People are reaching deep into their pockets to pay for gas this Labor Day — limiting how far they’re willing to travel.
Other factors like the higher costs of lodging and fares for flying are also putting a crimp on the three-day holiday.
Justin Kanton at Big Bear Mountain Resort is looking to lure some of those locals to the mountains after certain attractions were closed Labor Day in 2022 and 2024 because of wildfires.
“Labor Day is kind of our last big hurrah for summer as far as summertime operations,” Kanton said. “Definitely, a lot of people are going to be in town.”
When it’s not shoveling snow in winter, the resort company offers summertime activities like mountain biking, golfing at night with glow-in-the-dark decorations at its Snow Summit and Snow Valley parks. And this year, it’s also holding an inaugural rodeo.
But some travelers may find it tough to head to the San Bernardino Mountains, about 100 miles northeast of Los Angeles.
“I had to borrow $10 to fill up my tank today,” said Justin Wonacott of Anaheim, who works as a counselor at Set Free Anaheim, a church that supports recovering drug addicts.
“Gas prices are keeping me local,” said Wonacott, who was filling up his Toyota Sienna at the World Oil Express station in Anaheim along North Harbor Boulevard this past week. “God will provide but the high prices are definitely a hindrance for some people.”
Meanwhile, the American Automobile Association says Anaheim and Los Angeles will rank as a top destination spot in the U.S. for travelers over the busy three-day holiday — the seventh hottest spot in the nation.
Lodging statistics from CoStar, a real estate data firm, expect above-average charges for hotel rooms and higher occupancy — especially near Disneyland.
The average daily rates for hotels near the Anaheim theme park are up 6.2%, according to CoStar.
“This is due to very strong domestic leisure demand, booming convention demand and aggressive marketing programs by (Walt Disney Co.) and Disneyland resorts,” according to Alan Reay, president of Atlas Hospitality Group in Newport Beach.
Mike Waterman, Visit Anaheim president and chief executive officer, said visitors to Disneyland over Labor Day are coming from all over Southern California.
“The data we’ve been seeing shows Americans delaying their international visitations. They’re choosing to stay local, and with 25 million people within a two-hour or less drive to Anaheim and the fact that weather across the country has been crazy hot, plus Disneyland is a just a major draw — all those things really benefit our location. Families are choosing travel and experiences over personal goods.”
The only laggard locally has been spending on food and beverages, he said.
“I talk with a lot of the (general managers) on a regular basis, and the food and beverage component has been waning,” Waterman said. “I think that is a combination of GLP-1 (weight loss medications) and people just aren’t eating as much anymore, and consumers foregoing an expensive meal in a hotel.”
Lighter wallets
But while lodging shows healthy signs headed into long weekend, travelers are facing hurdles with high gas prices and overall inflation.
Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis with GasBuddy, a price-tracking service, sees a slight decline in driving over the holiday due to higher prices.
“I wouldn’t say Americans are immune to the high prices, but against the backdrop of people who lost their summer just a few short years ago because of the (pandemic) requirements, I think Americans don’t want to lose another year, so they’re going to push through where they can to pay for the gas,” he said. “They will gripe about it, but there are a subset of Americans who live paycheck to paycheck, and are cutting back on demand. But most Americans are just begrudgingly paying the higher price.”
The average price for a gallon of unleaded gas in California hovered at $5.73 a gallon Sept. 2 — more than a dollar higher than a year ago.
The price spike comes amid a prolonged U.S. war with Iran, which disrupted global oil supplies over the past six months. The fighting in the Strait of Hormuz, a key supply waterway, stopped the movement of 20% of the world’s crude oil.
The effects are being felt thousands of miles from the Middle East.
Michael Hegarty was taking care of his son’s dog in Anaheim over the Aug. 29-30 weekend when he pulled into the World Oil Express station to fill up his tank before heading back home to Phoenix.
Hegarty, a former press associate with the Obama-Biden White House in 2009 and 2010, paid $56.66 for just under 11 gallons of gas for his 360-mile trip in his Honda CRV.
“Hopefully, I can get across the (Arizona-California) border to buy cheaper gas with what I put in the tank today.”
The price of a gallon of unleaded gas sells for about 70 cents less in Arizona.
California sells the highest priced gas in the nation because its fuel is heavily taxed at the pump to pay for highway maintenance, local road repairs and other infrastructure projects.
Besides Hegarty, others throughout Southern California also are grumbling about gas prices heading into the Labor Day driving weekend, with some cutting back on plans for long trips to Las Vegas or travel across town to be with relatives.
