New York City brought in 48.7 million visitors in 2010, a year-over-year increase of nearly 7 percent and the city's highest-ever total, according to an announcement from Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
"This past year was New York City's most successful year for tourism ever, and we're well on our way to achieving our goal of attracting 50 million visitors a year," Bloomberg said. "The strength of our tourism industry is one of the reasons New York City was less impacted by the national recession than other cities, and it continues to be one of the reasons we're growing faster than other cities today. The industry employed more New Yorkers in 2010 than ever before, and the $31 billion visitors spent this year supported our restaurants, shops, hotels and cultural institutions. We're constantly looking for ways to strengthen and diversify our economy, and growing our tourism industry is an important part of that work."
The city set records for hotel rooms added to the market and hotel rooms sold, and attendance at the city's cultural institutions rose.
The complete rundown of New York's tourism numbers:
* 48.7 million people visited New York City, up 6.8 percent from 2009 and surpassing early projections of 47.5 million;
* 39 million of the visitors were from the U.S. and 9.7 million from abroad - both records;
* The hospitality industry added 6,600 jobs over the past year across all industry sub-sectors; the industry employs the most people in summer, and July 2010 set a all-time record for total jobs with 323,200; the annualized average jobs for 2010 through November was 315,000, an all-time high, and all of 2010 is expected to set the new record when December job data is released later this month;
* 25.7 million room nights were sold, a new record, exceeding the previous high by 2 million room nights;
* A net total of nearly 7,000 new hotel rooms were added to the City's inventory, a seven percent increase over 2009;
* Average daily room rates rose to $330 in December 2010, an 8.9 percent increase over 2009;
* New York City's 1,200 nonprofit cultural organizations, which generate an estimated $18 billion in economic activity due to tourism, reported an average attendance increase of five percent;
* Broadway attendance so far this season is above 7.55 million, up 3.8 percent from this point last season.
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