$1.17 in YEG but it was $1.25 in Grand Prairie this week.

Just gassed up in White Rock.............$1.50/litre for regular.

$1.424 in Sherbrooke, $1.434 in Trois-Rivières.
Filled up yesterday in NH at the highest I've seen there from memory, $3.68 which works out to $0.97 USD a liter = ~$1.07 CAD a liter at today's exchange rate. The gap with QC prices remains more or less constant, which is normal. (Goes up here, goes up there, and vice versa.)

Regina: $1.32.9 :(

Same here. It's basically like housewives of a couple generations ago, chirping about how a can of peas is 10 cents cheaper over at the store on the other side of town. The only reason people do it is that gasoline is basically the only product we buy where the price is displayed loudly, everywhere, at all times. So it's obvious when the price changes, etc.

The prices of a lot of things change constantly, but people don't have threads and news stories every week because carrots are up 2%. But with gas? People start talking about changing their routines because of a 5 cent difference, which on a reasonable fill is a whopping 2 bucks. And these are the same people that don't blink about spending that 2 bucks on a cup of coffee at Tim's, that is essentially free at home if they'd spend the 20 seconds. But there's no price signs everywhere for coffee.

I just discovered some old Visa receipts my father kept as a result of a cross-country trip back in July 1983. Gas at the time was around 40 cents in Alberta, 50 cents in Ontario, with a mix everywhere else. So give or take, gasoline is now 3x higher than it was - 31 years ago. Seems to be in line with the price of cars and car insurance (if not less of an increase than those). I won't even mention housing. I know for sure that my utility bills are much more than 3x what my parents paid back then.

I've got scans of catalogs from the 1980s (I'm weird) and pretty much everything I look at that's not a) electronics or b) shit we get cheap from China follows a similar pattern. Clothing is.. eerily similar in price. Holy crap did sending that stuff overseas save us a bundle. No wonder I had hand-me-downs as a middle class kid, yet today half the kids shop at Coach. Electronics are ridiculously cheaper, obviously. But - brand-new, hot toy of the year Star Wars action figures? 3 for $8 in 1983. Those things are about $8-10 each in stores today. So even with Chinese manufacture, they're about 3x as expensive. A boardgame like Candyland? $4.99. Today at Toys r Us? $10-15 depending on version. So a 2-3x increase. Even for some electronics... $100-150 for the current consoles in 1983. Today a PS4 costs $400. 3x increase, easily. Luggage is another thing that is bizarrely expensive today - a $50 high end bag back then is $2-300 today.

I just don't see gasoline being that out of line compared to.. well anything other than a Commodore 64 or a Casio wristwatch. Seems like a ton of stuff costs 3x what it did, 30 years ago. But holy crap are clothes cheap these days.

^ People love to scream bloody murder whenever the price of gas goes up by a few cents, but I have noticed that there is markedly less enthusiasm for accepting any sort of lifestyle change that might result in having to spend less money on gas, like living closer to work, getting rid of a second or in some cases third car, driving something smaller and more fuel-efficient, taking the bus or cycling, etc.

The knee-jerk response to that is usually "HAVE YOU EVER TRIED TO TAKE A KID TO HOCKEY PRACTICE ON THE BUS" or something like that.

Or just not driving around constantly. You know, going for a walk around your neighbourhood or letting the kids play pick-up soccer in the local park instead of a 2 hour return drive across the city for whatever sort of recreation is "needed" these days.

But yeah. In my opinion gas prices can't possibly be too high for anyone, because for all the whining, I see very few people actually cutting back on their driving. If anything we drive a lot more than my 30-years-ago comparison. A LOT more. I'm just now looking out my window watching 90%+ of the local schoolkids being driven to work. That simply never happened 30 years ago - sometimes I wonder if I've moved into some exclusive part of Beverley Hills or something. Gas can't be all that expensive if you're doing this on a daily basis.

