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Niagara Falls
Wednesday, March 27, 2024
Canada sees rise in US visitors in 2017.

It’s almost as if they’re escaping something — or somebody — with Canada seeing a rise in American visitors in 2017.

Okay, fair enough — it could also have to do with the fact Canada was celebrating its sequicentennial, but so far Statistics Canada numbers for 2017 show US residents made more overnight trips to Canada by both plane and car in every single month except February and March when compared to previous years, and broke decade-long records for January, June, September and October.

Here is a month-by-month breakdown of US travellers to Canada in 2017:

January: Saw an increase of 3.6 per cent from December and the highest number of visitors for since 2007. Trips to Canada by car, which account for two-thirds of all trips by American residents, rose 4.8 per cent.

February: Saw a decrease of 0.6 per cent. All provinces except Manitoba and Newfoundland and Labrador received fewer US travellers than in January.

March: Saw a 4.2 per cent decline from the same month a year earlier, partially resulting from a heavy snowstorm that affected border traffic in much of central and eastern Canada and the northeastern United States with same-day car trips being down 1.6 per cent.

April: Ontario saw a 6.4 per cent increase, up 3.7 per cent from March.

May: Saw a 5.3 per cent increase in visitors from 2016.

June: The number of US residents travelling to Canada rose to its highest total for the month of June in 10 years.

July: Two million US residents visited Canada during the month of its 150th birthday, an increase of 0.5 per cent compared with 2016. Of these trips, 698,000 were same-day trips by car. The number of US travellers making overnight trips by plane set a record high for the month of July. However, US travel to Ontario by plane decreased by 4.5 per cent compared to 2016. Of though four most-visited provinces, British Columbia, Quebec and Alberta recorded increases in the number of US travellers by plane compared with 2016. 

August: Saw a 3.9 per cent increase compared with 2016. This was led by overnight trips by plane with US residents making 403,000 overnight plane trips. Of the provinces, Quebec, which was celebrating Montreal’s 375th anniversary, was the province that recorded the largest increase in overnight trips by plane.

September: A 1.5 per cent increase compared with 2016, and the highest number of US travellers to Canada in September in 10 years.

October: US residents made nearly 2.1 million trips to Canada, a 1.5% increase from September, and up 3.1% from 2016. This was also the highest number of trips recorded for the month of October since 2007. The majority of the growth in October was led by overnight trips to Canada by plane, which rose to 413,000, up 8.7 per cent from October 2016.

Numbers for November and December have not yet been released.

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