It's beginning to cost a small fortune to fill up your gas tank in D.C.

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The price of a gallon of regular gas at one station on 22nd and P Street northwest was $4.09 Tuesday.

For Charlene Smith, who lives just two blocks from the station, enough is enough.

“I'm only getting half a tank. I'm spending $20 and looking for cheaper gas in Maryland or Virginia,” Smith says.

The District has one of the highest gas prices in the country, on average of $4.02 a gallon. The national average is $3.81 a gallon. In Maryland it's $3.83 and Virginia $3.72.

AAA Mid-Atlantic says there are two reasons why prices are so high in D.C. One is the fact that a half dozen refineries on the east coast have closed in the past six months - and we get our gas from this region.

The second reason is the extremely high price to ship gas to D.C. stations. AAA says because of a lack of regulatory laws, it costs gas station owners 40 cents a gallon to get gas shipped to their pumps compared to about 3 cents a gallon on average elsewhere, including Maryland and Virginia.

And with prices rising motorists are fearing they will soon see prices like this everywhere.