Gov. Jim Doyle apologized Thursday for the poor response to the traffic backup of Interstate 39/90 during the heavy snowfall on Feb. 6 and 7.

Doyle, who didn’t learn of the situation until 7 p.m. and did not declare a State of Emergency until 9:15 p.m., apologized to drivers for the poor decisions made by government officials.

“It’s very clear that this could have been handled much better and people’s lives could have been much less inconvenienced,” Doyle said. “Many people, through just some bad decisions, ended up out on that road who didn’t have to.”

During the severe winter storm, 2,000 vehicles were stranded for over 12 hours on Interstate 39/90, and traffic was backed up for over 20 miles, according to a report from Donald Dunbar , National Guard adjutant general of Wisconsin.

The National Guard was used during the backup because of the severity of the storm.

Doyle said he was grateful for the efforts of state workers during the situation, but admitted the response was inadequate.

“The report demonstrates very clearly that, despite all those efforts that were being made out on the road by really hardworking people, that at the higher levels, some very significant mistakes were made,” Doyle said.

Dunbar’s report placed much of the blame on the State Patrol, the agency in charge of traffic response, and claimed poor communication and a failure to recognize the incident as significant made the situation more severe.

“This delay of recognition caused the loss of precious hours that could have allowed alternative courses of action to be considered which might have mitigated the depth and breadth of this emergency,” Dunbar said.

According to the report, other agencies such as the Wisconsin Department of Transportation and the state Emergency Operations Center share the blame for failing to respond properly. The best course of action would have been to close the highway to prevent more vehicles from being stranded, the report said.

The report recommends reviewing state EOC procedures, establishing new forms of communication to alert drivers of such situations and, more importantly, getting rid of the mindset that “Wisconsin does not close highways.”