am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke.
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The thing about gas is, it's a trap.
Your car uses it up. Kinda like printers and ink. My car has about 97k miles on it, and my fuel stats say my average is about 35 mpg. (I only drive in city traffic, cuz I'm legally blind and can't exceed 45 mph).
97,000 divided by 35 is about 2770 gallons. Using data from the US Energy Information Administration (https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=EMM_EPMRU_PTE_STX_DPG&f=W) the average price per gallon for the life of my car is $2.59.
That's $7,175 approximately. And that gas is *gone*. It's like toilet paper - you only use it once. Renewables are like a bidet - you use water, but water is part of a cycle - it can be cleaned and reused.
There's an excellent video about this by Tech Connextras on YouTube called "You are being misled about renewable energy technology," on the Tech Connextras channel. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zgxb8I1nk2I
@MannyDexter @blogdiva Yeah, I believe that's the video where he brings up that we could replace all corn farms for ethanol--not corn for food, just the corn we grow to throw ethanol in our gas--with solar panels and supply ALL of the electricity for the ENTIRE United States.
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@lf_araujo @blogdiva @fsinn paid $6.7 the other day. I’m glad I get 45 MPG - in a 45 year old car!
Sometimes I wonder about the kind of fuel efficiency we could have if car makers cared about that instead of stupid features and designs that mean that a steep driveway will cause scraping. -
RE: https://mastodon.social/@randahl/116325598364670792
am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke. back in the 1990s, gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre in many european countries.
petrol should be $20 a gallon if not more because USians should have changed the way they develop suburbs.
USA DOESN’T NEED CARS, it needs walkable towns with stores, hospitals, schools, post offices, grocery stores.
i hate USA suburbs because they are literally food, health care and education deserts.
KILL THE USA SUBURB,
SAVE THE WORLD.@blogdiva this....
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RE: https://mastodon.social/@randahl/116325598364670792
am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke. back in the 1990s, gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre in many european countries.
petrol should be $20 a gallon if not more because USians should have changed the way they develop suburbs.
USA DOESN’T NEED CARS, it needs walkable towns with stores, hospitals, schools, post offices, grocery stores.
i hate USA suburbs because they are literally food, health care and education deserts.
KILL THE USA SUBURB,
SAVE THE WORLD. -
RE: https://mastodon.social/@randahl/116325598364670792
am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke. back in the 1990s, gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre in many european countries.
petrol should be $20 a gallon if not more because USians should have changed the way they develop suburbs.
USA DOESN’T NEED CARS, it needs walkable towns with stores, hospitals, schools, post offices, grocery stores.
i hate USA suburbs because they are literally food, health care and education deserts.
KILL THE USA SUBURB,
SAVE THE WORLD.@blogdiva cook
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URBAN PLANNING is completely disregarded in this country to serve the interests of the petromafia.
WHAT PART OF WALKABLE TOWNS don't you do not understand? it would entail ditching suburbanism for urbanism ―something WHITE PEOPLE do not want.
so stop rationalizing the shitshow we have now and start speaking of how to break the car apartheid of suburbanism.
@blogdiva
How are we supposed to flee from the scary brown people without a car? Ummm... I mean have freedom to choose our schools for our children, or something like that. -
Petrol is priced by the liter in Europe, and when I was there in the 90s, the per-liter price was higher than our per-gallon price. They used the revenue to build public transportation. I've been saying since then we should as well.
Start with a one dollar a gallon gas tax and increase it a dollar a year indefinitely.
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@blogdiva I still use the grocery store test: no matter the price of gas, try to find a beverage that’s cheaper, litre for litre… I mean, bottled water? WATER? Even apple juice is cheaper…
@GrumpusNation @blogdiva and oil is a non-renewable resource, whereas apple juice literally grows on trees.
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RE: https://mastodon.social/@randahl/116325598364670792
am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke. back in the 1990s, gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre in many european countries.
petrol should be $20 a gallon if not more because USians should have changed the way they develop suburbs.
USA DOESN’T NEED CARS, it needs walkable towns with stores, hospitals, schools, post offices, grocery stores.
i hate USA suburbs because they are literally food, health care and education deserts.
