Gas prices are dropping across the nation as travelers have cut back and found other ways to get around.

In Bismarck-Mandan prices for self-served unleaded dropped to $3.89 earlier this week. Prices had been at $3.99 for some time. On Friday, prices dropped to $3.84 at most stations.

Prices for self-served unleaded in North Dakota peaked on July 17 at a state average of $4.08 a gallon, said Rose White, AAA public affairs director in Omaha, Neb. As of Friday morning, the state average price had dropped to $3.94.

North Dakota is below the national average, which was $4 as of Friday morning, White said.

Mike Rud of the North Dakota Petroleum Marketer's Association said the drop in price came from a drop in consumer demand.

"There's been some conservation obviously, I think $4 was a trigger point," he said. "It started pinching people's pocketbooks."

Consumers began cutting back significantly once prices breached the $4 mark, enough to bring prices down. With consumers demanding less gasoline, the supply on hand increased and the price dropped.

"It's what a lot of people were hoping for, that the thought of conservation would kick in." Rud said.

He said crude oil was down from a high of $147 per barrel. Bloomberg listed the price at $123 on Friday.

White said the drop in price coincided with a decrease in consumer demand, and expected it to continue as the supply outpaced demand.

"There is plenty of gas available," White said. "It's still high priced but it's certainly down from the record highs we saw a couple weeks ago."

White said while she expects the price to drop in the next few days, a number of factors could disrupt production, such as hurricanes hitting major domestic oil producing sites in the Gulf of Mexico.

Still, she didn't expect gas to get down near the $3 per gallon prices of last summer, which don't seem bad in retrospect.

"Now we wish for those days again," she said.