Oregon Ends Ban on Self-Serve Gasoline
Oregon and New Jersey are the only two states that require motorists to have an attendant pump gas for them. Well, they were the only two -- now New Jersey is the only one.
Oregon is changing the law to allow drivers to pump their own gas -- though stations will be required to offer full service on at least half of their fuel pumps. The bill also prevents stations from charging more for full service.
I needed gas in Oregon once -- I was in town for a friend's wedding, I wrangled a press loan for a Nissan Altima, and on the way back to the airport, I needed to refuel. While I am all for keeping humans employed instead of having them replaced by machines, I wasn't thrilled that I had to wait for service.
On the other hand, I sometimes dislike pumping my own -- when it's cold I don't want to leave the car, sometimes my hands get dirty from the pump, et cetera. So it's nice that people will have the choice -- full service is pretty much dead where I live.
At least Oregonians won't have that problem.
[Image: mikecphoto/Shutterstock.com]
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Tim Healey grew up around the auto-parts business and has always had a love for cars — his parents joke his first word was “‘Vette”. Despite this, he wanted to pursue a career in sports writing but he ended up falling semi-accidentally into the automotive-journalism industry, first at Consumer Guide Automotive and later at Web2Carz.com. He also worked as an industry analyst at Mintel Group and freelanced for About.com, CarFax, Vehix.com, High Gear Media, Torque News, FutureCar.com, Cars.com, among others, and of course Vertical Scope sites such as AutoGuide.com, Off-Road.com, and HybridCars.com. He’s an urbanite and as such, doesn’t need a daily driver, but if he had one, it would be compact, sporty, and have a manual transmission.
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i remember when i lived in Vancouver BC i was filling up my tank and the lady beside me asked me if i could help her fill her tank. I thought wow what a lazy American (noticed her plates were from Oregon) and was thinking fill your own dam tank, but i guess she saw the look in my eyes and explained in Oregon they were not allowed to fill their own tanks and so had never had to do it before. Thought wow never heard of such a thing, I helped her and she was grateful and drove off. I had forgotten about that until reading this article.
One of the few intelligent things to come out of Oregon in a while.
Dear Oregon,
Welcome to 1982. Now about those riots.....
Hugs,
The other 49 states
When I was recovering from surgery in 2007, I was happy to find a station here in Toledo that still pumped it for you, and I was happy to pay for them doing it. Of course, it's long closed up and is a car wash now. I don't know what the procedure is for getting someone to pump your gas if you are handicapped badly enough that you can't do it.