KILL THE USA SUBURB,
SAVE THE WORLD.@blogdiva amen. When are you running for office because killing the suburbs is on my agenda, too!
The only draw back with $20/gal gas prices is that if oil is expensive then coal isn’t and that is a problem.
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RE: https://mastodon.social/@randahl/116325598364670792
am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke. back in the 1990s, gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre in many european countries.
petrol should be $20 a gallon if not more because USians should have changed the way they develop suburbs.
USA DOESN’T NEED CARS, it needs walkable towns with stores, hospitals, schools, post offices, grocery stores.
i hate USA suburbs because they are literally food, health care and education deserts.
KILL THE USA SUBURB,
SAVE THE WORLD.@blogdiva it's a but of a tangent but I hate the word "suburb." It's so vague as to be completely useless. It's everything that isn't a major city center but also not wilderness or farmland.
It's how towns like mine justify not providing the public transit and bike infrastructure they should despite having a population density higher than most of Chicago.
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RE: https://mastodon.social/@randahl/116325598364670792
am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke. back in the 1990s, gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre in many european countries.
petrol should be $20 a gallon if not more because USians should have changed the way they develop suburbs.
USA DOESN’T NEED CARS, it needs walkable towns with stores, hospitals, schools, post offices, grocery stores.
i hate USA suburbs because they are literally food, health care and education deserts.
KILL THE USA SUBURB,
SAVE THE WORLD.@blogdiva
Auto dealership owners have been the local donors for GOP politicians for decades. They keep us from as much public transportation as they can.
https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2023/05/wheeling-and-dealing-how-auto-dealers-put-the-brakes-on-direct-sales.html -
RE: https://mastodon.social/@randahl/116325598364670792
am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke. back in the 1990s, gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre in many european countries.
petrol should be $20 a gallon if not more because USians should have changed the way they develop suburbs.
USA DOESN’T NEED CARS, it needs walkable towns with stores, hospitals, schools, post offices, grocery stores.
i hate USA suburbs because they are literally food, health care and education deserts.
KILL THE USA SUBURB,
SAVE THE WORLD.@blogdiva We need (t(ele/rans)porter/portal)s!
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RE: https://mastodon.social/@randahl/116325598364670792
am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke. back in the 1990s, gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre in many european countries.
petrol should be $20 a gallon if not more because USians should have changed the way they develop suburbs.
USA DOESN’T NEED CARS, it needs walkable towns with stores, hospitals, schools, post offices, grocery stores.
i hate USA suburbs because they are literally food, health care and education deserts.
KILL THE USA SUBURB,
SAVE THE WORLD.@blogdiva We need a transition out and fast. This government won’t give it to us, though, preferring the havoc they’re creating. But streetcars? Small mass transit combined with as much telework as practicable (including public coworking spaces for those who prefer them)? More local delivery (à la ice, milk, meat trucks of yore, but with the benefit of preorder online)? More gardening collectives by neighborhood to make use of the often-arable soils cities are sited over? These things could be done with the existing structures while we begin pivoting the architecture. The houses aren’t built to last more than a century, we can turn things over in place and mitigate the shock that always ends up crushing the poor first.
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RE: https://mastodon.social/@randahl/116325598364670792
am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke. back in the 1990s, gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre in many european countries.
petrol should be $20 a gallon if not more because USians should have changed the way they develop suburbs.
USA DOESN’T NEED CARS, it needs walkable towns with stores, hospitals, schools, post offices, grocery stores.
i hate USA suburbs because they are literally food, health care and education deserts.
KILL THE USA SUBURB,
SAVE THE WORLD.@blogdiva " gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre"... Gas it's barely $2.50 per liter in 2026. In the ‘90s, it was under $1 per liter in Europe FYI
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RE: https://mastodon.social/@randahl/116325598364670792
am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke. back in the 1990s, gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre in many european countries.
petrol should be $20 a gallon if not more because USians should have changed the way they develop suburbs.
USA DOESN’T NEED CARS, it needs walkable towns with stores, hospitals, schools, post offices, grocery stores.
i hate USA suburbs because they are literally food, health care and education deserts.
