It's vacation season on I-95
Interstate 95 between Richmond and DC, and Interstate 64 between Richmond & VA beach is known as the "Fertile Crescent" of Virginia becasue it has experienced a wealth of economic growth over the past 10-15 years. The probem is that these highways are seriously over capacity at pretty much all hours of the day and night because the state cannot decide how to pay for transportation upgrades.
I frequent I-95 to do work up in the DC area on occasion. This highway will test your nerves to the maximum! When it's moving...it's really moving, with a pace that is at minimum 75 mph. When it isn' moving, well, you can get out your car & have a picnic in the median strip! It's taken me 5 hours on occasion to make the 100 mile trip from Downtown DC to Richmond. One of the truck drivers said over the CB "They ought to just bulldoze this highway over and plant flowers on it cuz it would be more useful as a transportation device like that!" I can't see how the people live up in the DC area and deal with loosing so many of their hours a day parked in traffic.
Well, typically, during non-summer, and non-holiday periods, things are heavy on 95, but usually not too bad if you time your travels right (Northbound between 8AM & 11 AM Monday - thursday)(Southbound betwen 12 PM & 3PM or after 10 PM at night) Anyways, most regulars out on the highway understand proper lane etiquitte, except for a few. Most drivers just sort of go with the flow, while merging traffic gets up to speed quickly.
The problem comes during this time of year when the highway is cluttered by vacationers who aren't familiar with how to properly drive on an interstate highway. They park their over-loaded minivans & SUV's in the left lanes moving less than 50 MPH with their bumpers dragging the ground. They're loaded with numerous kids, and pretty much every belonging they own. When they merge onto the highway, they don't have the power to get up to speed, so they end up causing bottlenecks and a bunch of swerving to get out their way. What's worse is when these idiots driving these overloaded vehicles have a problem & end up causing a massive traffic jam when they blow a tire, or burn out their engines.