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American Morning
Hitting the Road: Using AAA to Help Get Where You Need to Be
Aired May 24, 2001 - 10:18 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: As the long holiday weekend approaches, thousands of you are preparing to hit the road. We want to make sure your trip is not only safe, but also carefree. So throughout today and tomorrow, we'll be offering some advice in our "Hitting The Road" series.
CNN's Mark Potter is in Heathrow, Florida to tell us how AAA can help you this getaway weekend -- hello, Mark.
MARK POTTER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Miles. We're at the AAA national headquarters in Heathrow, which is just north of Orlando and this is the place where people have been coming to get their triptychs and their maps and to make sure that their trips go smoothly. And we know that there's going to be a lot of people on the road this weekend, maybe a record amount. And Janie, you know all about that. Janie Graziani, you're the spokesperson. You've done some telephone sampling. How many people do you think are going to be out there?
JANIE GRAZIANI, AAA SPOKESWOMAN: AAA is projecting that 34 million people will be traveling over the holiday weekend and more than 28 million of those will be going by car.
POTTER: And how does that compare to last year?
GRAZIANI: It's up almost one percent over last year and the previous year we had an increase of about three percent. So we can see that there is a little bit of a slowdown in travel, Mark.
POTTER: But even with the economy and the gas prices, you think there's going to be more people than last year. Why -- that doesn't seem possible to me.
GRAZIANI: It is possible. AAA research has shown in the past that people don't cut out their travel just because the economy is a little bit iffy or because gas prices increase. Mostly what they'll do is change the way they travel. For instance, they may cut a day off of their vacation so they're traveling less time or they'll travel closer to home so they don't have to drive a long distance.
POTTER: Well, thank you very much for your time.
GRAZIANI: Thank you.
POTTER: And of course it's important that these people hit the road knowing where they're going and what to expect and there are counselors here that deal with that. Noelene McCall is working on a map.
Where are you sending somebody right now?
NOELENE MCCALL, AAA CLUB COUNSELOR: This one's going, goes to Branson, Missouri, then to West Virginia to Fire Creek (ph) and then over to Blanchester in Ohio and then to Fort Mitchell, Kentucky; Hamilton, Ohio; Madison, Indiana.
POTTER: And you're keeping all that straight, right?
MCCALL: Um-hmm.
POTTER: And that's not the most complex trip you've had. You had one even longer than that, right?
MCCALL: Twenty-six stops all over the United States.
POTTER: And somebody has time to do that?
MCCALL: Um-hmm, this week.
POTTER: Well, keep up the good work.
MCCALL: Thank you.
POTTER: Thank you very much.
Mike, you're here. You're in charge of the maps and making sure that the maps work.
MIKE MOUSER, AAA CARTOGRAPHER: Correct.
POTTER: And we all know about the triptychs. We know about the maps that are available. But a lot of people may not know that on the Internet you can find this information. AAA has a site and there are others out there. Show me here what we can see on the Internet. We have a trip from, where, Orlando?
MOUSER: Yeah. What we've done here is we've pulled up a routing from Orlando to Atlanta, Georgia, and what this is, is this is integration of both map information and narrative information. What you can get is an overview map as your first tile, if you will.
POTTER: And quickly, what is it that people can see on these Internet maps? We have just a few moments here.
MOUSER: OK, what they can see is primary cities, roads...
POTTER: Construction sites?
MOUSER: Construction sites, scenic highways. There's also gas, food and lodging information along the individual tiles.
POTTER: And that can all be found on the Internet? MOUSER: Correct.
POTTER: Now, we're going to talk to you at length a little bit later this afternoon because you were a road reporter for AAA traveling around the country for nine years.
MOUSER: Yeah.
POTTER: And we're going to talk to him about accommodations and what people can expect out there on the road in America -- Miles, back to you.
O'BRIEN: All right, thank you, Mark. And as they used to say in the campaign, buckle up for safety, too. All right, we'll check in with you later.
As our series continues, we will take a look at defensive driving, how to prevent an accident when you hit the busy roads this weekend. CNN's Sean Callebs returns to driving school to get some helpful tips from a trained instructor. We invite you to tune in for that report. That'll be at 1:00 P.M. Eastern time.
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