You’ll have more traffic to worry about if you’re going to Grandma’s house or anywhere else for Thanksgiving.
AAA says 48.7 million Americans will travel 50 miles or farther from home this Thanksgiving, up nearly 2 percent from last year. The agency says the roads will be the most crowded they’ve been since 2007.
AAA says nearly 1.1 million Hoosiers will hit the roads for Thanksgiving, up by more than 20,000 over 2015. Of those 1.1 million, nearly 980,000 of them will drive, up 2.3 percent from last year. Meanwhile, airlines will only see about 79,000 more Hoosiers for Thanksgiving travel, just a slight increase from a year ago.
“The Thanksgiving holiday period is one that lends itself to people driving for the most part simply because of the limited time that they have,” said AAA spokesman Greg Seiter. He says they also don’t go very far when they do drive.
Something else that helps: gas prices. It’s $2.08 a gallon in Indiana while the national average is at $2.15 a gallon. That makes for the 2nd cheapest Thanksgiving drive since 2008, when gas was only $1.85.
“The fact that consumer spending is up, consumer confidence is better,” Seiter says, “Rising wages and relatively lower gas prices are all helping to encourage people to travel.”
AAA is warning you to be prepared though. The agency says it expects to rescue more than 370,000 motorists over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend. Seiter says many of those are from preventable car troubles, like dead batteries or flat tires.
“Make sure that those tires are properly inflated,” Seiter said. “Make sure that your battery is fully charged or that you have a newer battery that’s going to be more dependable for you.”
AAA is also encouraging people to download their mobile app. The app, which is free, helps to map a route, find the cheapest gas and even make travel arrangements. It’s available for iPhone, iPad and Android.