Nick Zuniga hasn't filled his big, silver pickup with gas in about six months.
Doing so would cost the 19-year-old Carmel Valley resident a little over $100, which he says he can “barely afford.”
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Online: For more information about gas prices, go to ucan.org and aaa.com
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Instead, the college student cuts off the pump at about $40. He rides his bike or walks to the shopping center or to see his girlfriend. When he drives, he goes slower to conserve gas and waits until the empty light is on before refueling.
“I'll push it 'til I'm basically rolling into the station,” he said.
Zuniga resisted the $4.19 per gallon regular unleaded being offered yesterday at a Shell station on Del Mar Heights Road in San Diego. He was there to pick up propane for a barbecue. After years of going up, up, up, gas prices in San Diego County are crossing once-unthinkable thresholds. Prices of more than $4 a gallon are showing up on gas station signs around the county and the average price of regular gas in the city of Del Mar surpassed $4 per gallon, the Automobile Club of Southern California reported last week.
Yesterday, Charles Langley of Utility Consumers' Action Network did a survey to determine whether the county average had increased over the weekend. His research showed it had risen a little above $3.96 a gallon for regular unleaded, a record in his surveys. The Auto Club, though, reported prices had hit $3.97.
The average price for regular unleaded could reach $4 any day now, Langley said.
“Once they've priced at $4.01, they've made the commitment to go beyond the $4 mark,” Langley said.
Tupper Hull, a spokesman for the Western States Petroleum Association, said he couldn't estimate when the average price would jump to $4 in the county, but attributed the rises in large part to increases in the cost of crude oil. May typically brings the highest annual gas prices, due to increased demand, Langley said. Over the past four years, prices rose from $2.34 per gallon for regular unleaded to the current $3.96.
Joseph Gluch, the manager at the Mobil station on Mission Center Road in the Mission Valley neighborhood of San Diego, said yesterday his station put off raising the price to $4 a gallon “as long as we could.”
After weeks of holding at $3.99, the station made the call to increase to $4.07 per gallon Wednesday. Even at that price, Gluch said the station makes only pennies on each gallon.
Gluch, who commutes to work every day from Fallbrook, said he's struggling to cover his own gas bills.
Rather than buying a new pair of shoes yesterday, he laughed and said he was going to just clean the ones he already has and use that money for gas.
He said his customers, too, are relying on a sense of humor.
“It's past the point of shock . . . to where they're joking,” Gluch said.
Michele Clock: (619) 593-4964; michele.clock@uniontrib.com
