Road trip plans foiled by rising gas prices

by Chris Owen on

Just as spring and summer road trip plans are being made, gas prices are on the rise. That’s no big news, as we reported the same thing about this time last year. This year, though, gas prices are beginning their annual climb earlier than ever with potentially bad news on the horizon for road trippers making plans right now.

In an interview with the Buffalo News, Patrick DeHaan, a senior petroleum analyst for GasBuddy.com, said, “it’s pretty rough. One word can sum it up: ‘ouch.’ It’s going to be a nasty year for gas prices.”

GasBuddy reports gas prices around the United States, assesses what drives the price of fuel, and offers helpful tips on getting the best fuel economy. This week, Gas Buddy reports a national average of $3.63 per gallon of regular gas, with an average of $3.92 and a high of $4.19 in New York City. In Santa Barbara, California, the situation is worse with an average of $4.40, peaking to $4.79 at the highest station, well before road trip season gets going in full stride. The early rise in gas prices has motorists wondering why.

“This year, the price increases are really based on what’s happening in the world oil market, the crude market,” said Wally Smith, a vice president with AAA, explaining to the Buffalo News, “You get around $4, people really start adjusting driving behaviors.”

So what can we do to prepare for $5.00 per gallon gas?

Moneycrashers, an online source dedicated to developing a community of people who try to make financially sound decisions, suggests that those thinking about buying a car might consider a more fuel-efficient vehicle. At $3.00/gal the added expense of a green car makes owning one more for super eco-aware drivers. At $5.00/gal, the math works.

But saving in other areas to offset the price of fuel, often areas directly affected by the price of fuel itself, can help too. Homes heated by fuel oil will see an increase in costs so finding alternative ways to heat your home is a good idea.

Food will go up in price so we can save money by starting a home garden. Moneycrashers even suggests keeping chickens, starting a beehive, growing your own sprouts, or learning how to forage for nuts.

If that sounds a bit extreme, consider other methods to save on food like buying products in bulk, cooking more at home, and eating out less.

“Food prices really surged at the end of 2011, which isn’t good news to consumers,” said USDA food economist Richard Volpe, in Business Week. “Costs this year will rise as much as 4.5 percent for meat products and baked goods.”

All good reasons why cutting back in areas related and affected by rising fuel prices can leave room in the budget for a decent road trip. Online tools to help manage expenses and predict the price of a road trip are also available.

The website Cost2Drive built a galculator, a fun and easy tool to help travelers budget for road trips, because, as they put it, “the carefree days of jumping in the car with no regard to costs are long gone.”The easy-to-use online tool calculates the price of gas from point A to point B based on current gas prices along the way and even throws in carbon footprint data to consider.

So while we may not be able to do anything about the price of gas, we can control expenses in other areas, leaving room for road trip dreams to blossom.


Flickr photo by photopaige

Travel search to become personal, focused, nosy

by Chris Owen on

Travel search engines come in a variety of sizes, shapes and brands all aiming to become our first choice when planning a trip. The ways in which we search for travel options today are very different from those we used only a few years ago, and likely, the ones we will use in the future. A new study, tapping the wants of the most connected travelers, says new technologies may create changes for our future travel planning methods.

“Today, we stand at the forefront of a technological evolution in travel that we refer to as Online Travel 3.0 which recognizes the power shift from suppliers to retailers and to end consumers,” says Stephane Durand, Director, Online & Leisure at Amadeus, a major provider of advanced technology solutions for the global travel and tourism industry.

An Amadeus-commissioned, global study identified the online shopping behavior and future motivations of trend-setting travelers, indicating younger, savvy consumers are mastering travel information more. While not representative of the mainstream consumer, they have the most sophisticated shopping needs and represent the early adopters whose current behaviors and preferences are leading indicators of consumer behavior in the future.

What do we want and are likely to see in the future?

Truly private sales:
Look for travel sellers to micro-target promotions to specific consumers offering products that are actually relevant for the buyer.

Cumulative intelligence:
Learning from our online behavior over time, programs will aggregate common patterns while micro-segmentation will help companies analyze behavior and deliver increasingly intelligent results.

Smart systems and virtual private assistants:
Devices will become smart and interconnected, while storing and analyzing consumer behavior information. The program will recognize and process inputs from sites visited and will act as an assistant on the consumer’s behalf.

