Mixed results for US newspaper websites a year on from the traffic surge generated by the US presidential race, according to Nielsen Online figures reported by Editor & Publisher.

The stats suggest that readers of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution spent 12 minutes more on its site in November 2009 when compared with the same period last year.

Half of the top 30 websites recorded a year-on-year increase in average user time spent on site, with the Atlanta Journal-Constitution posting the highest average time for the month at 23 minutes and 38 seconds.

But the New York Times’ website recorded the biggest year-on-year decrease in average time spent on the site by users. The figures suggest a drop of more than 19 minutes in the past year to a time of 17 minutes 17 seconds for November 2009.

Related reading on Journalism.co.uk: See the UK’s national newspaper websites’ traffic report for November from the Audit Bureau of Circulations Electronic (ABCe)