Analyst: Gas prices to top $3.75 nationwide this spring

Racing to the next red light?

This is NASCAR country, people. Get over it.

 

Batman,
The country is 30-40 years (a figure I heard) behind other areas on the globe insofar as providing a viable public transportation system.
Where I live here now, in Europe, there are bikepaths, great trains and buses, lots of cheap, smaller airlines.

Some initiative by the government, too, would help to get some new, habitual behavior started.

The great thing is, it's never too late.

And yes, Bubba's trailer is "out-there"

 

The only metropolitan area in this country that has anything approaching a comprehensive transit system is New York.

The others are at least partly full of fail, and that includes the better ones such as Boston and D.C.

It's sad, really.

 

Chicago, with Metra to the suburbs, the El and CTA buses, has pretty good public transportation, IMO.

 

I call bullshit.
In the summer of 1999, I paid between 90-99 cents per gallon in NE Iowa.
Back in the same area not 10 years later, I'm paying triple that. ($2.99)

 

Gotta agree. I recall gas being in the neighborhood of 75 cents a gallon in LA in 1987. Twenty years later and up the coast, I paid $3.35/gallon to fill my tank today.

 

I paid $1.30 per gallon in 1980.

Yes, it dropped after that and hit a low point in the mid-late 80s.

But my original statement is 100 percent true.

You are paying barely double what you paid in 1980.

What's bullshit is anyone who thinks they remember paying 75 cents a gallon . . . in California . . . anytime before 1974.

You can look it up.

http://www.fintrend.com/inflation/images/charts/Oil/Gasoline_inflation_chart.htm

 

I remember paying $1.30-ish in Missouri in 1985. Couple of years later, it was less than 70 cents. It is indisputable that until recently, the price of gasoline barely kept up with inflation overall, and for many years was way behind it.

 

sad, maybe, but completely understandable.

america has always had extra land. more space to spread out. european countries, not so much.

and so there you go. hey, once we get cars to run on shark farts, we'll be laughing at the scrunched-up euros once again.

(FWIW, i take the subway every day to work. so i'm no cul-de-sac wingnut.)

 

In college in 1996, I paid .89 a gallon at a Wilco on North Main Street in Blacksburg. So yes, more than doubled is accurate.

 

So because we had it good for a long time means I have to be broke now? I don't much care for that scenario.
And for the record, I drive a Mazda3. Gets around 30 mpg. Not as good as the Prius, but it's not a 12 mpg gashogging SUV.

 

Ummm...not quite. The reason gas prices were so low in the 80s was because of the oil bust. There was also a glut in the late 90s that kept it around a buck a gallon. But five years ago (pre-Iraq and pre-Gulf hurricanes), I remember it was hovering around $1.50. Now it's close to $3. That's roughly double, and it took a hell of a lot less than 28 years to get there.
I used to be able to fill my tank for $20-$25. Then it was $25-$30. Now it's around $35 (different car, slightly larger tank, but the point is the same). That $5-$10 extra per tank, times even 5 to 10 fill-ups per month can put a real crimp in a family's budget when they don't have time to adjust.