Dan Peltier

While many headlines continue to depict Puerto Rico in tragic terms, and there certainly are plenty of areas that are still struggling, many hotels and restaurants are back on their feet and better than before Maria. The island's tourism industry is on its way to real change as it tries to put the hurricane behind it.

Any membership-based organization that wants to survive has to take membership feedback to heart. U.S. Travel is doing that in its move to double down on domestic travel promotion. With domestic tourism more than 60 percent of the U.S. travel industry, we wonder why this took so long.

It won't be a wave, but some consumers are warming up to the idea of booking a weeklong tour package online. The Travel Corporation sees more online travel agencies on the horizon and feels that consumer demand will cause these companies to cozy up.

History is often written by the conquerors, as the saying goes. In tourism, stories of places are often told by companies that aren't considering some of the most important voices from locals. Baraka is bringing some of these voices out of the shadows.

The White House's Roosevelt Room was filled with some of the U.S. travel industry's most powerful leaders on Tuesday. We'll be watching to see if that meeting actually produces any powerful results, and whether it helps get President Trump on the travel industry's side.

Destinations need data to know how to help their hotels, restaurants, and attractions market themselves. While they don't need to know anything too intimate about travelers, they're still making sure all their t's are crossed as more privacy rights laws take effect.

As more travelers become concerned with how their information is being used, the travel industry could learn a thing or two from Levchin's PayPal and his new company, Affirm, on how to build trust in an era of information overload.

Levitz uses her weaknesses as strengths and has remained a humble leader, despite the outsize impact she has had on Philadelphia's booming tourism industry during the past four decades. Every destination can learn something from her leadership.

Many destinations or small towns aren't prepared for waves of tourism after a box office hit makes travelers want to visit, but not Singapore. The island nation has been expanding its airport, hotels, stopover program, and luxury offerings for years as it waited for its turn in the spotlight with U.S. travelers.

UNESCO sites have to follow conservation and management criteria to maintain their designations, but many have slacked off over the years and put themselves at risk. Albeit, the organization doesn't view many of its most iconic sites most at risk from crowds as the most problematic.