Florida beach cities 'ghost towns', local businesses down 30% this summer. [View all]

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

With over 825 miles of sandy beaches, Florida’s reputation as the perfect summer holiday destination has always been considered unshakeable. But this year, some business owners along the coast say the typical summer boom failed to materialize.

"Spring Break, really never happened for us, and then the summer swing, never happened for us," says Kirsten Smail, a marine educator for Dolphin Quest told ABC Action News. “It’s a ghost town,” confirmed Amber Simmons, General Manager at Pirates Pub & Grub. "It's the slowest year we've had since 2020."

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Changing tourism mix

A key factor dragging business for some Gulf Coast tourist destinations is the lack of foreign arrivals — particularly from Canada. Canadian visitors, long a lifeline for Florida’s Gulf Coast, are pulling back as diplomatic tensions rise and border crossings plunge. As the Trump administration ramps up its trade war and diplomatic spat, the so-called “snowbirds” from the north are changing their travel plans.

The number of Canadians taking road trips across the U.S. border dropped 37% year-over-year in July, according to Statistics Canada. Air travel was down 26% over the same period. This was the seventh consecutive month of declining tourism from Canada.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/florida-beach-cities-ghost-towns-190000484.html

Heckuva job Trumpy.