Only the city of Ironton has a higher average price on gasoline than Portsmouth in a survey of gas prices in various areas of Ohio, released by AAA East Central.

Ironton's $4.199 and Portsmouth's $4.123 top the price list that goes as low as $3.934 in Steubenville and Washington Court House.

AAA said the current average of $4.025 is up more than 12 cents since last week's survey.

According to AAA Fuel Gauge, the nationwide average price of self-serve regular gasoline is $3.937, which represents an increase of about 14 cents per gallon since a week ago.

The size and speed of the recent run up in gasoline prices is similar to the meteoric increase in the price of crude oil, according to AAA. Oil reached $133 per barrel in electronic, overseas trading Monday, before dropping below $130 per barrel Tuesday.

According to Bevi Powell, of the communications department at AAA, the longer prices hover near $4 per gallon, the more likely households will continue to look for shorter trips away from home in both time and distance.

The average price during the week of May 20, was $3.901, compared to $3.332 during the week of May 29, 2007.

A spokeswoman for the Portsmouth office of the AAA said their employees are not permitted to make comments as to the effects of gasoline prices on motor travel, and referred calls to the communications office in Pittsburgh, Pa.

"At this time, just coming off the Memorial Day holiday weekend, we noticed a very slight drop in travelers during the holiday weekend to kick off the summer drive season," said Tracy Edwards, manager of Travel Sales for AAA East Central. "And what we see folks doing for this summer would be probably taking shorter trips from home - not only just in time, but also in distance - and also probably spending some time with family and friends for lodging and those types of things to help cut some of the expenses, as well."

Edwards said he had not seen a lot of change in the use of motorcoach travel by vacationers.

"Our motorcoach travel, as far as the pricing, it has gone up a little on the motorcoach portion of it because of the increase in fuel costs," Edwards said. "But as far as year over year, our sales are pretty much the same, as far as the number of participants, year to date. So I don't see that affecting anything at this time."

The following is a list of the average price of a gallon of unleaded self-serve gasoline in various areas, as reported by AAA: