Citizens across Carter County didn’t feel any “labor pains” at the gas pump Monday.
According to information provided by the Auto Club Group – AAA affiliate from Knoxville, Tenn.,  the state, along with the rest of the country, experienced a break when filling up their cars to celebrate Labor Day.
“We experienced a record in gas prices,” Stephanie Milani, Public Affairs Specialist with AAA, told the Elizabethton Star Tuesday. “Prices were the cheapest in a national average since 2004.”
Residents of the country saved $18.9 billion over the summer, compared to last year.
According to GasBuddy.com, the average gas prices in Tennessee as of Tuesday reached 2.017 compared to 2.104 one year ago. The national average peaked at 2.192 while reaching 2.406 in 2015.
Each of the nine gas stations across the city stayed under $2 Tuesday, according to GasBuddy, with the Marathon, Exxon and Murphy USA stations on West Elk Avenue being the cheapest at $1.85.
As the months go on, Milani added that while it is a wait-and-see approach, the trend of gas prices going downward could occur leading into the new year.
“There’s a lot of different variables to take into place,” she said. “Over the past three weeks, we’ve actually seen prices increase week-by-week across the country. This time of the year is hurricane season and there’s typically a demand on gasoline production. A lot of this plays into how much crude oil goes for. There’s an expected meeting with countries of OPEC at the end of summer to address oil concerns. Like last year, prices went up and following that meeting, we noticed a decline in prices.”
While taking in the different considerations for the area, Milani added that it isn’t out of the realm of possibility that prices in the state see a decline leading up into the new year.
Along with gas prices, Labor Day saw thousands across the state travel to celebrate an “unofficial” end to summer.
“We always look at Labor Day as the unofficial end of summer,” Milani said. “You see a decrease in traffic following that day, unless people are staying at length in a location. There wasn’t a real study created this year for traveling, but we can expect the amount of traffic to die down now with Labor Day over with.”
Locally, the possibility of traffic depends on a variety of factors.
“It really depends on weather and gas prices,” Milani said. “If you see a break at the pump and nice weather, you’ll see an increase in traffic. But if any of those factors don’t happen, whether it’s bad weather or prices increase a little, you won’t see much traffic out.”
Residents in the area are encouraged to proceed with caution when traveling to Bristol this weekend with the inaugural “Battle at Bristol” game taking place at Bristol Motor Speedway.
While events like this weekend typically see an increase of traffic, Milani added that heavy amounts of traffic won’t be expected much throughout the remainder of the year, excluding Thanksgiving and Christmas.