WASHINGTON — This winter’s been a budget-buster for the state of Maryland. State Highway Administration spokesman Dave Buck says roughly $50 million was budgeted for winter road clean up, and the state’s already spent $70 million. That figure doesn’t include Saturday’s snow storm.

In Virginia, $52 million dollars was set aside for making sure roads were passable, and officials tell WTOP that’s close to what’s been spent so far.

In Montgomery County, Keith Compton, chief of the Division of Highway Services for the county’s Department of Transportation says $9.5 million was budgeted for snow removal, and after Saturday’s storm, the amount spent to clear roadways is closer to $13 million.

Buck says clearing the roadways on Saturday was especially problematic in Maryland because of the number of cars on the road. Despite repeated messages telling drivers to stay home, crews found themselves stuck in traffic while trying to treat highways and secondary roads.

Buck says he thinks people simply didn’t believe that the region would get the amount of snow originally predicted, and were taken by surprise by the fast-developing storm that dumped more than expected on the region. Buck says, “We had probably six to eight times — that I can think of – where we were on the 34 degree side of things, and not the 30 degree side of things,” meaning times when a substantial amount of snow was predicted, but failed to materialize.