johnnyburst79

I was watching CNBC earlier today and the futures expectations came on. By 2010, a barrel of crude will reach $150 per barrel and by 2012, it will be $225 per barrel as developing nations such as China and India exceed our demand for crude oil and therefore, gasoline. Here in the US, gasoline is predicted to be in the range of $6 or $7 per gallon within the next 3.5 years.

CNBC Video

As I read yesterday, many families are choosing between food and gasoline already. If gasoline prices DO double, it is doubtful that the wages will double and therefore, many families will be forced to find alternate means of transportation, most notably I assume, cycling. America needs to remove the internal combustion engine as its source of transportation or the Smith's will suffer.

I, for one, love driving but do ride my bicycle everywhere I can. I loved racing my car. No more.

mtnwalker

I still don't understand why our gov't has not looked into improving public transportation the way it is in Europe. A co-worker of mine who used to work in Zurich told me that when he was there for 3 years he did not need a car at all. There is a train, bus, whatever that will go where you want, when you want. One thing is for sure, the oil companies are getting richer and richer.

mwrobe1

Here's the link to the whole article (I think):
https://www.cnbc.com/id/24292484/

lil brown bat

Because by the time gasoline gets to $6-$7 gallon, it won't matter, because a sizeable segment of this country's population will be dead of cold because they can't heat their homes, and there won't be that many people left to transport.

Expecting to be among the popsicles...bicycle won't help me a damn bit then...

mrbubbles

[QUOTE=mtnwalker;6577873]I still don't understand why our gov't has not looked into improving public transportation the way it is in Europe./QUOTE]

It's very simple, the oil and auto industry is against such blasphemy. In US as a whole, the auto industry is vital to making people's lives as miserable as possible, a miserable person is much more profitable than a happy satisfied individual.

Here's how it works.

Auto industry helps boost realty, heath care, retail, fast food, construction. Making people fat and miserable is profitable for almost everybody.

UmneyDurak

It's tied in to taxes. Someone proposes to improve public transportation, the question that naturally arises is "Where will the money come from?". "Umm, hmm" So the solution would be "raise taxes" or impose new ones. That of course would be a political suicide since people only have a short term vision, and start *****ing and whining about increase in taxes without realizing the long term benefit to themselves.

DataJunkie

Exactly how do brits afford to heat their homes? It's already that price in their neck of the world.

Then again, I doubt they supersize their dwellings as much as we do.

notfred

Because effective public transportation requires population density. To get people to use it, there needs to be a train or bus stop within 5 minutes of everywhere you want to go, because you're not going to walk half an hour from the train station to work. If every neighborhood and every store and every movie theater is five minutes apart, you'd need a bus stop in front of each one. It would take hours to get anywhere on the bus, and most stops wouldn't even be used most of the time.

As soon as there's *one* place that you *need* to go that requires a car, you have to buy a car. Once you've bought the car, you might as well take it everywhere, you already made the investment in it.

This is why public transit *does* work in the densest cities in the US, like New York and San Francisco, and doesn't work in suburban sprawl-y places like Phoenix or, well, Sunnyvale. I think a lot of the people who like to say "how come our public transit is so much worse that Europe's?" have never actually lived anywhere with good public transit and used it everyday so that they realize what its strengths and weaknesses are.

And even in places where there's very good public transit, not everyone uses it. London recently instituted a very large toll for anyone driving into the center of the city because traffic congestion there is so bad. London doesn't have horrible traffic because everyone takes public transit all the time. It has horrible traffic because a lot of people drive.

Cyclist0383

Maybe in the city centers, but it's not your utopian vision outside of the centers of big cities in Europe.

mtnwalker

I completely agree with this. I never claim to follow politics nor claim to be knowledgeable about it. But every time I hear "political suicide" in the news I always think "These people are just thinking about themselves." Lawmakers say they care about the economy and the citizens but really all they care about is getting into or staying in their office.

atbman

Because of a threatened refinery strike the price in many parts of Scotland is around $10. Fuel prices are largely demand inelastic, judging by UK experience

notfred

You say this like it's unique to lawmakers, but pretty much everyone values their jobs. People don't like doing things that will get them fired, because they like to be able to eat. Lawmakers are just as selfish as the rest of us.

And anyway, if they say "elect me and I'll raise taxes to build more public transit", and that means no one votes for them, so they don't get elected and no public transit gets built, that doesn't really help anything either, does it?

mtnwalker

Oh, I agree with you. I'm not being a hypocrite. I guess I'm holding a naive notion that our "public servants" actually serve the public. In a sense they are. Nobody wants higher taxes and thats what our public servants give us. Unfortunately there is a major drawback for being comfortable. That is, things that needs to be done doesn't.

dalmore

$7 a gallon gas in 4 years will have little impact on the American lifestyle. Most Americans flip their cars every three years so by then they will have switched to a more fuel efficient vehicles or adjusted their budgets by refinancing their mortgage.

And incomes don't have to double since gas is still only a small percentage of the average American family budget.

But it does suggest one can make a profit investing in oil stocks for the foreseeable future.

riddei

Nah, we will see these prices before 2012...

johnnyburst79

That should have been done when oil was below $100 per barrel Commodities such as corn and rice would be better for short term. If you have $10K to sit on for a few years with an oil contract and let it double, go with oil. Otherwise, stick with commodities and energy stocks.

bigbenaugust 

They have blankets and sweaters and hot tea.

bigbenaugust 

Can we get a weekly graph of average gas prices vs. number of "I'm new here. What bike should I buy?" threads on BF commuting?

Pig_Chaser

Correct. In addition, as DataJunkie pointed out, the price of petrol in the UK is already at these levels and yet the UK is almost as autocentric as North America.

banerjek

Just call it an "investment" the way we do with roads. With fewer cars, some of the road money can logically be used for public transport. Better yet, say it improves national security and that anyone who isn't totally whole hog on the idea is a traitor.

Or just borrow all the money, much as has been done for some certain very spendy foreign policies. After the dollar is sufficiently worthless, it will be cheaper to use your paycheck than toilet paper

Plosive

"$7 a gallon gas in 4 years will have little impact on the American lifestyle. Most Americans flip there cars every three years so by then they will have switched to a more fuel efficient vehicles or adjusted their budgets by refinancing their mortgage.
And incomes don't have to double since gas is still only a small percentage of the average American family budget."
-The problem with this logic is that EVERYTHING (eg. food, imported products, services, etc) are all tied to the price of oil. As energy becomes more expensive it has a direct effect on everthing you buy.

"But it does suggest one can make a profit investing in oil stocks for the foreseeable future."
-Agreed

dalmore

That I would love to see!!!

devildogmech

Before gas prices went BONKERS, I was planning on buying a Jeep (old CJ) and restoring it with my oldest child, so he could have a cool, self built ride for when he gets his liscence.....

Now I'm thinking it would be better to just get him a REALY nice bike and upgrade the heck out of that!

As to alternate energy sources, don't people realize that for every gallon of ethenol produced from corn, a gallon and a half of disel is used???? Not very energy efficient, especially when the diesel engine is MUCH more efficient (and E-85 cars run like CRAP)..... Just saying.....

riddei

Did anyone see where Sam's Club is capping the purchase of rice to four bags? When was the last time we rationed food in the USA... WWII?

LINK TO RICE RATIONING

devildogmech

Why rice? I never realized it was such a staple in this country?