Driving Fast Will Cost You More Money!
by Harvey Bond
(Chicago, USA)
Drivers these days are prisoners of high gas prices. The worse thing is, there is really nothing that any of us can do to help control the price of gas itself. However, we can control, to a certain extent, how much gas we consume.
Think about it: the less gas we use, the less we have to buy! If your idea of conserving fuel is simply to make less trips in your car to different places, remember that there are other ways to control how much gas you use, as well.
For instance, if you prefer to drive at high speeds, you are saving yourself a little time (and maybe having some fun), but you’re costing yourself a lot of money on gas!
Life moves very fast nowadays. Most people have a lot of responsibilities to attend to, including work, family activities, or any number of things. These types of things lead to people having to rush to get around, which in turn leads to a feeling that “faster is better” when it comes to driving.
While it is obviously true that you will get where you are going faster if you drive at a higher speed, you will also spend more money on gas if you drive that way!
It is a basic fact that any vehicle, be it a smaller car, or a large van, truck or SUV, consumes more fuel when driven at faster speeds. Chances are that your vehicle gets its best gas mileage at 55 to 60 miles per hour. Therefore, driving faster than those speeds is going to increase your fuel consumption, which means you are going to buy more gas.
Buying more gas? Well, we all know what that means, and we would all like to avoid having to do so. If you are feeling the pressure of high gas prices, maybe you should consider reducing your speed a bit, so that you can buy less fuel.
There are a lot of speed demons out there who routinely go 75 miles per hour, or even faster! For these folks, it is important to note that not only are you greatly increasing your chances of a traffic ticket for speeding (and increasing your chances of death or serious injury in an accident), but you are also greatly increasing your fuel consumption, by as much as 20% or more!
That’s right; someone driving at about 55 miles per hour will only consume about four gallons for every five that the speed demon uses. At upwards of four dollars per gallon of gas, no one can afford to use more gas than they need to!
It can be a big change to have to control your speed on a busy highway or a high-speed freeway. After all, you will see impatient drivers passing you constantly, all while you feel like you are practically standing still.
However, if you can successfully make the change to driving at slower speeds, you will definitely appreciate the money you are saving on gas expenses!
It’s also worth noting that you do not necessarily have to slow all the way down to 55 miles per hour to experience the benefits of increased fuel efficiency. Any reduction in speed will net you some sort of decreased fuel consumption, though obviously you will save more gas the more you slow down.
You may want to pick and choose the times when you put the proverbial pedal to the metal. After all, if you are running late to an important meeting, you may be able to justify driving a bit faster.
If you are simply on your way to a weekend cookout at Uncle Jimmy’s, it is not quite so important to drive 80 miles per hour to get there. If your trip is relatively short, you will only cost yourself a few extra minutes of driving time, anyway.
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