THE AMOUNT of money people are spending on domestic travel has dropped to its lowest level for four years, according to the latest figures released by the Central Statistics Office.
The figures for July to September 2009 showed Irish residents spent €501.2 million on domestic travel in the third quarter of last year, down 15.5 per cent from a year earlier.
While the amount of money spent dropped significantly, the number of trips people took domestically remained steady, with a slight decline of 1.3 per cent to 2,512,000 over the same period.
The figures also showed Irish residents took 2,232,000 trips abroad, down 9.7 per cent on the previous year.
There was a large jump in the number of trips involving private vehicles and ferries at the expense of air travel. Trips using private motor vehicles increased 47 per cent to 197,000, while sea trips were up 29.8 per cent to 183,000 when compared with the third quarter in 2008.
Air travel fell by 15.3 per cent to 1,800,000 over the same period.
