Where the Roads Go
It’s hard not to be awestruck by the damage Irene did to Vermont’s roads and bridges. It’s also been sobering to see how much disruption the loss of key public infrastructure can wreak in business and everyday life. Vermont has more than 14,000 miles of roads throughout the state. The state highway system comprises about 20 percent—roughly 2,700 miles. The remaining 80 percent are class 1, 2, and 3 town roads. Tropical Storm Irene damaged—and in some cases washed away—nearly 560 miles of state highways. That’s about 20 percent of the state highway system. The miles of town roads damaged haven’t yet been tallied.
This town2town map is an inventory of Vermont roads, both paved and unpaved. Moving a cursor over each town reveals the number of miles of paved and dirt roads within each municipal border. The dirt roads include gravel roads and graded earth roads, but not those classified by the Vermont Agency of Transportation as “unimproved/primitive” or “untraveled.” The mileage includes both state and town roads.
Data source: Vermont Agency of Transportation