I drove from Puerto Plata (Costambar) to Santiago yesterday on Hwy 5 (the usual main route through the tunnel) and was surprised at the amount of work being done. Overall, the road was pretty good. Some portions have been repaved and the areas near the large bridges are much better...no slowing needed at all. There is significant work being done to add two lanes in some areas and some more repaving in others. However, there were at least two places where travel was reduced to one lane with a flagman stopping traffic as necessary. Not sure what happens at night...could be dangerous. Maybe they reopen both lanes.... There were some very rough small patches where the old surface had been stripped away and that slowed speeds significantly. However, the trip was still only about 1 hour and 15 minutes and I felt fairly safe. It would be fantastic to have four lanes all the way between these two cities or even some shoulders or special passing lanes to go around large slow truck safely. It was good to see all the work being done, but the route clearly needs more attention and improvement.