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People hit the road for Memorial Day weekend

LOWER SWATARA TWP., Pa. – Along the Pennsylvania Turnpike, there’s a mix of people you meet trying to get from point A to B. Some may be trying to g...

LOWER SWATARA TWP., Pa. - Along the Pennsylvania Turnpike, there's a mix of people you meet trying to get from point A to B.

Some may be trying to get from one end of the state to the other, like a group of girls on a traveling soccer team from Pittsburgh going to Philadelphia.

Others like Kelvin Davis drove much farther than that. He was driving from Fort Collins, Colorado to Atlantic City, New Jersey, almost 1,800 miles. He left Wednesday night and spent a night in Chicago before hitting the road again early Friday.

"We got everything set up as far as hotel room, just the usual, pack lunch versus eating out everywhere," he said as he stopped at the Highspire Service Plaza. "I'm trying to save a little bit of money like that and it also saves time."

More than 39 million Americans were projected to travel this Memorial Day weekend, according to AAA, the largest number since 2005. About 88 percent of those people are doing so in vehicles.

With those numbers, some wanted to get an early jump on traffic.

"Well, I was hoping to get here a little earlier, so I'd be ahead of the Memorial Day traffic but no, I wasn't worried exactly, but I would like to get to where I'm going before things get too bad," Steven Flanders, a New Yorker driving to southeast Pennsylvania, said.

The Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission expects 2.3 million vehicles to use the highway during the holiday weekend. It has suspended road work on the Turnpike until late Monday night.

Drivers in Pennsylvania are seeing about a 22 cent per gallon increase in gas prices from this time last year.

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