Dear Vermont: What the Heck?

Today I drove to my parent's home from my apartment.  The majority of the trip was very uneventful.  However, when I entered my home state, I was greeted by a very poorly thought-out set of construction zones.  First, there were a series of signs stating that either the right lane or the left lane were ending.  Once, however, there was no lane closure.  This was annoying, but because of light traffic, there was very little inconvenience.

I-89 in Vermont

The next stretch was characterized by signs indicating construction with no obvious signs of construction.  No cones, machines, or people working.  As before: annoying, but not inconvenient.  Finally another sign indicating a lane closure.  However, in this case, both lanes were closed!  Where did I drive, you may ask?  I drove on the shoulder, my car straddling the rumble strip, kept carefully between the cones on the road and the guard rail.  There was no work happening on the road, and the pavement was merely scarified.  There was no obvious reason not to drive on it.

Once I had successfully navigated through this area, I was greeted by a long stretch of scarified pavement across both lanes.  There were no signs indicating that the area was a construction zone and no obvious signs of construction going on (other than a missing top layer of pavement).  Very frustrating.  I-89 has always been lousy (thank you, Howard Dean), but this was the worst I've ever seen it.