Sep. 7, 2003  - This summer's broiling weather coincided with a sizzling tourism season for San Diego County. However, the county may be starting to choke on its own success, as local freeways overflow with travelers.

After an uncertain, cloudy June, tourists poured into the county during sunnier July and August, mostly along southbound Interstates 5 and 15, and west along Interstate 8 from heat-blasted Arizona.

The county led the nation in hotel occupancy for six weeks, including North County. Carlsbad's Hilton Garden Inn reported a July occupancy rate of 94 percent and August occupancy of 96 percent. The Del Mar Fairgrounds reports racing attendance was up 8 percent over last year.

Todd Gabello, the general manager of the Hilton San Diego Del Mar, said August was the hotel's "best month to date." Gabello was quoted in a survey by the San Diego North Convention & Visitors Bureau. The bureau covers the North County area, including La Jolla.

"Our summer has exceeded even our own aggressive goals," Marty Goldman, the vice president of marketing for Harrah's Rincon Casino & Resort in Valley Center, said in the survey.

Harrah's occupancy rate was "in the 99 percent range," Goldman wrote. The resort achieved that rate in part with promotions marking the July 1 opening of its expansion.

But those amazing numbers were accompanied by massive traffic jams, the kind vacation-minded travelers don't find relaxing.

In what has become a ritual, southbound I-5 slowed each Friday evening under the burden of weekend tourist traffic. Eager to avoid an exhausting drive with no time left afterward to do anything but sleep, tourists are beginning to delay their travel until Saturday morning.

Hotel operators say they aren't sure what can be done, short of the expensive and probably impractical step of widening most of I-5 in the county. However, the widening of I-5 at the bottleneck of its merge with Interstate 805 is under way.

Tourist reluctance to drive on Friday evenings increases with the distance south they must travel. This means areas south of the merge are worst hit, while North County hotels aren't as badly affected. But as traffic increases, local tourism officials say they expect the squeeze to move north.

"Labor Day weekend had the usual challenges that have been exacerbated by traffic," wrote Paul Corsinita, the general manager of the San Diego Marriott La Jolla, in the survey.

"People are afraid to travel on Fridays and stay Sundays of three-day weekends," Corsinita wrote. "Saturdays are easy sellouts."

The Hilton San Diego Resort on Mission Bay gives Saturday morning arrivals keys to resort facilities in advance of their rooms becoming available, said General Manager Patrick Duffy. The guests place their bags in storage meanwhile.

Duffy and Sal Giametta, spokesman for the San Diego Convention & Visitors Bureau, said the trend of avoiding Friday evening travel began about two years ago.

The traffic is not an immediate threat to local tourism but more of a long-range concern, said Bob Rauch, a veteran hotelier and director of the Center for Hospitality and Tourism Research at San Diego State University.

"My best guess is that we matched our best year ever" in summer tourism, which was 2000, Rauch said.

As has long been the case, San Diego County benefits from its overwhelming popularity as what Rauch and other tourism officials refer to as a "drive market" destination. Driving vacations are more popular since the Sept. 11 attacks, and San Diego County is within easy driving distance of Los Angeles, the nation's second largest city.

September's traffic is expected to be much weaker, as leisure travel drops off. Business travel, still hurt by a slow economy, can't pick up the slack as it used to do in the fall.

For example, the Hilton Garden Inn in coastal Carlsbad, which had a 96 percent occupancy rate in August, expects an 81 percent rate for September, said General Manager Bob Moore.

"The return of business travel to a robust level is still 18 months away, but it has bottomed out and is on the rebound," said Rauch, who is also a director for the San Diego North Convention & Visitors Bureau.

Rauch said he expects to see more small- to medium-sized groups of business travelers in the San Diego North region. That's because office space is being snapped up in Carlsbad, Carmel Valley and Rancho Bernardo, increasing the market for business meetings.

North County doesn't get many guests attending large conventions, which are usually held at the San Diego Convention Center in downtown San Diego. However, strong convention business creates a "compression" effect, Rauch said. As downtown San Diego hotels sell out, visitors look for rooms farther north. This increases the occupancy rate for the San Diego North area.

Declining fall occupancy rates means hoteliers must get creative to fill rooms, said Cami Mattson, the president and chief executive of the San Diego North Convention & Visitors Bureau.

"Moving into fall is decidedly slow and Thanksgiving and Christmas are very dead for hotels," Mattson said. While visitors still keep coming to San Diego County, they prefer to stay with friends and family during the holidays. That means hotels will be offering more package deals and other incentives.

That's also what the San Diego Wild Animal Park is doing, said Ted Molter, the marketing director. The park launches its Mum Festival on Oct. 25, ending on Nov. 16. It's being promoted to the usual drive markets in Southern California. For example, Manhattan Beach is offering a bus trip to the festival.

For the Christmas holiday season, the Wild Animal Park holds its Festival of Lights from Dec. 12 through 23 and 26 through 30.

Year to date, attendance at the Wild Animal Park is "a little bit behind" that of last year, Molter said. But with the two big events remaining for 2003, Molter said it's possible the park could pull ahead by year's end.

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(c) 2003, North County Times, Escondido, Calif. Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News. HLT, MAR, HET,