Arizona.

“As we look to fall and our peak season starts in January, people are making travel decisions and a healthy Tucson goes a long way in maintaining many jobs and economic impact for our community,” said Gibson.

Copyright 2021 KOLD News 13. All rights reserved.

[ad_2]