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Director of Analytics: Garden City had about 54,000 people in town on an average day in 2024, holiday retail traffic hit record levels
Summary
The Director of Analytics presented cell‑phone and local counts showing an average daily presence of about 54,000 in Garden City in 2024, record Black Friday and parade attendance, and busiest semesters at the community college; she noted methodology limits for counting children.
Shannon, the Director of Analytics, presented a year‑end roundup of 12 metrics drawn from cell‑phone and local counting methods, saying the numbers help the city and businesses understand seasonal peaks and visitor patterns.
Shannon reported that "in an average day in Garden City, last year, over the last 2024, we have 54,000 people that are in town at some point." She said the estimate includes residents and people who commute into town for work, and that her team validated the methodology against on‑site counts at events (finding about a 3% margin of error in one comparison). She cautioned that providers do not track children's phones directly and that the methodology infers child attendance by other means.
Key findings presented included busiest shopping and event days: the speaker said Black Friday 2024 was among the busiest days for several retail centers, with Target and Walmart reporting high foot counts (Target ~8,400 people and Walmart ~13,000 on noted peak days), and a downtown Christmas parade that Shannon said drew about 13,000 people — the largest parade turnout recorded by the analytics team.
Shannon also discussed airport activity, saying November 2024 was the busiest month at the local airport in recent memory and that combined passenger counts across nearby airports show Garden City accounts for roughly half of regional passenger totals when compared with Liberal, Dodge, and Hayes.
Why it matters: These metrics inform planning for events, retail staffing, transportation, and marketing. Shannon emphasized that the figures are best used for trend analysis rather than exact counts; she noted occasional data limits and that some baseline modeling (for children and other subgroups) is inferred rather than directly observed.
The presentation concluded with an offer to share the methods and to provide follow‑up data for board members who requested comparisons with other local airports and historical trends.