I'll assume you mean 'being driven to school' but your observation is valid. We drive WAY more now than we ever did when I was a kid. But in defence of this particular point there's a damn good reason why so many kids are being driven to school. Half the kids in this city don't have a local school in their area and have to rely on either bussing or parents driving them. In my particular case we choose to drive them. They can be there in less than 15 minutes by car or spend over an hour on the bus each way every day.

FREE here... just walk, bike or bus:)

There may be situations in new areas where there are no schools, but that still speaks to people choosing lifestyles that require car dependency. I mean, no one moves to the way-out burbs to use their cars less.

But exceptions aside, freeweed's point is still valid. Whenever I go up to my mom and dad's during the day, the elementary school near their house is absolutely flooded with cars dropping off or picking up children... in the mid/late 80s when I was a kid it was NOTHING like that. And I would estimate that the vast majority of children attending that school live less than one mile away.

The school bus routes are that bad? Or are we talking public transit?

I got a kick out of a woman next to me at the pump complaining like crazy about the cost of filing up her huge 1/ ton truck ($75 range) as I filled up my smaller sedan (about $40). Less cost and more miles to the gallon. :yes:

I would expect the newer areas without schools (yet) would offer school bus service to kids in those areas, no?

'

My observation has also been that there is a direct correlation between the people who complain about the price of gas, and the people who leave their engine running when running inside to the store or picking up their kids, or just sitting in it waiting for someone.

Yes, I am talking about school busses.

Wow, the management of school bus routes must be just brutal then...

One of the problems in many parts of the country is that there are so many different school boards and options that only a fraction of the kids in a given area go to the closest neighbourhood school - which even in suburban areas you tend to have within walking distance of your house.

Ottawa just boggles my mind on this as you have four different school systems: English public, French public, French Catholic and English Catholic. All of which have their own transportation system (more often than not) and of course each has their own Director of Student Transportation Services who makes 100K a year.

Agreed, but is 100K really a lot of money these days?

Where do you live where bus passes are free?

A mix of everything. Although in my case, I was talking about elementary work.. err I mean school. So kids aren't "allowed" to take public transit.

Part of the problem is all of these parents who move out to the middle of nowhere where there are no schools. So, the kids will have to go to a school 5-10km away. Or more. It's gonna be a long bus ride. Next, as you yourself allude to, there are way too many people who think elementary school means everything, so they insist that little Suzie goes to a "special" school where she'll get a better education in finger painting. Said school is almost never anywhere remotely close to home. Then you combine with what lubicon said - omg, the horror of kids sitting on a school bus for a while. It makes much more sense for mom or dad leave work early to drive the kids, this way 7 year Johnny's day is optimized so he can fit in the 8 scheduled extra-curricular activities he's enrolled in.

But mostly, there are just a lot of stupid parents in this world. I certainly haven't interviewed thousands of them, but I know some who drive their kids to the school here (and similar situations in other cities). SOME OF THESE KIDS LIVE A 5-10 MINUTE WALK AWAY. Now, I know crime is at all time highs and children are being snatched up by complete strangers by the thousands each year in Canada, but I'd have to think a school bus over that kind of distance would be acceptable. Apparently not, for reasons varying from "no seatbelts", to "I wouldn't trust a stranger to drive my child", to "it gives me an excuse to leave work early", to "I'm a housewife and we pay someone clean to the house for us, what else am I going to do with my day, plus I get to spend more time with the kids" (no lie, I've heard this exact line from 3 different couples).

The upside is that because these kids will have chauffeur service until they're 40, and apparently kids today aren't ever going to get their licenses because anything you need to drive to (work or pleasure) isn't worth it, they won't drive much and demand for gasoline is going to plummet in about 10 years, which means gas prices will be like 70 cents before we know it.

For the record, I've actually seen schoolbuses here. I think the school gets 2-3 loads of kids a day. When they first built it, I was really worried that driving around here would be non-stop buses and having to stop for them and such, but there's so little utilization of them that I'm almost never actually on the road around them. It's the SUV and minivan parade that interferes with traffic the most, by far. To the point that they've brought in traffic control measures.