Given that the Route 66 Rendezvous in San Bernardino, Calif., regularly sees more than 500,000 visitors over the weekend, a slight drop in attendance may not seem to be a bad thing.
Until you figure that a 4 percent drop would mean 20,000 fewer people — no small thing.
The Press-Enterprise says the local tourism chief Wayne Austin is optimistic, but realistic about this weekend:
“In light of the economy, most of the fairs and most of the exhibitions are experiencing a little downturn,” he said. “I would be remiss to expect that we wouldn’t experience a little downturn, too.” […]
And now, with gas dipping below $4 a gallon, Austin sees an almost imperceptible drop in participation at the four-day event, which opens Thursday.
“I think that little drop in gas prices has gotten people out of their homes, realizing that maybe they can get their lives back to normal,” he said.
Well, maybe.
Two weeks ago, when oil prices were dropping steadily and bringing a lot of relief to consumers, I would have said that Rendezvous attendance probably wouldn’t have been affected at all.
But after Hurricane Ike and the fact many Gulf Coast refineries are shut down in its wake, gas prices popped back up and won’t go down for several more weeks.
If Rendezvous attendance indeed drops, it’ll be the victim of bad luck.