FUEL FOR THOUGHT

By CALVIN TRILLIN

I was sitting in my car thinking about what I'd do with the $27 a year that's going to come my way if the 1993 gasoline-tax increase is repealed. My mother told me that it's always good to look at the bright spots up ahead.

I'm using the figure of $27 because that's an economist's estimate of how much the "average driver" would save on gasoline every year if he no longer had to pay the 4.3 cents-per-gal. tax hike. It's a figure based on the assumption that the oil companies, long known for their exquisite sense of fair play, will pass the full saving on to consumers.

I figured that I'm an average driver. Not to boast, I've always thought that I'm a bit better than average. I am, after all, the former co-editor of a New York journal called Beautiful Spot: A Magazine of Parking. You don't get that kind of position if you need eight turns to back into a space and still end up far enough away from the curb to permit motorcycle parking on your right.

So I was confident of being one of the people in for a $27 windfall. I just needed to figure out how to spend it. I knew that a trip to the West was out. I had just read that 10 states out there are raising their speed limit to 75 m.p.h. and that driving at that speed instead of 55 uses 50% more gasoline. Renting a car in Omaha and heading west at 75 m.p.h., I figured, I would run through my windfall somewhere between North Platte and Ogallala.

Then it occurred to me that "average driver" was based on miles driven rather than skill at the wheel. My saving might be less than $27 because I live in New York City, where alternatives to driving are available and increasingly attractive. The subway system, for instance, has mostly new trains as well as many renovated stations, and I think of it as much safer now that Bernhard Goetz, the wonk vigilante, is moving to Boston.

Goetz lived only one stop away from me, and for the past 10 years I rode uptown knowing that theoretically I could, without realizing whom I was talking to, ask a fellow passenger for the correct time and get three in the back for my trouble.

Also, the city just announced a new initiative to make taxi riding more pleasant: drivers will be required to learn 50 courteous phrases that the authorities believe to be appropriate for dealing with passengers. What New Yorkers found entertaining in that piece of news was that these 50 phrases will be the only complete sentences of English some drivers know. We can now look forward to hearing a driver punctuate a stream of Haitian patois or Urdu or Russian with "It is my pleasure to place your bags in the trunk" or "May I help you into the building, sir?"

Factoring in an increased use of both subways and taxis, I calculated my actual saving at closer to $19 a year. I considered, of course, the possibility of expressing my gratitude to Bob Dole for making this unexpected tax relief possible; I could write out a check for $19 to the Dole for President campaign.

But how about Bill Clinton, who has said that he will be happy to sign the tax repeal into law? Should he get $9.50? Or does he deserve an even larger share for being willing to sign a measure that he clearly thinks is completely stupid?

I pondered that. I didn't turn on the motor. Until the bill is actually signed, driving won't save me a dime.