DC Area Is No. 1 Summer Travel Destination In The US: Report

WASHINGTON, DC -- If you're planning on traveling this summer, there is no better place to visit in the United States than the D.C. area, according to a new report.

WalletHub ranked 100 of the largest metro areas on 40 key indicators, ranging from cost of the cheapest flight to attractions to weather. The rankings list more heavily weighted cost and convenience, but attractions did factor in as well.

The indicators were grouped into six categories: travel costs and hassles, local costs, attractions, weather, activities, and safety. D.C. ranked in the top 10 for attractions, travel costs and hassles, and safety, and ranked in the top 20 for all of them except for local costs, where it ranked 84th.

The D.C. metro area, which included Northern Virginia and the Maryland suburbs, ended up with a total score of 67.34, just ahead of the Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford area. So a trip to D.C. is a better idea this summer than Disney World, according to WalletHub.

Austin, Chicago, and Atlanta rounded out the top five. Santa Rosa, Calif. came in last.

Each metric was graded on a 100-point scale, with 100 meaning the most favorable conditions for summer travel possible. For flight analysis, they collected data on April 19 and selected July 5 as the departure date and July 15 as the return date, because July is the most popular month for travel and the average American considers 10 days to be a good vacation length.

"To determine the shortest flight, we compared the departure and return flights and chose the longer of the two. For instance, if a departure flight from Washington to Los Angeles took five hours, whereas the return flight from Los Angeles to Washington lasted six, we chose the latter," WalletHub states in the report. "Considering the disparities in flight costs and travel times, we also chose the best deals for each metric within a $30 range or one-hour window. For example, if the cheapest round-trip flight from Washington to Los Angeles cost $700, whereas the second-cheapest flight cost $25 more but reduced the total travel time by two hours, we chose the latter. Similarly, if the shortest round-trip flight from Washington to Los Angeles took six hours each way, whereas the second-shortest took 25 minutes longer but saved the traveler $200, we again chose the latter."

D.C. was penalized the most in the "local costs" category due to the high cost of living, which is weighted at 40 percent in that category. The lowest nightly rate for a three-star hotel room is 40 percent of the grade, and those aren't cheap either, nor is the final element of that category, the average price of a two-person meal.

Fortunately, D.C. does very well when it comes to attractions, obviously, with plenty of museums, restaurants, and parks to choose from.

Image via National Park Service