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Corridor K TN-NC2/26/2010, The News Observer Facts are Getting Lost in Corridor K Hysteria Download .pdf of article here. 2/17/2010, Chattanooga Times Free Press Crowd Views Corridor K Options Whatever final decisions are made on the proposed Corridor K project, Tom Darden hopes it doesn't mess up the beauty of the Ocoee Gorge. "Our preference is to look for a creative and engineering solution within the existing footprint," said Mr. Darden, a resident of Reliance, Tenn. "If you can make that scenic drive even more scenic and you are going to spend huge amounts of federal money, let"s improve the existing footprint." Read more... 2/11/2010, Chattanoogan.com Don't Let Corridor K Gash The Mountains - And Response In June of 2008, officials with the Tennessee and North Carolina Departments of Transportation released a draft stating their intent to construct a new highway, deemed 'Corridor K,' through the Stecoah Gap and across the Appalachian Trail. Corridor K would cut through the mountains of southeastern Tennessee and southwestern North Carolina connecting Chattanooga to Asheville, via the Ocoee Gorge in Tennessee and the Cheoah Mountains in North Carolina. Completed portions of Corridor K would pave the way for Interstate 3, a road proposed to run from Savannah to Knoxville. Read more... 2/10/2010, Polk County News Consultants working on the Transportation Planning Report for Corridor K have developed seven options for improving transportation through the Ocoee Gorge, including a "no build" option. The Citizens Resource Team asked them to include an eighth, a "hybrid" that had been discussed that would keep the current route to some extent at each end before relocating the highway. None of the cost estimates comes close to the $2.1 billion estimated for an earlier alignment, which has been scrapped. TDOT started over completely with the current study, emphasizing Context Sensitive Solutions. No recommendation has been made for an alignment, nor has a decision been made about whether to move toward a two-lane or four-lane highway. The next step, the Environmental Impact Statement, will study the possibilities in greater detail before alignments are considered. Information about the project will be presented next week at two public workshops: Feb. 16 at Polk County High School and Feb. 17 at Copper Basin High School, with each workshop running from 5-8 p.m. There will not be a formal presentation, so citizens can come and go at their convenience. TDOT will have a number of stations providing information on various aspects of the project. Read more... 2/4/2010, Chattanoogan.com Conservation Groups Urge "Right-Sizing" Of Corridor K Mountain Highway The Departments of Transportation in Tennessee and North Carolina are now studying, among other options, ways to complete the Corridor K project between Chattanooga and Asheville by improving existing roads instead of building stretches of new four-lane highway through mostly new terrain. Conservation groups in both states said Wednesday they "are encouraged by news that the agencies are looking at developing two-lane routes mostly along existing roads, which, with necessary improvements, would meet the transportation needs of local communities. Previous proposals for completing the unfinished segments of Corridor K focused on cutting new highways through the Cherokee National Forest in Tennessee and the Nantahala National Forest in North Carolina. Both DOTs are now considering two-lane alternatives with lighter environmental footprints at significantly reduced costs to federal and state taxpayers." Read more... 2/3/2010, Polk County News Eight Options Presented for Corridor K Elected officials and members of the Community Resource Team got their first look at preliminary corridors for Corridor K last week. The public will have its chance, and the opportunity to comment, at public workshops scheduled for Feb. 16 at Polk County High School and Feb. 17 at Copper Basin High School. Both meetings are scheduled for 5-8 p.m. Comments can also be made through the public involvement link at www.tdot.state.tn.us/corridork. Read more... 1/28/2010, Graham Star Online Construction of the $400 million missing link of Corridor K through Graham County will be delayed as the state transportation department examines improving existing highways instead. Stacy Oberhausen, project engineer with the North Carolina Department of Transportation in Raleigh, said last week a state and federal directive has been issued to study improving N.C. 143, N.C. 28 in Graham County and U.S. 74 through the Nantahala Gorge as an alternate plan. Read more... 1/24/2010, Citizen-Times.com Another rock slide adds to mess along closed I-40 stretch near Tennessee border HARMON DEN -- A new rock slide occurred early Saturday on I-40 near the Tennessee border, but it happened within the section already closed because of an earlier slide, and state officials don't anticipate it affecting overall cleanup plans. The new slide is at mile marker 6.5, about four miles east of the Oct. 25 rock slide, near the Harmon Den exit, said N.C. Department of Transportation spokesman Van Denton. The slide, estimated at 500 cubic yards -- about 50 dump truck loads -- was discovered by a contractor working on the earlier slide about 1 a.m. Saturday, Denton said. Crews were surveying the area today to determine whether the roadway was seriously damaged. Read more... 1/14/2010, National Parks Traveler Road Proposal Stirs Controversy Along the Appalachian National Scenic Trail In the spring of 1948, Pennsylvania native Earl Shaffer stumbled into Stecoah Gap on the Appalachian Trail, high above the Little Tennessee River in western North Carolina's Graham County. "I must have been a pathetic figure," he wrote later in his memoirs, "streaming with sweat, bleeding from scratches, every muscle aching, crawling endlessly in a back-slipping, bush-clutching struggle before coming out on top." 11/12/08, Chattanooga Times Free Press Answers elusive as slide cleanup begins When Vanessa Bateman got a call Tuesday to come to the Ocoee Gorge to check the stability of a bluff over U.S. Highway 64, she didn't know she would become a hero. 11/12/08, Chattanooga Times Free Press Another rock slide, another detour The colloquial phrase "you can't get there from here" seems far more relevant in this region today than it did just a few weeks ago. A series rock slides Tuesday on U.S. Highway 64 through the Ocoee Gorge in Polk County closed a second vital east-west route that links Tennessee to North Carolina. The resultant detour will more than double travel time for many commuters and travelers accustomed to using the scenic highway. The Wilderness Society Corridor K 2009-10 magazine article, .pdf download only 10/5/08, Chattanooga Times Free Press Cleveland: Tracking forest history CLEVELAND, Tenn. — Most people who visit the Cherokee National Forest have never heard of Quentin Bass. But if they walk on the Old Copper Road, read interpretive signs or hear of historic discoveries in the forest, they are seeing work largely due to the forest"s archaeologist. Sitting at his somewhat cluttered desk in a hidden corner of the district office in Cleveland, Mr. Bass has a low-key way of explaining his job. Read more... 1/7/08, Chattanooga Times Free Press Despite route change, road could still impact Southern Appalachians, environmentalists say "Environmentalists in Georgia and North Carolina said Monday the proposed interstate from Savannah, Ga., to Knoxville remains a threat to the region, even if it skirts the mountains. The proposed road, called "Interstate 3" or I-3 for short, has not been designated as an interstate, but has been proposed as one, officials said. U.S. Rep. