America's most expensive gas? It's in L.A. Land.

I'll give you the bad news first, then the not-so-bad news.

First: Los Angeles has America's most expensive gas, at an average of $4.59 per gallon, according to the Lundberg Survey of 7,000 gas stations. The survey reports the nationwide average is $4.10 a gallon, and the most expensive gas in America is in Los Angeles and Fresno -- where regular averages $4.59 per gallon.

Now the better news: Gas prices in Los Angeles have been fairly steady for about a week now. The attached photo was taken June 13 in Santa Monica, and the price at that station (Lincoln and Santa Monica boulevards) hasn't budged in nine days, still $4.89/gallon.

LosAngelesGasPrices.com, an excellent resource, reports that regular gas averages $4.60 per gallon in L.A., unchanged from a week ago.

Your thoughts? Comments? E-mail story tips to peter.viles@latimes.com
Photo Credit: LA Land, via the Pain at the Pump gallery in Your News at Your Scene at LATimes.com.

Will gas prices drive buyers downtown?

My colleagues over at the Bottleneck blog posted an interesting item today asking if rising gas prices will make downtown real estate look more attractive:

"We've been hearing this for awhile -- mostly from developers. Suburban residents will move into urban areas because they can't stand their commutes anymore. There's been much debate about whether this is true. But the Wall Street Journal reports that gas prices might be doing what traffic could not:

'Abandoning grueling freeway commutes and the ennui of San Fernando Valley suburbs, Mike Boseman recently found residential refuge in [Pasadena]. His apartment building straddles a light-rail line, which the 25-year-old insurance broker rides to and from work in Los Angeles...' "

The Associated Press has a similar story, reporting, "Real estate agents, transportation officials and industry surveys indicate that home buyers are placing more importance on cutting their gas bills and commute times than they have since the oil shocks of the 1970s."

More, from the A.P.: "On Wednesday, a survey of 900 Coldwell Banker agents showed a remarkable 96% said that rising gas prices were a concern to their clients, and 78% said higher fuel costs are increasing their desire for city living."

One more, from LosAngelesGasPrices: The average price of a gallon of regular unleaded in L.A. is $4.61 Wednesday, up from $4.60 Tuesday.

Your thoughts? Comments? E-mail story tips to peter.viles@latimes.com.
Photo: Los Angeles Times

Making the housing-gas price connection

The hometown paper makes the housing-gas price connection this morning, reporting that housing markets in outlying suburbs are suffering in part because of their remoteness: "Outlying areas like the Antelope Valley and the Inland Empire have long appealed to people who were willing to accept a burdensome commute for the chance to own a better house. But buyers are increasingly factoring gasoline costs into their purchase decisions, said Dan Griffith, a Rancho Cucamonga-based real estate agent."

More: "Christopher Leinberger of the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank, says home values in these so-called exurbs may continue to languish long after urban markets begin to recover, thanks to higher gas costs.

"Under the old model we have lived with for the past 50 years, you could drive away from major employment concentrations until you could qualify for a house because cheap energy costs made it possible," Leinberger said. "Now as energy prices go up, the housing prices out there on the fringe take a major hit."

If the phrase "drive ... until you could qualify" rings a bell, it should. Bloomberg News recently quoted Robert Lang of the Metropolitan Institute at Virginia Tech describing the housing bubble in outlying suburbs, saying "it was drive until you qualify'' for a mortgage.

Your thoughts? Comments? E-mail story tips to peter.viles@latimes.com
Photo Credit: LA Land

The pump chronicles: $4.89/gallon in Santa Monica

Most recent first. $4.89 a gallon today at Santa Monica and Lincoln. That's an increase of 80 cents a gallon, since April 25.

This was All the way back on June 5. I drive by this gas station most Friday mornings.

This was May 30.

This was April 25, $4.09 a gallon. Recapping: Gas at this station has spiked by 19.6% in six weeks. I pulled over and took this picture because, at the time, I thought $4.09 was a really high price for gas.

Why so many pictures and so few words? Because a picture is worth 1,300 words (inflation), and because some media companies now measure journalists' productivity in column inches produced, and I'm padding my production (That's an inside-the-building joke).

Your thoughts? Comments? E-mail story tips to peter.viles@latimes.com
Photo Credits: LA Land

Photo of the day: $4.83 on Pico

Yeah, it's that nutty expensive station on Pico and Barrington in West L.A.

While I've got your attention:
--Los Angeles Gas Prices reports that the average price of regular in the city is $4.53 a gallon, up from $4.33 a week ago. The website reports a high of $4.99 in L.A.
--Interesting tidbit: the "spread" between L.A. gas prices and the national average has been widening significantly. A month ago it was 17 cents a gallon ($3.88 in L.A. vs. $3.71 nationally); today it's 47 cents ($4.53 vs. $4.06). An LA Land coffee mug* goes to the first commenter not named Johnny Dollar who explains that one.

Your thoughts? Comments? E-mail story tips to peter.viles@latimes.com
Photo: L.A. Land
*It's a virtual mug.

"Drive until you qualify" -- the gas-mortgage connection

Yes, more on gas prices. The big brain blog Calculated Risk agrees: the spike in gas prices is a big problem for exurban locales such as Temecula: "The combination of the housing bust plus high oil prices is hitting exurban towns like Temecula very hard."

CR links to a solid piece from Bloomberg exploring the gas-housing double whammy, and what it means for newer communities out on the fringe of big metro areas: "It was drive until you qualify'' for a mortgage, says Robert Lang, director of the Metropolitan Institute at Virginia Tech in Alexandria, Va. "You can't do that anymore. Your cost of transportation will spike too much.'"

But, and those of you who think I'm dead wrong about gas prices will enjoy this: The New York Times, also big in the brain department, has an interesting take on this: people in our region make relatively good incomes; gas, as a percentage of income, is relatively low in Southern California. The NYT's conclusion, expressed in this graphic: high gas prices will hit much harder in poor, rural areas such as Wilcox County, Ala.

Your thoughts? Comments? E-mail story tips to peter.viles@latimes.com
Photo: Los Angeles Times

Pain at the pump, Catalina division

Kinda cheating if you ask me, but Kosher Krab submits this photo from a gas station in Avalon, on Catalina.

As you can see, $5.61 for regular.

Personally, I think this belongs in the Death Valley category of remote places.

Your thoughts? Comments?

Send your photos of gas prices to the Pain at the Pump gallery in Your Scene at latimes.com.

L.A. Land photo of the day: $4.59 and rising

The back story on this one is that I drive by this gas station in Santa Monica a couple of times a week, and when I drove past on April 25, and regular was $4.09, I thought that was so high that I took a picture and posted it.

Then last week, on May 30, I drove by and it was $4.39, and I thought, wow, that's a quick pop, so I posted that.

You can see what it is this morning: $4.59.

Relatedly: A great site for monitoring L.A. gas prices is, you guessed it, losangelesgasprices.com, which reports today that regular gas ranges from $4.08 to $4.72 per gallon in L.A., with an average price of $4.36.

Your thoughts? Comments? Post your photos of expensive gas, or cheap gas, on the Pain at the Pump album on Your Scene at latimes.com.

Photo: L.A. Land