Martinez Savannah of Perris said that she’s not traveling to Arizona for the holiday weekend to visit family because of the high cost of gas. “I understand why gas prices are keeping people from going far,” says Savannah, as she filled her tank at a 76 station along Main Street in Riverside.
Marissa Garcia of San Bernardino also has felt the sting of high gas prices. She travels hundreds of miles a week over traffic-congested freeways for her nonprofit work.
Each week, she drives to La Mirada in southeastern Los Angeles County, then to Barstow and Fontana for work. “I usually don’t fill the tank all the way. It’s too expensive. Rent is too expensive. Car maintenance is expensive and food is expensive,” said Garcia while filling her car’s tank at a Shell station along Second Street in San Bernardino.
This weekend, she plans to put her feet up and rest on Labor Day.
Fewer Canadians
High gas prices aren’t the only deterrent to travel this weekend. Southern California airports are seeing flat domestic travel with some losses in international travelers — but not all — as Labor Day approaches.
In fact, Canadians are staying away from Southern California because they are upset with the U.S. over unfavorable trade policies and taunting by President Donald Trump who renamed Lake Ontario as Lake America.
Visit Anaheim’s Waterman noted that travel from Canadians was down significantly in 2025 from prior years. The northern neighbor had held the No. 1 spot for visitors to Anaheim until last year when it fell to the No. 2 spot behind Mexico. He’s cautiously optimistic that a rebound for Canadians is in the works in the second half of the year.
“For 2025, they were resistant to come,” he said. “But I think over time, especially if you’re a die-hard Disney family, you can walk away for a year, but my personal prediction is that being two years away from Disneyland is asking a little much. They are starting to come back.”
According to new data released by Statistics Canada, Canadian travelers pulled hundreds of millions of dollars out of the United States in the first part of 2026 — the latest available figures.
The agency’s National Travel Survey released Tuesday, Aug. 25, showed Canadians cut back on trips, average visit length and spending on trips into the U.S. during the first three months of 2026, when compared to the same period a year prior.
Canadians made nearly 500,000 fewer trips into America and spent about $800 million less on those trips year over year, according to preliminary numbers gathered by Statistics Canada.
Feeling the squeeze
Los Angeles International Airport and John Wayne Airport have felt these traveler pullbacks.
While domestic travel is down in the low single digits at John Wayne, the total number of international passengers boarding and deplaning fell 29% in June, and 26% in the first six months of the year.
Air Canada, which offers one daily departure to Vancouver, carried about 10% fewer travelers in 2025, with no rebound anticipated in 2026. The airline is hauling about 34,100 fewer passengers through mid-August compared with 92,900 travelers reported in all of last year.
WestJet, which offers nonstop flights to Calgary, carried about 33% fewer passengers last year and is on pace to haul even fewer this year. The weekly passenger totals are down 3-5% since May compared with the same period in 2025.
“If this is any indication, we expect the Labor Day traffic to be down compared to last year,” said John Wayne spokeswoman AnnaSophia Servin, who blamed the lower passenger totals on the abrupt exit of Spirit Airlines on May 1, which shut down and stopped all operations.
The story is much the same at LAX.
The airport counted 23.6 million international passengers in 2025, down 1.6% from 2024’s 23.9 million. Traffic has continued to fall from overseas in the first seven months, off 2.7% to 13.5 million passengers versus the 13.8 million seen a year ago.
A noticeable highlight is an 8.6% drop in Canadian travelers headed to Los Angeles in the first six months, while daily flights with Air Canada fell 2.3%.
For all of September, LAX is forecasting a 1.9% drop in passenger travel from a year ago, according to a statement provided by LAX to the Southern California News Group.
Bright spot
With new airlines and flights into Asian and Mexican markets, Ontario International Airport has experienced modest growth in international passenger traffic — a slight 0.4% uptick in July versus the same year-ago month. Domestic passenger traffic fell 1.4% over the same timeframe.
“We see travel over Labor Day weekend, from our perspective, flat compared to last year,” said Atif Elkadi, chief executive officer of the Ontario International Airport Authority. “That is really due to unintended consequences of what’s happening in the world. We’re just kind of monitoring it and keeping tabs on it.”
Some of the factors for the “flat” air travel this year? “I think there’s the economy. I also think there’s the cost of fuel,” said Elkadi.
Air travel also is stagnating as more students return to classes ahead of Labor Day — including the California State University system at the end of August, he observed. About 70% of students in the nation’s K-12 schools return to school before September, according to the Pew Research Center.
“All of this plays a role into it,” Elkadi said.
