Vehicle traffic on I-15 at Calif. border sees uptick

By Kyle B. Hansen

Wednesday, Aug. 19, 2009 | 1:59 a.m.

Although the total number of visitors to Las Vegas has been on the decline, vehicle traffic on Interstate 15 at the Nevada-California border is up, according to numbers released Tuesday by the Nevada Department of Transportation.

The transportation department has about 100 automatic traffic recorders in the state that continuously collect data to create a monthly report. The most recent report shows traffic at the state line up about 8 percent this July compared the same month in 2008.

But more cars don’t necessarily mean more tourists: The total visitor volume to Las Vegas was down more than 6 percent through the end of June, according to the latest numbers from the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.

And as of June 30, the number of passengers who fly through McCarran International Airport was down 11.8 percent this year.

Those decreases haven’t trickled over to I-15 traffic between Nevada and California.

Numbers show an average of 46,558 drivers crossed the state line each day last month, up from 43,106 in July 2008.

On the weekends, an average of 54,351 vehicles crossed the line, up 6.34 percent from 2008. The weekday traffic average was 39,306, up 7.46 percent from last year, according to transportation department records.

In the Las Vegas Valley, traffic on the freeway at the Blue Diamond interchange remained essentially the same as last year, with an average of 102,783 vehicles daily.

At the Sahara Avenue interchange, traffic on I-15 in July was down more than 13 percent from the previous year. The most significant drop was on weekdays, when there was an average of 237,371 vehicles, down 14.85 percent from 2008, numbers show.

The Interstate 215 portion of the Las Vegas Beltway saw a small rise in traffic compared to last year. The transportation department tracks data at the Eastern Avenue and Gibson Road interchanges. The increase was less than a percent at the Eastern Avenue interchange, but was up 2.4 percent at Gibson Road.