Overhere, I don't see realy a change in the amount of traffic, and prices are much higher.

$ 8.75 for a gallon overhere in Europe.

Not much since I only have to drive about 3.3 miles to work. However, in the next few months I will be moving from OK to Upstate NY. I am sure the gas on that trip will be quite costly. I can take a positive view and say at lest it cheaper than paying a company to move me. $2,000 vs. about $8-10,000.

Yes it has affected me. We have curtailed travel and I am car pooling as much as possible - it's not easy at all.

Remember that Europe is smaller and more compact and has a far superior public transportation system than the U.S. due to the nature of that compactness. I'm sure they are also nationalized; meaning a huge tax burden on the populace. The average Euro does alot of bus/rail/subway-tube traveling.

Is that a correct assumption?

Europe is definatly smaller, but I haven't got a clue if the public transport is superior.

Where I live, we have got a bus once every hour on weekdays, and only once every two hours in the evening and weekend. There is a railroad, but it's not for the transport of people. In the citie's however, public transport is much better.

What I do know, is that the traffic jams keeps increasing every year.

Thanks.

I am reminded of the bus stop out in the middle of the corn fields from the Hitchcock movie "North by Northwest". Don't know why, just seemed to fit the thread.

So far I have not changed much. I hate the prices but I still have to get to work and home and take some recreational trips.
I do only work 4 days per week, so that cuts travel some. I have 2 vehicles and both are 4wd SUV gas hogs and I am not changing, at least not for now. I go hiking almost every Saturday or occasionally a weekend backpack trip. Since it is getting hotter here, I will be likely driving further for hikes but not as often.
Try working from home if your job offers that option. So far, since I do 4 day weeks, I have not felt the need to WFH.

Unless I come into some unforeseen money, I will most likely not take a vacation this summer, due to the price of gas. Well - I should say I won't GO anywhere on vacation this summer.

Let me tell you about the [censored]-poor state of regional mass transit in the USA.

OK, first of all, I admit that I, like many others, have a crazy commute. You'd think that with the distance I go, I'd be sitting on a bus with 7 other people. That's not the case at all.

My bus commute starts in Clinton NJ and ends in New York City.

If I arrive at the bus stop at or before 6:07 AM, I am 97% certain to get a parking space. If I arrive after 6:17 AM, I am 100% certain NOT to get a parking space. If you have ever seen rally car racing, that's a fair approximation of what the parking lot is like in the magic 10 minutes when the whole damn lot fills up. After that - well there's nothing, there's no other choices, so if you miss that window of opportunity, you're driving in. The 6:00, 6:05, 6:20 and 6:30 busses are PACKED FULL every morning and even more people would take mass transit if they could park!


Ironically, there's a train station not too far from the bus stop and NJ Transit says it's "underutilized" - I wonder why?

Let's see - my 6:20 bus gets me to New York by about 7:40-ish.

Or I can take the train out of Annandale.
There's a 4:59, 5:55, 6:23 and 6:50 AM train.

Let's try the 6:23 AM train.
That gets me as far as Newark Penn Station by 8:12 AM. Newark Penn Station is NOT in New York City - so I have to transfer to a train from there to New York City - and that's at least a 30 minute time allocation - if I'm lucky and hit all the transfers. So now it's almost 8:45 and I'm just arriving in New York.

That no good.

All over the United States, it's the same story. There's AMPLE demand for mass transit, there's nowhere near the infrastructure to support the number of people who WOULD use mass transit if they COULD. The Long Island Rail Road is saturated, they need more tunnels under the East River. Even on the lightly utilized systems, more trains and buses overall are needed, and instead we talk about congestion pricing and the like without thinking where and how we'll get the cars off the roads when people go to work.

This is a sore spot for me, because for me, Driving in shaves at LEAST 45 minutes off my commute, which is no small potatoes, and I take the time hit to "do the right thing" - but I gotta tell ya, there's plenty of days where I don't really NEED to be in the office before 8AM, but I go in anyway because I won't get parking otherwise.