Lost midst all of the attention given to the World Travel Market (WTM) held Nov. 7-9 was the release on Monday Nov. 7—WTM’s first day—in Washington, D.C. by the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Travel and Tourism Office (NTTO) of data for the first half of 2016 that reveal some slight but potentially significant shifts in overseas source markets and just as international visitors choose to visit the United States. The Inbound Report has culled some of the figures from the NTTO release and presents them here.
First, one might take a look at Table No. 1 and you will notice that the Middle East now accounts for 12.8 percent—one out of every travelers—of overseas travelers to the United States.
Second, it does not come as a surprise that London’s Heathrow Airport tops the list of airports outside the United States in the volume of international traffic to and from the USA. But that No. 3 on the list is Cancun, Mexico.
Third, Table No. 3 affirms the pre-eminence of airports in the gateway U.S. cities of New York, Los Angeles and Miami in the number of international passenger comings and goings.
Fourth, the U.S. legacy carriers—United, American and Delta—are securely at the top of the list of USA-based carriers in international passenger traffic to and from the United States.
Finally, in Table No. 5, one learns that the top-volume months for international travel to and from the United States are October, February and February—in that order—not the peak leisure travel months of May, June and July
