"The Road to Nowhere"In the 1930s and 1940s, Swain County 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. Fontana Dam Facts and History
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 resolved, but the roadwork was never resumed. And Swain County's citizens gave the unfinished Lakeview Drive its popular, unofficial name "The Road To Nowhere." On weekends throughout the summer, the Park Service still ferries groups of Swain County residents across Fontana Lake to visit their old family cemeteries for Decoration Days and family reunions. The legal issue of whether to build the road was finally resolved in February, 2010 when the US Department of Interior signed a settlement agreement to pay Swain County $52 million in lieu of building the road. Congressman Heath Shuler, a Bryson City native, was the driving force in bringing the settlement to fruition. The people were moved, the water rose, and by the 1970s — thirty years after the original agreement was made — only a small portion of the road was built. This small section, still there today, is about seven miles long and ends abruptly at a quarter-mile tunnel in the middle of the park, in the middle of nowhere. With no road, a consolation prize of $52 million was agreed to be paid to Swain County. As of today only $12 million has been paid, and the county has filed a lawsuit for the remainder of the promised money. It’s no wonder one landowner has maintained his now-iconic sign: “Welcome to the Road to Nowhere – A broken Promise! 1943 - ? →” Just beyond the tunnel if you do get a chance to make the journey are some awesome hiking trails like Lakeview Drive Trail, Whiteoak Branch Trail, Forney Creek Trail, Goldmine Loop, and Tunnel Bypass Trail.
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