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The Story Behind “The Road to Nowhere”
"In the 1930s and 1940s, Swain County NC gave up the majority of its private land to the Federal Government for the creation of Fontana Lake and the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Fontana Lake is actually a reservoir for Fontana Dam, which was built as a TVA project during World War II to produce electricity for ALCOA aluminum plants in Tennessee as well as for Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Manhattan Project. Hundreds of people were forced to leave the small Smoky Mountain communities that had been their homes for generations. With the creation of the Park, their homes were gone, and so was Old Highway 288 the road to those communities. The old road was buried beneath the deep waters of Fontana Lake.
The Federal government promised to replace Highway 288 with a new road. Lakeview Drive was to have stretched along the north shore of Fontana Lake, from Bryson City to Fontana, 30 miles to the west. And, of special importance to those displaced residents, it was to have provided access to the old family cemeteries where generations of ancestors remained behind.
But Lakeview Drive fell victim to an environmental issue and construction was stopped, with the road ending at a tunnel, about six miles into the park. The environmental issue was eventually deemed too expensive and the roadwork was never resumed. And Swain County’s citizens gave the unfinished Lakeview Drive its popular, albeit unofficial name “The Road To Nowhere.”"
Jo Ann and I wanted to see this curiosity while we were in Maggie Valley along with 'ol' school' and his wife. We took a day trip to Bryson City to check it out. It was a beautiful ride into the park and ended at the tunnel. Not really much to see but we walked all the way through it, about 1/4 mile and out the other side. Lots of graffiti but an otherwise non descript journey, still glad we went.
Originally Posted by Zammy
