Losing out on rising gas prices

At Goldy’s Truck Plaza, halfway between Lynchburg and Altavista on U.S. 29, it isn’t hard to see the effects of diesel prices teetering on the edge of $4 per gallon.

Patrick Street, a truck driver with J. Nic Transportation in Salisbury, N.C., came to the convenience store counter recently with a bottle of soda and a couple of snacks.

“No gas today?” said Vinita Anand, owner of Goldy’s.

“No, I need to get a little farther down the road,” said Street. His company asks him to buy just $400 a day in gas.

Anand said it’s becoming more common for truck drivers to put off their diesel purchases, or to buy less.

“They used to fill up,” Anand said. “Now they only take $50, and then go down the road.”

The drivers hope to find something cheaper by waiting, her husband Sunny Anand said.

They can’t find it much cheaper, though. Diesel prices averaged $3.95 per gallon last Monday, about $1.10 more than a year ago, according to the Energy Information Administration.

With diesel prices climbing 30 cents a gallon over three weeks, March 2008 saw one of the steepest increases of the past 12 months.

While several regions in the U.S. already have passed the $4-per-gallon mark, only the Gulf Coast had an average price less than $3.90 last week.

The effect of prices that high is starting to spread into the general economy, as

transportation companies increase their prices or add fuel surcharges.

Vinita Anand pointed at a rack full of Little Debbie cakes in Goldy’s selling for 35 cents.

They cost a quarter each just a week or two ago, she said.

She also saw the invoice price of bread jump 18 cents in a week.

“Whenever the diesel prices go up, everything becomes expensive,” she said.

“It doesn’t affect just the drivers. It affects everybody.”

Tim Pague, an Amherst County native who is president of Arizona-based Kamble Company Transportation Services, said the 30-cent diesel price jump in March created a tug of war between drivers and producers.

His company matches producers who need shipping with trucking companies, and negotiates a price.

In March, he saw the price of most trips double compared to the previous year.

A load taken from Arizona to Virginia went up on average $800. For a truckload of broccoli, that would raise the price about 6 cents per bunch, Pague said.

Getting items trucked from California to either Florida or North Carolina went up by more than $1,000, he said.

“Trucking companies don’t make a lot of money to start with,” he said. When diesel prices inch upward, “They have to ask for the additional funds necessary so they can maintain their margins.”

Diesel prices stabilized somewhat toward the end of March, dropping a few cents per gallon. Pague said that helped stabilize the market.

But back in the restaurant at Goldy’s, a couple of truck drivers carrying bridge

support beams to West Virginia stopped for dinner last week. Getting around five miles per gallon and spending all day on the road, they stare the high prices in the face regularly.

Robert Gouldthorpe, a truck driver from Madison Heights, said he spent $3,000 on fuel in March 2007. He spent $6,100 last month.

His driving partner, James Linkous of Bluefield, W.Va., has seen prices fluctuate for the decades he’s been on the highway. “This is the first time in 30 years I’ve worried about making a living,” he said.

However, he said hauling highway construction components like they do pays more than carrying food and other small products.

The independent truck drivers, who don’t have a company to foot the bill for gas, are hurt the most, he said.

He’s worried about the effect diesel prices are having on the overall economy.

Even if the price just got back down to $2.50, that would be something the nation could adjust to, he said.

“It’s killing the economy. Ain’t nobody going to adjust to $4 a gallon.”