COLUMBUS – Roads and airports will start getting busy today – and will get more crowded every day until Thursday — as 54 million Americans head out on Thanksgiving holiday getaways.
Those travelers, and the 2 million Ohioans among them, who the auto club AAA predicts will travel at least 50 miles from home between Wednesday and Sunday, will find filling up the tank will not set them back too badly.
The average price of gas has dropped 12 cents a gallon over the past two weeks, thanks to falling crude oil prices, according to fuel industry analyst Trilby Lundberg’s biweekly survey.
“That is almost the entire reason that pump prices are down. We may see a few more pennies before this is over,” she said.
As refineries in the Great Lakes and Midwest wrap-up maintenance season, the auto club’s analysts say supplies of gasoline are expected to build through year-end as demand remains low and keep gas prices cheaper.
The average retail price of regular gasoline in Columbus Monday morning was $2.45 a gallon, 13 cents higher than a week ago but 14 cents lower than the price at the same time last year, according to the daily survey by the AAA, the Oil Price Information Service and WEX, Inc.
The only state in the region to post an weekly increase, Ohio’s statewide average price was lower that prices in the neighboring states of Michigan ($2.48), Pennsylvania ($2.81) and West Virginia ($2.69).