NEW YORK (1010 WINS / AP) -- Holiday travelers hitting the road for the unofficial start of summer have some budget adjustments to make with gasoline prices at record highs.
1010 WINS Memorial Day Weekend Guide
But AAA still expects the roads to be crowded. The auto club estimates more than 31.5 million drivers will take to the highways. That's just slightly lower than last year despite the fact that the price of gasoline is more than 60 cents a gallon higher this year.
1010 WINS Video: Gas Prices Hinder Holiday Travel
The auto club says oceans and beaches seem to be the favorite destination.
Analysts predict the average price could rise as high as $3.90 a gallon this Memorial Day weekend and easily blast past $4 in coming weeks.
Some motorists say they are staying closer to home.
Over in the Garden State, fuel prices and economic uncertainty appear to be putting the brakes on travel over the Memorial Day holiday weekend in New Jersey for the first time since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.
AAA Mid-Atlantic estimates about 45,000 fewer Garden State residents will travel this holiday weekend than during the same period in 2007.
The numbers reflect fewer people on the roads.
1010 WINS Audio: Stan Brooks reports
AAA also predicts slightly fewer travelers will use buses, train or other mass transit.
Those who hit the roads will pay a record $3.69 a gallon for regular gasoline in New Jersey. That's 73 cents a gallon more than Memorial Day 2007.
The AAA Fuel Gauge says the least expensive gasoline is in Atlantic and Cape May Counties and the most expensive is in Mercer County.
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The main destination for most are likely the beaches. Just in time for the get-away weekend, the areas best beaches are announced.
Two Long Island beaches have been rated among the nation's best by a Florida professor who calls himself "Dr. Beach."
Stephen P. Leatherman, a Florida International University professor, has listed Coopers Beach in Southampton, and Main Beach in East Hampton among the nation's best.
1010 WINS Audio: John Montone reports
"Dr. Beach" picked Caladesi Island in Florida as the best beach in the 2008 ranking.
He compiles his list as part of the National Healthy Beaches Campaign, and this year plans a television special featuring the nation's best beaches.
And the best beach in New Jersey is ... Wildwood.
That's the verdict from residents and tourists who voted for months in an on-line poll to select the top spot on New Jersey's
127-mile coast.
A coalition of environmental and tourism groups sponsored the poll to select the state's 10 best beaches, and announced the winner Thursday afternoon.
More than 16,000 votes were cast, rating beaches based on water quality, access and aesthetics.
The three beaches that comprise the Wildwood resort area, Wildwood, Wildwood Crest and North Wildwood, all placed within the top four statewide.
"We are so excited but not surprised,'' said Ben Rose, a regional spokesman for the Wildwoods. "It shows that the 9 million people that visit the Wildwoods every year understand how fun it is here."
1010 WINS Audio: Alice Stockton-Rossini reports
Wildwood is an uncommonly wide beach, so much so that some visitors complain about the long walk from the boardwalk to the water's edge. That has led to some creative solutions, ranging from beach buggies to camel rides; the latter was quickly shot down.
Wildwood is also a hotbed of '50s doo-wop culture, and is home to many oldies festivals and antique car cruise nights. And it is one of only four Ocean beaches in New Jersey that don't require people to buy a beach badge.
Winning communities will receive signs announcing the honor, not to mention bragging rights in the highly competitive shore tourism market.
Voting had been done since early February, as New Jerseyans, as well as visitors from other states, weighed the relative merits of Garden State shore spots.
There was the nudist chic of Sandy Hook, the frat house din of Belmar, and the big-hair allure of Seaside Heights.
There was the Victorian splendor or Cape May (the No. 5 winner) and Ocean Grove.
There was the pristine splendor of Island Beach State Park, a place so good New Jersey's governor gets a beach house there.
And there was the family-friendly appeal of places like Ocean City, which bills itself as "America's Greatest Family Resort," or the eternal hope of a Bruce Springsteen sighting in Asbury Park (No. 6.)
Island Beach State Park won a special award for best beach for ecotourism, due largely to the fact that it is almost completely undeveloped aside from the governor's summer house, a beach pavilion and a handful of small maintenance and rescue buildings.
"New Jersey's beaches remain among the safest and cleanest in the entire country,'' said Lisa Jackson, the state's environmental protection commissioner. "That's not an overstatement or hyperbole; that's simply the truth. We are extraordinarily blessed in this state."
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