This week is spring break for Metro schools and other districts. But hitting the road is more expensive than it was last year. Gas prices are up .80 cents since this time in 2010. Some Middle Tennesseans are cutting back on both business and pleasure.
Angela Jones stands beside her car, dressed in bright hospital scrubs, and jokes that ten dollars will only get her one or two gallons. Still, she doesn’t plan on changing her driving habits.
“No, I still have to go to work, I have to hang out. Fit it in your budget. That’s all. I buy cigarettes that cost five dollars, almost six dollars, and that’ll kill me, so I think I can pay five or six dollars for some gas.”
It’s not so funny for Bruce Kane, who’s filling up at a nearby pump. His Chevy Tahoe is covered in decals for Kane Konnections, his fiber optics construction business, which runs a whole fleet.
“It’s killing us. We’ve got several trucks using diesel and gas right now and we’re having to change our way we do business just to keep up. We’re leaving our equipment on job sites right now and carpooling back and forth to the job site. It’s the only way we can keep going.”
Just five minutes down the road, prices are relatively cheap at $3.26 six a gallon. But not cheap enough for customers like Curtis Wood. He makes a special trip just to fill up.
“Sometimes I want to go out, take my kid to the park—we just go outside now. I tell you—I stopped traveling as much. I go back and forth to work, the grocery store, and back home. If we do anything else, we’re walking.”
The US Energy Information Administration predicts gas prices will rise through the summer driving season.
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