If you do not count the increases in gasoline, renting a car will be fairly reasonable cost wise in 2008. The cost increases will be about 4 percent or less, owing mainly to the weakness in Detroit and the deals car manufacturers will be offering the large rental car companies.

Automobile renters with corporate accounts are not expected to see much of an increase as the bargaining power for the companies is still very strong. So if you are a small businessman or family looking to rent a car expect to see a modest increase in the price of a car rental when you travel.

The American Express Global Business Travel Forecast projects an increase in rental car rates next year of 4 percent or less.
Prices for airport car rentals “are a function of the number of people getting off of airplanes,” says consultant Neil Abrams, who advises companies on rental-car contract negotiations. “And as long as airline deplanements continue to rise . . . there will be some ability to raise” rates.
The National Business Travel Association forecasts a larger 2008 increase in rental car costs than does AmEx: 5 percent to 7 percent. But AmEx takes into account off-airport rentals, while NBTA does not.
Abrams and the NBTA expect the average rental rates paid by big corporations that can negotiate high-volume discounts with rental-car companies to rise only a bit, if at all.
To the extent that big corporations succeed in getting volume discounts, small companies and entrepreneurial business travelers will bear the brunt of rental-car companies’ expected revenue increases.
Gasoline prices also are likely to increase total spending on rental cars. via  IndyStar.com.

USA Today has the top 10 places to view Christmas Lights across the United States this year.

The top 10 are:

• Biltmore Estate Asheville, N.C.
• Dana-Thomas House Springfield, Ill.
• The American Club Kohler, Wis.
• The Farmers’ Museum Cooperstown, N.Y.
• Strawbery Banke Museum Portsmouth, N.H.
• Stowe at Night Stowe, Vt.
• Molly Brown House Museum Denver, CO
• Mary Todd Lincoln House/Hunt-Morgan House Lexington, Ky.
• Farolito Walk Santa Fe, NM
• Napa County Landmarks Napa County, Calif.

And I want to add one more to the list, Callaway Gardens just south of Atlanta has an amazing show called Fantasy in Lights.

If you are traveling in the coming year expect to see costs go up. The combination of a strong economy and inflationary pressures will push the cost of travel up in every facet.

Hotels will see an increase over the rate of inflation but of all the major categories will go up the least in terms of year over year increases. As a matter of fact, the rise in hotel rates will be the lowest since 2003.

Business travelers continue to show an affinity for upscale, luxury hotels like Ritz-Carlton and Four Seasons. And a large number of road warriors continue to find their way to midpriced chains like Hampton Inn and Holiday Inn Express.
In response, proprietors of those two kinds of hotel properties can be expected to raise their prices more than any other hotel types in 2008, according to PKF Hospitality Research.
PKF predicts the average room rate in the U.S. will go up about 5.3 percent, to just over $109 a night. But rates in the luxury segment will rise 6.6 percent to an average of nearly $309 a night. Midmarket hotels lacking formal food and beverage operations are forecast to bump up their prices 6 percent to $92 a night.
The American Express Business Travel Forecast paints a similar picture for hotel price increases next year: up 4 percent to 6 percent in the midmarket segment; up 5 percent to 7 percent in the higher-priced segments of the market. via IndyStar.com.

In response to heavy lobbying and a system that has not been certified, the passport requirements that were to go into effect at the end of next year have pushed it back a year. This will allow the systems to be set up properly, and give the lobbyists another year to spread their money all over Washington to the politicians.

The extension was added to the appropriations bill for the Department of Homeland Security.
Congress originally set Jan. 1, 2008, as the date that all travelers entering the United States from other countries in the Western hemisphere would be required to have a passport. The Department of Homeland Security proposed moving up that deadline to Jan. 8, 2007, for cruise ship and airplane passengers.
Now Congress has pushed back the passport deadline for land and sea travel to June 1, 2009. Passports or other secure documents could be required earlier than this date if the government makes a lower-cost identification option available and installs the technology to read these cards at entry points.
Congress didn’t change the passport deadline for air travel. Airlines already ask passengers for passports for international travel, even in the Western hemisphere, so the new requirement won’t disrupt air travel, according to the Travel Industry Association of America.  via the Dayton Business Journal

Holland America will add cell phone capability in March 2007.

