Fewer places to eat
Eight longtime area restaurants were forced to close in 2020.
Just over 176,000 passengers moved through Milwaukee Mitchell International Airport in November, new numbers show.
That’s up significantly from April when air travel in Milwaukee and across the U.S. all but stopped as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The pandemic continues to muzzle air travel in Milwaukee and the U.S.
Mitchell’s November numbers are still well behind the pace set in the same month a year ago when more than 526,000 people passed through the airport. Compared to November 2019, passenger traffic last month at Mitchell was down 67%.
That’s consistent with the downturn in air travel nationally as the pandemic has continued.
Airlines have been losing millions of dollars a day while furloughing, laying off and offering buyouts to tens of thousands of their employees.
The numbers are still better than April when just under 24,000 people passed through Mitchell International.
Meanwhile, air travel is picking up ahead of the Christmas holiday.
About 1.07 million people passed through the security checkpoints at U.S. airports on Friday and again on Saturday, according to the Transportation Security Administration.
USA TODAY and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
Contact Joe Taschler at (414) 2242554 or jtaschler@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter at @JoeTaschler or Facebook at facebook.com/joe.taschler.1.