Jacksonville’s Struggles Reveal the Pandemic Hardship for Travel’s Small Businesses

If there was an iota of a travel economy silver lining to coronavirus lockdowns earlier this year, it was that many leisure markets around the world — from the Greek island of Myokonos to Cape Cod in the U.S. — were still a few months out from their vital money-making summer travel season. Tour operators, hotel owners, and restaurateurs in these parts of the world at least had a few remaining off-season months to reconfigure protocols and adapt to a new normal — or at least what they thought might be a new normal. But in northeast Florida, the pandemic and its accompanying economic lockdown couldn’t have arrived at a worse time. “March, April, and May are our busiest months. That’s our revenue generation to pretty much carry us through the year until the fall,” said Lisa West, who owns the Addison on Amelia Island bed and breakfast outside Jacksonville. “To have the last guests walk out March 20 and the first guests back not until May 12 was a killer for us, an