Column: This is insane! Gasoline at 48 cents per gallon? What a ripoff

Published: Thursday, April 24, 2008
By Ed Shamy Free Press Staff Writer

The more things change, the more they stay the same. Take a stroll through The Burlington Free Press archives about gasoline prices:

Jan. 16, 1974: Gasoline in short supply in Vermont. Entire communities without a single open filling station. And gasoline is obscenely expensive, an average of 48.7 cents per gallon for regular.

Jan. 19, 1974: AAA poll of 113 Vermont service stations shows most are open 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., most closed Sundays, all limiting sales to $3, and charging an average of 49.6 cents per gallon.

April 2, 1974. Some Vermont vendors are selling gasoline for as high as 53 cents per gallon for regular. Rampant speculation that oil companies may be gouging consumers.

November 1975: 62.2 cents average per gallon in Vermont.

April 1978: The owner of a Burlington gas station predicts that the days of the traditional full-service gas station will "go the way of the family farm." Newfangled self-service stations are popular among gasoline users eager to save a nickel.

July 27, 1979: The average price of a gallon of premium gasoline is $1.004 in Vermont, the first time any gasoline has exceeded $1. Regular average is 93.7 cents.

August 1979: Gas pumps in Vermont are not equipped or calibrated to handle transactions that cost more than 99.9 cents per gallon. Mass confusion.

Aug. 1979: A South Burlington woman: "I try not to think of the gas prices. I've just started riding my bike more."

Feb. 1980: Unleaded gas approaches $1.25 per gallon.

Oct. 1980: "People will drive five miles to get 2 cents off on a gallon," says the manager of a Berlin gas station during a price war.

May 1981: Three gas station owners in Londonderry predict a painfully slow summer tourist season because gas has reached an eye-popping $1.399 per gallon. Rampant speculation that oil companies may be gouging consumers.

May 1989: President of the Vermont Chamber of Commerce says, "When it breaks that $1.50 a gallon figure, that's when it starts to affect people."

May 1989: "I get floored paying $1.20 a gallon," one motorist says.

August 1990: Woman at a Cumberland Farms gas station in Lyndonville speaks about the situation at her home as gas rises to $1.30: "We drive two cars. Let me tell you, it hurts." Marshfield man at a Montpelier gas station vows to use his bicycle more.

April 1997, with gas at $1.25 per gallon: "People always yearn for prices to go under a $1 a gallon, but that's going to be hard to get to," AAA spokesman says.

August 1999: Burlington man: "Terrible! It was $1.19 the other day. Today it was $1.21. They've got you where they want you, and they are going to keep you there until they bleed you to death." Rampant speculation that oil companies may be gouging consumers.

March 2000. Grand Isle woman, on the impact of $1.60-per-gallon gasoline on her Jeep Cherokee: "I'm thinking of selling it."

February 2003. Gas at $1.68. "If prices are at this level right now, what will they look like this summer? That could affect tourism over the summer," a AAA spokesman says.

September 2005: "I didn't know until yesterday that my pumps wouldn't go over $2.99," says a gas station owner in Elmore.

November 2007, with gasoline prices averaging $3.02 per gallon in Vermont: "Everybody keeps wanting to see what's that point of impact where people start to cut back. We keep setting the benchmark, and people continue to travel," a AAA spokesman says.

Today: $3.50 per gallon and rising with no end in sight.

A footnote: In 2000, each Vermonter traveled 11,167 miles in a motor vehicle, according to the U.S. Transportation Department. By 2005, there were more of us and still each of us traveled more -- 12,379 miles.

Ed Shamy's column appears Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Contact him at 660-1862 or eshamy@bfp.burlingtonfreepress.com.