Memorial Day weekend travel tips and gas prices update

BAY COUNTY, Fla. (WMBB) – If you’re planning a trip for the Memorial Day weekend, you won’t be alone on the roadways.

Triple-A Motor Club is predicting that 2,300,000 million Floridians will be driving more than 50 miles from their homes this weekend. That’s a new record. It’s also about 106,000 more people traveling this Memorial Day than last year.

If you’d like to avoid some of those people, AAA is predicting the most congested travel periods will be Thursday and Friday from 3:00 pm to 7:00 pm. AAA also suggests you plan to drive during the least congested times, which will be before noon or after 7:00 pm.

Out of those 2,300,000 million Florida drivers, many will find themselves broken down on the side of the road. AAA alone expects to rescue more than 378,000 stranded motorists nationwide during the holiday weekend.

That’s up 5% from last year. The three most common reasons are flat tires, dead batteries, and people locking themselves out of their vehicles.

You can help avoid some potential problems by performing a pre-trip inspection. That inspection should include your tires, including the spare.

Make sure your brakes are not grinding or squealing. Check your vehicle’s battery.
Replace your windshield wiper blades and fill the windshield washer fluid reservoir.

Also, top off your vehicle’s motor oil and other fluids, like radiator coolant, and the brake, transmission, and power steering fluids. It’s also a good idea to have an emergency kit on hand.

It should include a flashlight with extra batteries, first-aid supplies, drinking water, non-perishable snacks for people and pets, car battery jumper cables, emergency flares or reflectors, a rain poncho, a basic tool kit, duct tape, gloves, shop rags or paper towels.

Here is some good news for your wallet.

The trip is not going to cost you much more in gas than it did last year. Gas prices remained steady last week over the week before. The average price of a gallon of regular unleaded is $3.45. That’s $.04 higher than it was during Memorial Day weekend last year.

The most expensive prices in Florida this week are in the West Palm Beach-Boca Raton areas at $3.65 a gallon. The lowest is in the Ft. Walton Beach-Crestview area at $3.19. Panama City and Pensacola are tied for the second lowest prices, averaging $3.25 a gallon.