Packed parking lots at Colorado Springs Airport indicate record Thanksgiving travel

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) - Colorado Springs Airport's long-term parking lot filled this morning, thanks to a busy holiday travel season, one that AAA travel forecasters say will set yet another consecutive record.

Airport officials recommend leaving an extra 30 minutes early and giving yourself more time coming home because of congestion. They say Sunday will be even busier than Wednesday's travel.

"Colorado empties out at the holidays.  The folks are increasingly flying to where they're from, and where their families are. That's what happens when we're a growth state," Skylar McKinley with AAA said.

Mckinley says that 5.8 million of those folks will be flying domestically this year for holiday travel, up 2% from the year before, which was also a record-breaking year.

"The number has grown on an absolute basis in the past decade considerably, with some exceptions. There was a significant economic downturn during the COVID-19 pandemic. That was the first significant downturn in many years. Travel plummeted." McKinley said.

McKinley says that that trend has reversed, and cities like Colorado Springs benefit economically from the increase.

"That's good news for the airports when these folks head out of town, we see that same sort of economic activity during the Christmas and year-end holidays where a lot of Colorado neighbors head back to where they're originally from," McKinley said.