Memorial Day weekend travel expected to be up; gas prices close to last year

While travel by air and other modes of transportation will be up this year compared to Memorial Day 2023, the large majority — 87% of travelers, or more than 380,000 Oklahoma residents — will take to the highways, the organization said.

The numbers of people in Oklahoma traveling by car and by plane are both expected to be up by 3.7% compared to last year, AAA Oklahoma said.

Meanwhile, the price of gasoline continues to drift downward and is about the same as last year.

“The news continues to be good for motorists ahead of Memorial Day, with gasoline prices again falling, making it four straight weeks of declines for the national average as we get closer to the start of the summer driving season,” said Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, a fuel price-tracking service, in a blog post this week.

According to AAA Oklahoma, the average price of gas in Oklahoma on May 17 last year was $3.16 per gallon, slightly more than the average price of $3.12 per gallon on Friday, May 17, this year.

In Tulsa, the average price on May 17 last year was $3.07, slightly lower than the average price on the same date this year of $3.12, according to AAA Oklahoma.

GasBuddy estimates that the national average will hold in the mid-$3 per gallon range for much of the summer, with potentially tens of thousands of stations falling below $3 per gallon throughout the next several months.

GasBuddy also forecasts that nationally, gas prices will average $3.58 per gallon between Memorial Day and Labor Day.

As of Monday, the states with the lowest average prices were Mississippi ($3.00), Oklahoma ($3.03) and Louisiana ($3.07), according to GasBuddy.

The states with the highest average prices were California ($5.14), Hawaii ($4.73) and Washington ($4.54).

Nationally, AAA expects the upcoming weekend period to be the second-busiest Memorial Day holiday travel period since the organization began tracking in 2000.

AAA projects that 43.8 million travelers nationally will head 50 miles or more from home over the period, a 4% increase over last year and coming close to matching 2005’s record of 44 million Memorial Day travelers.

“We haven’t seen Memorial Day weekend travel numbers like these in almost 20 years,” said Paula Twidale, senior vice president of AAA Travel. “We’re projecting an additional one million travelers this holiday weekend compared to 2019, which not only means we’re exceeding pre-pandemic levels but also signals a very busy summer travel season ahead.”

The “wildcard remains the cost of oil,” AAA said in a news release, “and unlike last year, there are now two wars — in the Middle East and Ukraine — that could roil the oil market.”

Air ticket prices are comparable to last year, with AAA booking data showing a 1% to 2% increase in prices for domestic flights, AAA said.

Tulsa International Airport “is preparing for an exceptionally busy summer travel season,” it said in a statement.

Airline seat capacity at the airport for this summer (May-August) has increased by 6% over last year. Airline seat capacity at an airport refers to the total number of seats available on all the flights departing from that airport over a specific period.

Across the U.S., the Transportation Security Administration expects to screen 18 million passengers and crew members over Memorial Day weekend, with the busiest day expected to be Friday.

The number of passengers at Tulsa International Airport in 2023 was the highest since 2008, airport officials said in January.

The airport finished with 3,144,567 total passengers last year, an 8.8% increase year over year and 4.6% over 2019. Just more than 3.3 million passengers went through the airport in 2008.