Colorado Springs average gas price fall ahead of Thanksgiving

Colorado Springs gas price followed the region’s weather trend as gas costs and temperatures plummeted to seasonal lows heading into Thanksgiving week.

Colorado Springs gas prices averaged $2.94 per gallon Monday, according to national travel service AAA. Colorado averaged $3.16 per gallon, edging below the declining national level, which hit $3.31 per gallon this week.

“The national average is seeing its longest streak of declines in over a year,” said Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis for GasBuddy, the online price tracker, “reaching a ninth straight week, as gas prices fall to their lowest since January.”

Some pockets of Colorado Springs offered a gallon of gas as cheap as $2.95 on Sunday, GasBuddy price reports showed. Meanwhile, some of the city’s most expensive gas rung up at $3.89 per gallon.

The sub-three-dollar gas follows seasonal trends that tend to see prices drop as demand dwindles during frigid months when Coloradans and Americans alike spend less time on the road.

That lower demand often drives prices even further down in cities along the front range because of the Rocky Mountain region’s oil refining capacity, De Haan said. The higher refining capacity boosts regional supply, whereas some parts of the country, such as the northeast, rely heavily on imported gas.

Other hyperregional idiosyncrasies can be at play for some of Colorado's rural areas and ski getaways that have “captive” consumers, such as Vail, which tends to see higher gas prices, De Haan added.

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He expects the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, or OPEC, to cut production in November, given the falling price of oil. The artificial decrease in supply will push prices up slightly.

“I would say between now and Christmas we’ll find the bottom,” De Haan said. He later added, “I think prices, maybe the lower prices, will modestly climb, but I think that over the course of the winter, between now and Valentine's Day, we’ll probably see some stations below $3; most stations will probably in be somewhere in the upper twos, low threes.”

Other Colorado locales, according to AAA, showed the following Monday averages:

- Denver $3.01

- Pueblo $3.16

- Vail: $3.65

- Grand Junction: $3.64