KILL THE USA SUBURB,
SAVE THE WORLD.@blogdiva $20? Let's go for $40!!!
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RE: https://mastodon.social/@randahl/116325598364670792
am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke. back in the 1990s, gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre in many european countries.
petrol should be $20 a gallon if not more because USians should have changed the way they develop suburbs.
USA DOESN’T NEED CARS, it needs walkable towns with stores, hospitals, schools, post offices, grocery stores.
i hate USA suburbs because they are literally food, health care and education deserts.
KILL THE USA SUBURB,
SAVE THE WORLD.@blogdiva In the US it was a 1.5 mile walk to our nearest coffee shop, which was the closest shop of any kind - I walked to the cafe only about three times in more than ten years. I was sick of having to get in the car for every single errand.
When I moved back to the UK, I spent three weeks traveling by bus and train to different towns and cities. I found a perfect walkable place with good transport links and a lively high street, but there are an awful lot of towns with abandoned centres and out of town retail parks with limited if any bus services. Away from the major population centres, it would be difficult to cope without a car.
I'm coming up to three years happily car-free, but the UK could still use more effort revitalising towns and improving public transport links.
I spoke to shop owners in my travels, the main problem that they shared was extortionate shop rents. For tax reasons, it seems the property owners literally do not care if the shop is empty or occupied. I suspect also that the "value" of the building is related to the rent cost - whether or not there are tenants.
Another town (Harlow, where I lived as a kid) used to have a thriving shopping centre and a large busy market. The town council decided to use the market stall space rents as a revenue stream. Within a few years the market was gone. Now, the market square with its almost entirely gutted surrounding shops looks like a set from The Walking Dead.
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RE: https://mastodon.social/@randahl/116325598364670792
am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke. back in the 1990s, gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre in many european countries.
petrol should be $20 a gallon if not more because USians should have changed the way they develop suburbs.
USA DOESN’T NEED CARS, it needs walkable towns with stores, hospitals, schools, post offices, grocery stores.
i hate USA suburbs because they are literally food, health care and education deserts.
KILL THE USA SUBURB,
SAVE THE WORLD.@blogdiva It's a zoning problem as well. You can't build or open a corner bodega or cafe in most neighborhoods in the US. That's what makes them deserts.
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RE: https://mastodon.social/@randahl/116325598364670792
am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke. back in the 1990s, gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre in many european countries.
petrol should be $20 a gallon if not more because USians should have changed the way they develop suburbs.
USA DOESN’T NEED CARS, it needs walkable towns with stores, hospitals, schools, post offices, grocery stores.
i hate USA suburbs because they are literally food, health care and education deserts.
KILL THE USA SUBURB,
SAVE THE WORLD.@blogdiva
️️️ 4 bucks a gallon is fucking cheap, here its like 2.5 dollars a litre -
@blogdiva It is already ±$6 in parts of California. I would like more mass transit, but in a county of 65,000 people in the California foothills, one can only expect so much.
I still need some kind of vehicle to transport 40 lb sacks of chicken feed. My birds insist.
(and the two full-size bags of potting soil, 5' plant trellises, and 15 gal pots, waiting to be unloaded, when it stops raining)
@c_merriweather @blogdiva Somewhere on one of my hard drives, I have pics of me hauling > 80lbs (two sack of feed plus misc other chicken/duck supplies) by cargo bike
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RE: https://mastodon.social/@randahl/116325598364670792
am sorry, but $4/gallon in 2026 is a fucking joke. back in the 1990s, gas was $7/g̶a̶l̶l̶o̶n̶ litre in many european countries.
petrol should be $20 a gallon if not more because USians should have changed the way they develop suburbs.
USA DOESN’T NEED CARS, it needs walkable towns with stores, hospitals, schools, post offices, grocery stores.
i hate USA suburbs because they are literally food, health care and education deserts.
KILL THE USA SUBURB,
SAVE THE WORLD.RE: https://social.ridetrans.it/@Andres4NY/116297846609329025
@blogdiva inflation-adjusted!
