Crashes, construction and jack-knifed tractor-trailers plagued the region’s drivers Wednesday as more people hit the roads this year. Airline travelers fared better than their automobile-bound peers despite warnings of massive delays at security checkpoints. On one of the busiest travel days of the year, the scene on most Washington-area highways just before lunchtime began looking like a bad rush hour with miles-long backups on the Capital Beltway and on interstates north and south of Washington.
Nearly all of the roughly 1 million people AAA Mid-Atlantic predicted would head out of town for Thanksgiving are driving this year — an 11 percent increase from 2009 and a climb that added a little more insanity to the usual Thanksgiving travel madness.
Meanwhile, while airport traffic picked up Wednesday afternoon with flight delays and more travelers, the experience was smoother than expected for many.
“I’m actually surprised,” said Elvis Campbell, 27, who was flying from Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport to Orlando, Fla., on a morning flight. “I got here an hour and half early and it was like, ‘Where is everybody?’ ”
National and Washington Dulles International Airport expected roughly the same number of travelers this year as last year, said Rob Yingling, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, which manages the airports.
Lines to get into all three terminals were minimal all morning at National, including the one using a controversial airport “X-ray scanner.” By Wednesday afternoon, most airports nationwide declared National Opt-Out Day, a protest designed to slow down security lines, a failure.
Many at National said they would rather just get through security quickly, adding that they didn’t care if they were selected to pass through the scanner or that they’d rather be safer.
But Amy Curpuz, 18, who arrived at National from Michigan on Wednesday, said she thought the scanner and its alternative option — an intimate pat-down — were “too violating.”
Like their air-bound brethren, those who hit the road early Wednesday avoided some of the headaches that pained travelers who left later.
As predicted, construction at the Newark, Del., toll plaza caused congestion on Interstate 95 to extend halfway through Cecil County by the afternoon. Traffic was so bad that the state waived the $4 toll for northbound traffic until 11 p.m. Wednesday.
And once drivers emerged from that mess, they found another waiting for them in Wilmington where an overturned tractor-trailer blocked I-95 in both directions for as long as three hours.
Meanwhile, Interstate 270 northbound was crawling with motorists by midafternoon and drivers inched up the entire highway to Frederick where accidents had forced lane closures. The Beltway’s western half was also a zoo after an accident shut down half of the inner loop’s lanes.
Virginia drivers heading south didn’t get out of congestion on southbound I-95 until they reached Fredericksburg. And those passing through Richmond found another treat — another tractor-trailer blocked southbound lanes north of the city for hours Wednesday morning.
