Las Vegas visitor volume showed a decline in April for the first time in 26 months, but Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority officials say it’s more the result of a calendar quirk than a cooling of the tourism economy.
The LVCVA reported Tuesday that 3.3 million people visited Las Vegas in April — the fifth highest monthly total in the last 12 months — but that was 0.9 percent fewer than April 2011’s total.
LVCVA officials attributed the downturn to there being five Fridays and Saturdays in April 2011 and only four this year. Officials also noted the International Sign Association convention, which drew 20,000 people in April 2011, didn’t meet in Las Vegas this year.
Air passenger and car traffic numbers were up, but citywide occupancy rates were down 1.2 percentage points to 86.5 percent. The average daily room rate for the month was up 2.6 percent to $108.42 a night.
For the year to date, nearly every major tourism indicator is up over the previous year. For the first four months of 2012, visitor volume is up 2.4 percent to 13.1 million people, citywide occupancy is up 0.1 percentage points to 83.7 percent, the average daily room rate is up 3.4 percent to $109.48, the number of passengers at McCarran International Airport is up 3 percent to 13.5 million people and the average daily auto traffic on Interstate 15 traffic from California is up 7.1 percent to 39,872 vehicles.
The only laggards on the list were motel occupancy, down 3.5 percentage points to 55.4 percent, and convention attendance, down 0.6 percent to 2 million.
Convention attendance has been down three out of four months in 2012, yet the number of conventions and meetings held in Las Vegas is up 27.5 percent to 7,716 in that period.
Visitor volume woes continue for Laughlin, which saw an 8.8 percent decrease to 186,875 people in April.
The LVCVA tracks visitor volume for Laughlin and Mesquite.
While visitor volume was down in Laughlin, convention attendance was up 22.7 percent to 10,878 people. Occupancy was off 4.8 percentage points to 64.3 percent, but the average daily room rate was up 0.7 percent to $49.34.
Visitor volume in Mesquite was up 2.6 percent to 97,374 people, but occupancy was down 5.4 points to 86.7 percent and the average daily room rate was off 4.5 percent to $57.28.