Ga$ Rises: Some motorists halt travel over soaring prices

HARLINGEN — Gas prices in Harlingen and throughout the Rio Grande Valley are steadily rising, but residents here are still paying less than the national average of $3.45 per gallon, according to the American Automobile Association.
People at the pumps are upset and some are halting frequent travel.
“Someone is making a fortune and it’s not me,” David Hanson, a Winter Texan from Ontario, said Wednesday.
Hanson is currently paying $3.69 per gallon for his truck’s diesel. It costs him more than $100 every time he fills his truck’s tank. But this has not slowed him and his wife down. Hanson said he and his wife still travel all over the Valley during their time here in the winter.
Emily Shaw was filling up at a Harlingen pump Wednesday and called gas prices “horrendous.”
Shaw, a Missouri native, has been in Harlingen for the past month taking care of her mother and tries to keep her travel to a minimum.
The average price of gasoline in Harlingen on Wednesday was $3.36 per gallon, according to AAA. In Brownsville it was $3.35 and in McAllen $3.38.
The current average gasoline price per gallon in Texas is $3.37, according to AAA. One year ago the average price of gas in Texas was $2.92.
The highest recorded gas price in Texas hit on July 17, 2008, when gas was $3.98 per gallon and diesel was $4.77 per gallon, according to AAA.
Ted Statler is from Colorado and spends half of his year in Harlingen as a Winter Texan. Statler’s recreational vehicle gets 8 miles to the gallon and runs on diesel. His hope is that prices go down before he leaves in March.
Sue Ruhling parks her RV next to Statler and is not looking forward to what diesel will cost her on the trip back to Kansas City in the spring. She also gets 8 miles to the gallon.
These Winter Texans pay for diesel twice a year: once on the trip to Texas and then on their way home. For most of the year they park the RVs in a lot and drive their personal vehicles around town.
Statler has a notebook and keeps track of gas prices as they go up, down and all around. He said he is not complaining about prices, but is sure to keep track of how much money he pays when he gets on the road.

daltenburg@valleystar.com