It was a beautiful day in the neighborhood in terms of weather, but it was anything but for Wednesday morning commuters.
Congestion formed on most mainline routes, and crashes caused major backup in places.
At present, a wreck on westbound 94 at County Road 17B in Lake Elmo has traffic snarled three miles back near the St. Croix Rest Area.
In Burnsville, a wreck on northbound 35W at 113th Street is finally out of the traffic lanes, but the knot forms at County Road 42 and traffic is at a grind up to the Minnesota River bridge.
Westbound Hwy. 36 crams at Lexington Avenue. That is due to a crash ahead at Cleveland Avenue taking out the left lane.
It's a porcine drive on eastbound Hwy. 212 from Eden Prairie Road past a crash at Shady Oak Road.
The notorious work zone on I-494 through Minnetonka, Plymouth and Maple Grove kept traffic slow most of the morning. Currently northbound crams up at Minnetonka Blvd. up to 394 while southbound has a knot from Rockford Road to Hwy. 55.
Both southbound Hwy. 169 and Hwy. 100 had a vile flow between I-94 and the Crosstown. Trip times were off the charts for the 7 to 8:30 a.m. time period. It's still bad, but ever so slowly congestion is dissipating.
Where there were not crashes, traffic crept along. So much for the nice weather. It seemed a lot like a winter travel day.
