This year alone, as reported last week on Vermont WCAX3 TV, the Smugglers’ Notch section of seasonally open Vermont Route 108 between Cambridge and Stowe, Vermont, has seen eight large vehicles get stuck, despite fines raised to near $2,000 per instance last year.Tip of the hat to reader Steve Hearne for his note to me this weekend. “It just keeps happening in the notch,” he began, making reference to the Smuggler’s Notch stretch of Vermont state route 108, open seasonally, and which made some news here in Overdrive last year. Then, Matt Cole wrote about new fines set to levied for vehicles getting stuck there when violating the ban on large vehicles — the Vermont legislature voted to raise the fines from less than $200 to as much as $2,000 if the vehicle in fact gets stuck.
Beware, drivers.Hearne’s email shared this recent report from local television in Vermont that noted the hefty fines weren’t totally deterring some trucks, with too many drivers simply following GPS devices blindly and/or missing posted signs. The video posted from WCAX-3’s coverage simply “doesn’t do the road justice,” Hearne added. “I can tell you firsthand it is a challenge to pass through there in a four-wheeler. There is a house-size boulder at one point that the road goes around, and line of sight is barely beyond your own hood. Any large vehicle, especially any tractor trailer, is doomed.”
Be warned. Again.