HOLLAND AMERICA LINE will outfit all its ships with cell phone capability by March 2007, the line said; the service is currently available on the Volendam. The technology allows passengers to make and receive calls and send text messages on their own cell phones or personal digital assistants while onboard and be charged international roaming fees. The line partnered with SeaMobile, which provides the same service on ships for Silversea Cruises, Oceania Cruises and Crystal Cruises.

State Farm has gotten approval from the state insurance regulators to raise the policy premiums 50 percent in Florida. The scary part is that State Farm was asking for a 79 percent increase and had to settle for the 50 percent bump. The rates will effect new and current customers.

The rates, more than a $1,000 increase on a $2,000 premium, are effective Aug. 15 for new customers and Nov. 15 on renewals. State Farm Florida first sought an average 79 percent increase when it asked for higher rates in May, but the company withdrew that request earlier this month.

State Farm officials have said they sought the rate increase to enable the company to continue to underwrite coverage in the state. Other companies also have sought rate increases.

Allstate Floridian has pursued a different strategy, dropping Florida customers to reduce its risk from hurricane damage. Allstate has plans to drop 350,000 home policies. In March, the company had 529,000 Florida homeowners’ policies.

Nationwide has a pending request to increase rates by 71 percent on the 261,000 policies it has in Florida. via The Quad-City Times Newspaper

America West/US Air are looking for money anywhere they can find it. They have gone so far as to put advertising on the air sick bags on their flights. While pricing has bot been determined, the company is thought to be targeting companies like Dramamine to grace the covers of the thier air sick bags.  

Passengers should see the new, commercialized sickness bags in September, he said.
The ads are just the latest initiative the company has used to squeeze out a bigger profit.
America West, which merged with US Airways last year, had the first advertisements in the industry on tray tables, the first airline gift cards and the first in-flight meals for sale.
“Little things like that work,” said Michael Boyd, president of the Boyd Group, an aviation consulting group in Evergreen, Colo. “Barf bags have a lot of shelf life — people aren’t barfing as much in planes as they used to.”
The new bags drew a few chuckles among US Airways passengers at the company’s hub at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport.
“I would honestly pay no attention to an ad if I got sick,” said Nathan Vierra, 19, a student. “But hey, if skateboarders can sell ad space on their T-shirts, I guess why can’t an airline sell ads on barf bags?” via  MSNBC.com.

The newly christened Crown Princess had a dangerous list to the side that caused dozens to be injured and 33 passengers to be sent to the hospital. The ship that entered into service in June of this year. The 113,000 ton vessel had several floors flooded with seawater.

Do you wonder if Princess and the cruise industry just dodged a huge bullet and this ship is not seaworthy? Or was this just a fluke occurance that the steering problem that caused the roll was human error?

One passenger said seawater flooded several upper decks of the Crown Princess, forcing water from a swimming pool “like a mini-tsunami,” and breaking windows and furniture.
The vessel, with about 3,100 passengers and 1,200 crew, had just departed Port Canaveral on Florida’s east coast en route to New York when it listed badly to its left side, said Coast Guard spokesman Petty Officer James Judge.
The ship then righted itself before returning to port, where the Coast Guard said all passengers and crew had been accounted for.
Besides an adult and a child who were critically hurt, 12 people were seriously hurt and about 70 had lesser injuries, said Cape Canaveral Fire Rescue Capt. Jim Watson.
Thirty-three people were taken to hospitals, he said. Most had bruises and minor back and neck injures.

Dozens injured after cruise ship tilts - Yahoo! News.

It looks like all air traffic in and out of southern California is stopped as a power outage at the main radar facility occurred.

Tell me how this is possible.

A power outage at a radar facility Tuesday cut communications and brought incoming and outgoing flights in Southern California to a standstill, a Federal Aviation Administration spokesman said.
“We lost everything. We lost all power to phone lines, computers, everything,” said Allen Kenitzer, a regional spokesman for the FAA.
The outage at the Los Angeles Air Route Traffic Control Center was reported around 6 p.m., Kenitzer said, and the cause was not known.
The center is located in the high desert near Palmdale. via ABC News