Yeah and the town I went to literally had cars parked along every single street. I can only speak for myself, but I didn’t spend a single dime there. We brought a lunch and snacks and I was thinking of getting dinner while out but seeing how busy it was, I decided instead to gtfo of town before everyone else decided it was time to get on the road, basically a minute or two after totality ended. It was a “see something cool in nature” thing rather than a “go spend money” thing for me. I wouldn’t be surprised if it costed the region more money in police overtime than it brought in in tourist dollars. Though regions on the way there might have seen higher speeding ticket revenue, at least until the line of cars saturated to the point where no one was speeding (and turning left if you were going the other way would be difficult).
Yeah and the town I went to literally had cars parked along every single street. I can only speak for myself, but I didn’t spend a single dime there. We brought a lunch and snacks and I was thinking of getting dinner while out but seeing how busy it was, I decided instead to gtfo of town before everyone else decided it was time to get on the road, basically a minute or two after totality ended. It was a “see something cool in nature” thing rather than a “go spend money” thing for me. I wouldn’t be surprised if it costed the region more money in police overtime than it brought in in tourist dollars. Though regions on the way there might have seen higher speeding ticket revenue, at least until the line of cars saturated to the point where no one was speeding (and turning left if you were going the other way would be difficult).