We answered this question in our personal finance feature today:
Question: I am one of the thousands of people who live in Quezon City but work in Makati City. That means I drive some 20 kilometers to work every day, and that’s just one way. I tried commuting but it’s impossible during rush hour. With the price of gasoline going up, travel to and from work makes a huge dent in my budget. Is there any relief in sight for us? – Josephine P.
We all will have to deal with the rising cost of gas, whether or not we are from Quezon City, Bulacan, Cavite, Cebu or Davao. The most terrible forecast I have heard so far is for a full tank to cost P30,000. That’s almost the take-home pay of senior call center agents.
Full tank at P30,000? Goodbye car, hello MRT for many middle-class families. I see a lot of them in the MRT, even now. You can sense which MRT commuters used to bring a car to work. Pretty soon, Josephine’s “impossible” may turn to “no other choice.”
I like the sneaky tricks to save on gas:
- Lighten up the trunk. More weight in your car trunk will make your car work harder, using up more gas.
- At the gas pump, don’t top off the tank. The excess gas may spill and will amount to waste. Just stop filling at the automatic level.
- When parking, choose a shady spot to prevent gas from evaporating under the heat.
- Fill up your tank in the morning or evening when the air is cooler. At midday, gas may expand due to the heat and you will end up getting a lesser amount of gas.
One oil company has seen an opportunity in this crisis. Seaoil is offering a price lock prepaid card at P1,070 for 20 liters, or P53.30 per liter. They are selling the card only from June 10 to 16.
Good or bad deal?
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My article entitled “Inflation, your nest egg’s silent assassin” came out in the Philippine Daily Inquirer (print version) yesterday. It has a link where you can download the retirement worksheet from Augustus J.V. Ferreria.
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For those who are interested in learning about investing in the stock market, the Philippine Stock Exchange has a seminar called “Demystifying the Stock Market” on June 19, 2008, 6:00 to 10:00 PM, at the Trading Floor of the PSE Centre, Exchange Road, Ortigas Center, Pasig City. For more information please call the PSE Senior Specialist/Project Head at 6887537 or 9130054.
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:37 am
[...] your tire pressure. This tip, I got from a reader over at Inquirer’s MoneySmarts blog. Apparently, you can get more gas mileage if your tires are properly [...]
June 17th, 2008 at 11:46 pm
This string caught my attention, but still a little surprised there isn’t as many comments as I expected. I’ll keep checking back since this is a hot topic for me personally.
June 13th, 2008 at 9:15 am
Nina,
Thank you for the info you share but I still think trains will be cheaper if you compare the cost of un-subsidized train ticket from say Baclaran to North Ave vs the cost of a car ride on a normal traffic. This is on one person to one person comparison and not a family of 5 buying 5 train tickets vs riding a car.
And yes I think trains has less pollution (and not no pollution) if you compare the carbon footprint of train passengers vs if they just ride cars/busses/jeepneys against the pollution generated by the train power plants…
June 12th, 2008 at 7:56 pm
Paetechie was right. There were several trains projects in the pipeline but implementation is very slow. Relocation of informal settlers is really a problem for every government project. It’s very complicated, sometimes the government and the lender have different policies.
MRT/LRT is very close to my heart. Five years ago, I was working in a government oversight agency and among the projects I was focusing on are the MRT/LRT Projects. We were pushing for single ticketing system then and the fast-tracking of train projects in the pipeline like South Rail (Phase I Rehabilitation of existing PNR line up to Laguna), North Rail (Phase I from Caloocan to Bulacan), Line 6 of LRT (Baclaran to Cavite), Line 7 (I think this one is from QC to Bulacan), possibility of linking North Edsa and Monumento, possibility of travelator from MRT G. Araneta Station to PNR Sta Mesa Stations. We gave those color codes to MRT/LRT calling MRT-EDSA the blue line and LRT1 yellow line and so on. Sadly, that oversight Office was abolished now.
But even without an oversight office pushing to speed-up projects, I hope that all rail projects in the pipeline will be implemented. Train projects are quite expensive and budget is always a problem in our country. Government projects are complicated to implement and the politics get things more complicated.
June 12th, 2008 at 7:45 pm
Omski, I agree trains are efficient and it can ease congestion but I disagree that it is the cheapest and it has less pollution. Trains aren’t really cheap, it seems cheap because it is subsidized by the government plus convenience makes it a cheaper alternative. Less direct pollution but I really wouldn’t say less pollution. It uses electricity and how that electricity is produced would determine the amount of indirect pollution these trains are contributing. Sorry for being too technical. I am an environmental consultant and I can’t help not to correct the notion that because the trains has no emissions means no pollution.
No, I don’t think gas companies gives payola (personal thoughts). It’s win-win for them. Train uses electricity and many power plants uses oil to fire-up their plants. I would say the lack of support of government Officials is the main reason why the train system did not develop. When I was working in the government, I’ve met some LRT/MRT employees. According to them, during the Marcos time, even before LRT was constructed, the government had a Master Plan for developing the train network in Manila. Just imagine if those trains were built according to that Master Plan, we probably don’t have to face the traffic problems we have. Anyways, past is past, just wanna share it.