With gas prices down, holiday travel up - Duluth News Tribune

DULUTH — Consider it a holiday gift from Scrooge, or the oil companies, but gasoline prices in the Northland have dropped to pre-Ukraine war levels.

In fact, gas prices in Minnesota are now a little lower than they were at Christmas last year.

A sign at the Holiday station in Scanlon shows a gallon of unleaded gas priced at $2.68 on Monday afternoon.

Jed Carlson / Superior Telegram

Across Minnesota, gas prices have fallen nearly $2 per gallon from a peak average of $4.66 per gallon in June for regular unleaded to $2.89 per gallon Monday, according to Gasbuddy.com .

Nationally, the average price has fallen from $5.02 in June to about $3.19 this week.

But there are places you can save even more money, including the Carlton/Cloquet area, where prices Monday were as low as $2.64 per gallon. That’s 45 cents per gallon less that than $3.09 being charged Monday at many Duluth gas stations fewer than 20 miles up the freeway. The Cloquet-area prices were among the cheapest in the state.

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For some perspective, with gas prices down $2 per gallon, the cost of a 350-mile round-trip drive from Duluth to the Twin Cities just got $28 cheaper, assuming your vehicle gets about 25 mpg.

Gas prices still are about 30 cents per gallon higher than they were in 2019 — before the pandemic when, in 2020, gas prices and consumption crashed as people stopped driving to work or for leisure travel and demand for gas dwindled.

Meanwhile, AAA says you can expect more people on the road, and at airports, over this holidays this year than in 2020. The automobile club is forecasting 112.7 million people will journey 50 miles or more away from home from Dec. 23 to Jan. 2 — an increase of 3.6 million people over last year and closing in on pre-pandemic numbers. And 2022 is expected to be the third-busiest year for holiday travel since AAA began tracking in 2000.

The price goes up on the pump as Garry Hendrickson fills up at the Holiday station in Scanlon on Monday afternoon, Dec. 19, 2022.

Jed Carlson / Superior Telegram

“This year, travel time will be extended due to Christmas Day and New Year’s Day falling on Sundays,” said Paula Twidale, AAA’s senior vice president of travel. “With hybrid work schedules, we are seeing more people take long weekends to travel because they can work remotely at their destination and be more flexible with the days they depart and return.”

Nearly 102 million Americans will drive to their holiday destinations, up 2 million from 2021, but shy of pre-pandemic 2019, when 108 million Americans drove out of town for the holidays, the highest year on record.

AAA says air travel will see a 14% increase over last year, with nearly 7.2 million Americans expected to fly, close to matching 2019, when 7.3 million Americans traveled by air.

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