Hating every minute of it, Americans are slowly learning to live with high gasoline prices. For a nation accustomed to cheap fuel, big vehicles and sprawling suburbs, the adjustments are wrenching.
Cory Asmus of Temecula, Calif., just bought a $4,800 motorcycle for his 20-mile drive to work so he could cut his gas bill to $8 a week, from $110.
Florian Bialas, a retiree who lives near Chicago, sold his 1987 Pontiac Sunfire for $3,000 and plans to relinquish his license when it expires in September. “I can walk to most places where I need to go,” he said.
And Debbie Gloyd of Cleveland has parked her Chrysler Concorde and started taking the bus to work. “I can’t afford these gas prices,” she said. “They’re insane.”
With the nationwide average price for regular gasoline closing rapidly on $4 a gallon, people are bracing for a summer of pain at the pump.
As the Memorial Day holiday approaches, kicking off the summer driving season, the record prices are provoking dread and upsetting some people’s vacation plans. A recent survey by AAA, the automobile club, found a rare year-on-year decline, of 1 percent, in the number of people planning to travel this summer.
There is no doubt that high energy prices are going to create inconvenience, and in some cases hardship, on many American families. Never the less it is worth keeping in mind that most of Europe and GB have been paying MUCH higher prices for energy products for decades. They don’t make more money, they don’t all have access to mass transit, and they live very comfortably. High energy prices are not going away. We will, as the Europeans have done, adjust. Giving a ride to church may be a need to more than the physically challenged and elderly. Finding ways to get folks to their jobs may be even more important and less convenient. But we will adapt because we have to and there is a clear role here for the “churched” to cause this change to take place in an orderly and civil way.
But most OIL PRODUCING nations also have gas at less than $1.00 a gallon. Saudi Arabia, for example is right around .25 per gallon.
Quite a contrast.
I don’t know if we have really started to adapt to higher energy prices yet…people I know appear to be in the mindset that this situation is temporary, and therefore does not require structural change. Yesterday I drove 78 miles each way, most of it interstate highway, to our See city for a Diocesan Council meeting. Both ways, the roadways seemed to have about the normal number of cars, with plenty of out-of-state plates on the cars of vacationers (A drop of a whole 1% in holiday weekend driving doesn’t sound huge to me…although I know the net decrease is somewhat higher, since one would normally expect an increase of a couple of percentage points year-to-year.) I’m as guilty as anyone…I was driving alone, although there are two other Council members who live within twenty-five or so miles of me, with whom I potentially could have traveled given a (very) small amount of planning, effectively reducing “my” cost of fuel by 1/2 to 2/3.
Thank goodness that Dear Daughter graduated this week from Montessori grade school, eliminating a total 52 mile daily round trip, coming to a couple of gallons of gas a day. (I just figured out that at $6,000.00 a year tuition, and $4 a gallon gas, the cost of transportation would be about a quarter as much as the cost of tuition!) Next year, she rides her bicycle the 1 1/2 miles to the middle school in our town. So she is doing her part.
[blockquote]Cory Asmus of Temecula, Calif., just bought a $4,800 motorcycle for his 20-mile drive to work so he could cut his gas bill to $8 a week, from $110.[/blockquote]
Small motorcycles get about 70-80 mpg; $8 works out to about 150 miles per week at $4 per gallon. If he was spending $110 to drive 150 miles, at $4/gal that’s a bit more 25 gallons of gas, which is approximately six (SIX!!!) miles per gallon.
What was he driving before, a Sherman tank?
My wife and I own two vehicles…..a 2000 Ford Focus station wagon and a 2004 Pontiac Montana minivan. We now park the Montana in our garage and use it only for long trips and in-bulk shopping at Costco…..where we buy most of our gas at a discount. The Focus is used for trips around town for local grocery shopping.
And I think the government should subsidize the cost of gas at the pump ala Venezuela.
Going to keep my 1999 Taurus, which gets 18 miles to the gallon in town. No car payment, cheap license plates, and full insurance cost only $500 a year. It has 70,000 miles on it…no major repairs, it owes me nothing….drive it until it drops……and will then give it a Ford burial…….sigh
My Focus gets 18 mpg around town, and if we use it on the freeways….rarely…..around 26 mpg.
I just heard an ad for a hybrid SUV they were ‘boasting’ that it gets 23 highway.
My 2006 Caravan gets 20 city, 23 highway, consistently since I bought it.
I’ll stick with it.
I live in a county seat town in southern Illinois, pop. 21,000. My office is three doors down from my house, and the courthouse at which I principally is two blocks away. Now that the Princess is going to public schools, both my children go to school within two miles of our house. All services and products that we need can be obtained within two miles of our house, which I consider to be walking/biking distance, {with the (to me) curious exception of high end men’s clothing and shoes} as well as numerous cultural amenities, 52 churches, and two full-service YMCAs. I have no reason to drive for personal reasons, other than if I need to obtain medical care which, fortunately at my age, is not a big deal. (I do have to drive for business reasons, but that expense is passed on to my clients. That doesn’t help the problem on a social level, but it does help me.) My children and I all have bicycles, and use them whenever possible.
I have long treasured life in this relatively self-sufficient little town. If energy starts to become a contraining force on American society. More people may find themselves living this kind of life. And, if their experience is like mine has been, they will be the richer for it.
Now if I could only do something about my prolifigate wife, who drives fifteen miles each way to her medical office–but it is close to the hospitals at which she practices.
I think you’re right. People here in our small town (35,000) in the San Joaquin Valley are beginning to shop locally, and retail busines has been moving here big time, and as a result, business is picking up. We have a very good local hospital, farmers’ markets, and most things found in larger towns…..along with 27 churches. People would rather “shop local” and support our local economy, and we see this spreading. There IS a good “down side” to the situation, and with the exception of those who have to commute long distances to and from work, we’re doing relatively well. As for my wife and me, we’re adjusting to the gas price increase, and we compensate for it by combining two or three trips into one as often as we can. And it works!
we are selling the olds and buying a scooter. keeping the minivan for the fam, but since we homeschool we rarely need to use it. we can deal, with adjustments. i can’t imagine there being an end in sight to this. americans need to get creative — i heard about a guy in indiana who drilled oil in his backyard!!