GTA gas prices drop to lowest level in 6 months

The latest gas prices in Toronto & the GTA can be found here.

If you’re planning a road trip on the final weekend of August it’s a great time to fill up the tank.

The price of gas in the GTA reached lowest in approximately six months on Friday after an overnight drop.

The average price fell four cents overnight to $1.549 per litre at most GTA stations and the price is expected to hold for Saturday. The last time the city saw prices this low at the pumps was in February.

Many experts suggested the reprieve in soaring prices will be short-lived with the cost expected rise significantly when September arrives.

Roger McKnight, chief petroleum analyst at En-Pro, told CityNews earlier this week he doesn’t believe the return to higher prices is in the immediate future, but people should enjoy the cheaper prices while they are here.

“I think we’re okay right through Labour Day,” McKnight says. “After Labour Day, it goes into what we call the shoulder season of demand.”

“What happens in the fall, diesel prices determine gasoline prices. If diesel prices go up, it drags up gasoline in a slipstream effect.”

He says an early cold snap could see the price of diesel skyrocket. He predicts prices will be back in the $1.80 to $1.85 range when those changes start to come into effect in September.

“Grab this while you can, because I don’t think it’s going to last,” he says.

Gas prices are down 60 cents from when they peaked at a record $2.149 per litre in June in the GTA. Prices were as high as $1.749/litre at the start of August.

In Canada, although gas prices rose 35.6 per cent in July compared to a year earlier, that was down from a whopping 54.6 per cent increase in June. Still, Canadians are feeling the pinch from inflation as food costs were up 9.9 per cent compared with a year ago, the fastest pace since August 1981.

With files from Lucas Casaletto and Mark Douglas