Some people are getting different cars to cope with skyrocketing gas prices. Natalie Chang got a new ZIP code.

Chang, a certified nurse's assistant who works in downtown Honolulu, moved from her Windward O'ahu home on Friday to a place on Pi'ikoi Street to shorten her commute. She said she is also consolidating her shopping errands and limiting her travel overall.

"It's unbelievable," she said yesterday after paying for gasoline at the 7-Eleven store on the corner of Kalakaua Avenue and Young Street, where regular was going for $3.16 a gallon.

Chang was one of many local residents who went to the pump yesterday to top off their tanks ahead of today's anticipated spike in gas prices. Pump prices for a gallon of regular gas could reach $3.60 on O'ahu and approach $4 on the Neighbor Islands as the state sets its weekly cap today on the wholesale price of gasoline.

This week's wholesale cap will be about $3.50 a gallon, including taxes. That's up from $3.04 last week and $2.76 when the cap took effect on Sept. 1.

Prices under the cap, for the near future at least, are likely to rise because of the drastic jump in Mainland prices in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. The cap — the only such law in the country — ties Hawai'i's prices to prices in Los Angeles, the Gulf Coast and New York.

Nationwide, the price of self-serve regular gas averaged more than $3 a gallon for the first time ever, according to a nationwide survey released yesterday. The weighted average price for all three grades surged more than 38 cents to nearly $3.04 a gallon between Aug. 26 and Sept. 9, said Trilby Lundberg, who publishes the semimonthly Lundberg Survey of 7,000 gas stations around the country.

Last week Hawai'i legislative leaders, following up on a similar request by Gov. Linda Lingle, asked Chevron and Tesoro to not set wholesale gasoline prices at the maximum under Hawai'i's new gas cap law unless it is absolutely necessary to cover production and distribution costs.

At the Costco gas station in Iwilei yesterday, a line of cars snaked out onto Alakawa Street as drivers waited to fill up at $3.09 a gallon for regular.

New Sang of Manoa waited 20 minutes for his turn at the Costco pumps. Sang, 33, a pediatrician, said the cost of gasoline has prompted him to car pool more and take fewer trips to the North Shore.

"All across the country people are adjusting to these prices and they've been going up for a while now, so it's nothing new," Sang said. "I wanted to go (fill up) prior to the price going up."

At the 7-Eleven on Kalakaua, people parked and waited for the pumps to become available. Gas sales have doubled there during the past few days, said employee Leslie Tanaka, who has worked there for 20 years.

"Even if it's half full, they'll fill up," said Ethel Fleming, who has worked part-time at the store for 17 years.

At the Union 76 station on the corner of Beretania and Ke'eaumoku Street, several customers expressed surprise and frustration while others were simply resigned to the fact of rising gas prices.

"The whole country has the same problem now; it's not unique," said Sandy Colvin, a financial controller who lives in Makiki. "It's legalized price gouging, pretty much, but this is the way it's gone on for a long, long time."

Jonathan Teruya, a 22-year-old Kuli'ou'ou man who recently returned to Hawai'i after graduating from UCLA, learned of the high gas prices and the imminent rise while filling up his minivan before showing some college friends around the island.

He said he would probably have to watch his spending while he's home to make sure he has enough money for gas.

"It's ridiculous here," he said. "It (gas) is cheaper up there (in California)."

Don Gau, owner of the station, said he is frustrated at the rising prices and said the current oil situation is much worse than the gas shortages of the 1970s, even after one considers inflation. He said his daughter had to stop driving her Land Rover and switch to the more fuel-efficient Mini Cooper.

"In my life I've never seen gas prices go up so much," he said.

Reach Peter Boylan at pboylan@honoluluadvertiser.com.