The study, Empowering Inspiration was based on surveying the behavior of 4,638 travelers in the U.S., U.K., Germany, India, Russia and Brazil.




Flickr photo by Danard Vincente

An inspirational bike ride across America

by Jessica Festa on



This video is more than just one man’s trip biking across the United States. It’s a philosophical look into what makes life itself such an incredible journey. The filmmaker, Ryan Van Duzer, began his expedition using a quote from Helen Keller as his inspiration: “Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all”. Beginning in San Diego, California, he made his way toward Tarpon Springs, Florida, cycling from town to town and asking people what they loved most about life. Throughout the video, you will meet unique individuals and hear an array of answers while also getting to see the diverse landscapes of the United States.

Airborne students, teachers help continue NASA relevance

by Chris Owen on

NASA’s Airborne Science Program and Earth system science research has a fleet of highly modified aircraft that can be deployed all over the world for Earth science missions. Operating in the United States, Europe, Asia and South America, researchers use these aircraft to improve our understanding of the planet. This summer, thirty-two undergraduate and graduate students from across the United States will participate in the Student Airborne Research Program aimed at measuring pollution in California.

Using NASA’s P-3B airborne laboratory, students will measure pollution in the Los Angeles basin and California’s Central Valley and study ocean biology along the California coast. In addition to airborne data collection, students will take measurements at field sites.

Its just one part of an ongoing program that combines global satellite observations and ground sampling to better model and understand the complete Earth system, continuing NASA’s mission even at a time when manned space flight has all but come to a stop.

“NASA’s Airborne Science support of the Earth system science community will be exceptional in 2012,” Randy Albertson, NASA Airborne Science deputy program director told SpaceDaily. “The program on track to exceed the 2011 record of 2,600 hours flying science missions.”

In addition to the Student Airborne program, NASA has projects scheduled this year that include measuring snowfall from space (critically important to freshwater resources, atmospheric water and energy cycles), collecting detailed measurements of important greenhouse gases and studying the processes that form hurricanes.

Not only students are engaged with NASA either. More than 70 teachers had an opportunity to experience what it feels like to float in space as they participated in the Reduced Gravity Education Flight Program at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston last week.

The teachers flew aboard NASA aircraft designed to fly parabolic flight paths, which create brief periods of weightlessness used in NASA’s astronaut training.

NASA Associate Administrator for Education and two-time space shuttle astronaut Leland Melvin also participated in some of the flights and shared first-hand with the participants his experiences in astronaut training.

“The enthusiasm among our teachers participating in the reduced gravity flights is contagious,” Melvin said in a statement. “I know it will add a new dimension to their teaching as they engage their students in science, technology, engineering and mathematics studies.”


NASA photo

Space travel Code of Conduct aims to limit junk in orbit

by Chris Owen on

Decades of space travel activities have the Earth’s orbit littered with space junk. As the world’s nations continue activity in space, the space junk pile increases and along with it the chances of a deadly collision. Now, the United States and other nations are doing something about it.

“Space is no longer an environment accessed nearly exclusively by two superpowers or a few countries. Barriers to entry are lower than ever, and many countries are enjoying access to, and the benefits of, space in unprecedented numbers,” said Frank A. Rose, the Deputy Assistant Secretary, Bureau of Arms Control, Verification and Compliance in a speech at the 15th annual FAA Commercial Space Transportation Conference last week.

The U.S. Department of Defense tracks about 22,000 objects in orbit, only 1,100 of which are active satellites. The rest are things like dead satellites, spent booster rockets or orbiting debris. Experts are concerned that the man-made debris increases the odds of future damaging collisions, a situation that will only worsen as more nations explore space travel.To reduce this risk to future satellite operations and space travelers, the United States has joined the European Union calling for a uniform code of conduct that reduces the risk of further debris-generating events, reducing the need to maneuver around debris, expending precious fuel.

“I believe that 2012 will be a defining year for space security, and the work we all will do in responding to the challenges in, and the threats to, the space environment can help us preserve space for all nations and future generations,” said Rose. “We look forward to partnering with the commercial space transportation industry in this effort.”






Flickr photo by AsylumSeaker