Toronto tourists set a new tourism record in 2017, spending close to $9 billion dollars in the region last year.Visitors spent a total of $8,840,000,000, up $700 million from last year.
Toronto Tourism said that approximately 43,730,000 visitors came to Toronto last year, a 3.6 per cent increase from 2016.The city saw 28,200,000 same-day visitors and 15,530,000 overnight visitors.
An estimated 26,700,000 same-day travellers and 10,400,000 overnight visitors came from other Canadian cities.
Toronto saw 2,973,000 overnight visitors from the United States who spent a total of about $1,763,000,000.About 2,150,000 overnight visitors came from overseas, spending more than $2 billion.
The city also saw a spike in visits from Mexico, with 75,000 visitors in 2017, up from 44,000 the previous year.
Johanne Bélanger, president and CEO of Tourism Toronto, said in a news release, “More and more, world travellers are seeing Toronto as an exciting urban destination, and we’re seeing that with both a record number of visitors and visitor spending.”
Tourism Toronto said hotels in the region sold more than 10,000,000 room nights last year and had an occupancy rate of 76.1 per cent.
Large business conferences and the Invictus Games were among the events that drove visitors to the city last year, Tourism Toronto noted.
Bélanger’s statement continued, “Now that 2018 is here, we can look forward to the 24 city-wide conferences and events taking place throughout the Toronto region, the most Toronto has hosted in a single year.”
“Future growth indicators for the visitor economy remain strong, and that benefits Canada, Ontario, the greater Toronto region and the 329,000 people that work in tourism-related industries.”
Speaking about last year’s tourism numbers at city hall on Wednesday, Mayor John Tory congratulated all of those involved in attracting tourist to the city.
Tory said, “People want to be here and they are coming here in increasing numbers from around the world and that is really good for our economy and really good for our city’s reputation.”
