Here Are The Busiest Travel Days For Thanksgiving In Minnesota

If you’re going to be heading over the river and through the woods this Thanksgiving, here’s the latest updated information about just which days will be the busiest in the air and on the roads here in Minnesota.
Thanksgiving is set for Thursday, November 28th this year, which is fairly late. In fact, it’s *the* latest date on which Thanksgiving can fall. The Farmers’ Almanac notes that since 1941, Thanksgiving has been held on the fourth Thursday in November. So if you do the math, sure enough, Thanksgiving can’t ever fall on a date later than November 28th. (November 22nd would then be the earliest date on which Thanksgiving could fall, btw.)
These days, if you’re like many Minnesotans, the Thanksgiving holiday involves traveling. In fact, Thanksgiving is now *the* biggest holiday for traveling here in Minnesota and across the country. According to the latest information from AAA, over 79.9 million travelers will head 50 miles or more from home over the Thanksgiving holiday this year. That’s 1.7 million more people compared to last year and 2 million more before that pandemic in 2019.
Here in the Bold North, however, most of that Thanksgiving traveling involves driving, with AAA noting that over 89 percent of travel for Turkey Day is done in the car. And we’re not alone here in Minnesota, either.
AAA now projects a record 71.7 million people will travel by car this year over Thanksgiving – that’s an additional 1.3 million travelers on the road compared to last year. This year’s number also surpasses pre-pandemic numbers when 70.6 million people drove to their Thanksgiving destinations in 2019.
All those travelers will make for a busy couple of days at airports like the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport in Bloomington. The Transportation Safety Administration (TSA) said over 3 million travelers went through security checkpoints on the Sunday after Thanksgiving last year, a 9 percent increase from 2022. This year, AAA is projecting 5.84 million people will fly domestically this holiday. That’s an increase of 2 percent compared to last year and a nearly 11 percent increase over 2019.
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So if you are packing the Crockpot filled with some delicious Thanksgiving food into the backseat with the kids and heading out, we now know just which days you’ll encounter the most traffic here in the Land of 10,000 Lakes. AAA says the worst times to travel by car over Thanksgiving are in the afternoon on Tuesday and Wednesday, November 26th and 27th.
The best time to hit the road, AAA says, is Thanksgiving Day itself when interstates and highways are typically clear. Drivers in Bold North returning home on Sunday, December 1st should leave early in the morning to avoid the busiest holiday traffic.
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Travel site Afar says between 2 and 6 pm on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving (November 27th) will be *THE* overall busiest time to drive. If your holiday plans have you on the road at that time, and you’re looking for the most updated traffic information, be sure to check out the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) and its Minnesota 511 website.
The Minnesota 511 site and app include real-time updates on traffic incidents and construction info, streaming video, road condition reports, traffic cams, searchable list views, and more. All good things to check before you hit the road this holiday season!
And once you get to your Thanksgiving destination here in the North Star State and consume all that food, if you’re tired of watching football, keep scrolling to check out a list of the 25 Best Thanksgiving Movies of All Time!