You can look at gas prices as a percent of personal expenditures to see gasolines direct cost to the consumer. You'll see a similar curve.

http://jerrykhachoyan.com/gas-expenditures-as-a-percent-of-p...

Yes other components of personal expenditure are affected by gas prices which affects the percentage, but when an individual is considering where to live the only component of gas price that matters is it's direct cost.