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Gas
crisis? What gas crisis?
Melvyn D. Magree Originally published in the Reader Weekly August 14, 2008 Undoubtedly, many people are hurting from the price of gas. Those who have few alternatives to get to work or to stores are seeing a bigger chunk of their budget go to gas. All of us will be seeing higher prices for most of our goods and services as companies pass on their fuel costs. Even though many newspapers have cost the same for decades, we are getting less content now. I’ve even heard that Bob Boone is considering doubling the price of the Reader Weekly. However, you wouldn’t know there is a gas crisis if you drove any distance. In July we drove to Ohio for my wife’s 50th high school reunion. We saw quite a mix of traffic; some at or below the speed limit and lots well above the speed limit. As we headed out Highway 53 through Superior, I was surprised at the number of cars going at 35 mph. Generally most people have driven at 40. When we got to Allouez traffic started creeping up. By the time we got to the 45 mph zone, many cars started passing us. Before we got to the 65 mph zone, many were going 70. As we turned south on 53, traffic started to thin out. I had set the cruise control at 65 and we thought we passed more cars than passed us. This changed as we neared Eau Claire. When we headed east on I-94 and then I-90, the pattern changed drastically. Many cars and trucks passed us; we passed few. In Illinois we had to stop a few times to pay a toll. As I neared each successively lower speed limit sign I’d tap the brake. Other vehicles would whiz by me at 10-15 miles per hour over the limit, slowing down at the last possible moment before the tollgate. I was amused if I got through the gate before a hurrier-scurrier. Our first overnight stop was at a relative’s house in Elgin, Illinois. The dashboard computer on our 2002 Toyota Prius read 49.7 mpg for 441 miles. Wow! I hadn’t seen that kind of consumption since a trip years ago back from Stevens Point where the reading was above 50 mpg until I started up the 21st Ave. E. hill. When we left the next morning, we knew we should fill up. The first stations we saw were on the right as we needed to turn left. We drove well into Chicago before we saw a station near the highway. The price was $4.11, well above that of the stations we missed. As we drove through the Chicago area, we passed almost no cars as we went the posted limit, 55mph. Many cars whizzed by us, even in construction zones. After the tollbooth for the main segment of the Indiana toll road, the highway was posted 70 for cars and 65 for trucks. Wonder of wonders, only one truck passed us, but we crawled by many that were probably going 68. I couldn’t find any specifics about enforcement, but I assume truck drivers would get a hefty fine if they arrived at a tollbooth too early. The truck that passed us had stopped on the side of the road for some reason or other. In Ohio the limits were 65 and 55. Many trucks were going 63-65; few cars were going 65 or less. We were constantly being passed. When we arrived at a friend’s house in Middleburgh Heights, a western suburb of Cleveland, we had driven 824 miles from Duluth, and our mileage was still 49.7 mpg. While we were there we didn’t drive except to a brunch and a visit to my stepmother on the other side of the county. We filled our tank in the morning of the day before we left. The price was $3.589, but in the afternoon it was $3.539. Argh! I’m running out of space, and so I’ll give a quick summary of our trip back across the Mackinac Bridge. It was in one sense more of the same. We were among the few going the speed limit, whether it was on I-75 in the Lower Peninsula or MI-28 and US 2 in the Upper Peninsula. Our aggregate trip mileage slowly dropped to 48.9 by Marquette. As we crossed the U.P. on mostly two lane roads, a few cars would trail behind us, often SUVs and pickup trucks, and zoom around us at the next passing lane. When we arrived home, we had traveled 1805 miles and had used gas at the rate of 49.0 mpg. I think we had a tail wind traveling east. When we filled the tank the next day at $3.729, our total fuel cost for the trip was $144.20 or 0.08/mile, 48.16 mpg. I don’t know which is in error, the odometer or the display computer. Even with the two hotel stays on the way back, the trip cost less than flying. Plus, we stretched our legs when we wanted, and we didn’t have to pass through security. If there was a gas crisis, why were all these vehicles getting 15-30 mpg passing us? If there is, will lower speed limits help or create even more disrespect for the law? ©2008 Melvyn D. Magree |