[at-l] Re:New Georgia Interstate to cross Trail

[mtnstream73 at eufaula.rr.com (Bett Middleton)]

Someone wrote:> >TN I-181
> >
> The Data Book is calling that I-26...it's been so long since I've been
> through there that it wasn't even four lanes last time...
>
Nightwalker wrote:
I-26 doesn't go into TN. It ends at I-40 in Asheville NC.


*****Actually, I just drove this stretch when I went to Trail Days in Damascus.  I-26 is being extended to connect with I-81 in Tennessee.  Before the NC section was completed, the controlled access section in Tennessee was called I-181 as it was just a spur off of I-81.  The new section of interstate in NC is now finished, the Trail has been re-routed enough to allow hikers to walk underneath the new section, and this whole interstate will soon be called officially I-26.  Presently, the signs along the way still have the old designations, but there is a new interstate shield up which says "Future I-26". 

My concern about a new interstate in the N. Georgia area and it crossing the At somewhere actually comes from seeing this section of interstate in NC built.  In order to widen to four lanes and straighten it, this road took out enormous amounts of mountains and though the views are beautiful traveling through there, I hate to think of that many of the Georgia mountains being blasted to kingdom come.  I'm assuming from what I read that if its possibly going between Helen and Hiawassee, that it would pass over the mountains somewhere in the Unicoi Gap area.  I think it would take a significant chunk of Blue or Rocky Mountain and I would hate to think how that would change the trail in that area.  With all the building of homes and businesses up there they are already flattening more than enough of those lovely mountains.  

It seems to me that in the last number of years that the North Georgia mountains has finally made that area known as a tourist, vacation, retirement area.  People move there or visit there to see and enjoy those same lovely mountains that they keep flattening to build huge shopping areas.  Add an interstate into the mix, and you'll soon have fewer mountains and less reason for people to visit.  

That's just my thinking at this point, with what little I know about it at this time.  I'll be listening for more info, and development details.

Swallowtail aka Bett