Port Authority’s New York-area airports set passenger record in November

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey’s airports saw their busiest November on record, the agency said Wednesday.

Total passenger volume hit 11.5 million people in November, up 3% from the previous November and up 7% from the pre-COVID travel period in November 2019. Still, on a monthly basis, passenger volume was down 7% from October.

Port Authority airports remain on track to see their busiest year ever, the agency said. Through November, 132 million passengers have passed through authority airports this year, up 3%, or 3.4 million, from the same point in 2019.

The authority said last month’s surge was boosted by record high passenger levels over the Thanksgiving travel period. Between Nov. 20 and Nov. 27, the airports saw 3.1 million passengers, a 3% increase from the previous holiday travel record set in 2022.

The agency’s airports include John F. Kennedy International Airport, LaGuardia Airport in New York and Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey.

The authority also reported that its Port Authority Trans-Hudson rail transit system saw its highest monthly post-pandemic total ridership in November.

PATH’s 4.3 million riders increased to 67% of November 2019’s total passengers, the first time the line linking New Jersey with Manhattan achieved two-thirds of its pre-pandemic ridership.

PATH’s average weekday ridership hit 176,612 last month, the third-highest average weekday ridership since February 2020, the authority said, coming in behind September and October.

Still, November’s total ridership was down 10%, or 455,000 riders, compared to October. The authority said the decline reflected the end of its peak travel period that runs from late summer through early fall.

Traffic at the authority’s bridges and tunnels continued at pre-pandemic levels.

The authority’s six vehicular crossings recorded almost 10.1 million eastbound vehicles in November, about the same level as the prior month and November 2019.

The authority said its cargo port continued to outpace its pre-pandemic levels, ending the year as the nation’s second busiest port for loaded containers.

The port system moved 644,439 twenty-foot equivalent units of containers in November, up 7.5% from November 2019, but down 13.2% from October 2023.

For the year, the seaport moved nearly 7.2 million TEUs, an increase of 4.2% from the same period in 2019.

The seaport remained the nation’s second busiest for loaded containers handled year-to-date, totaling over 4.8 million TEUs.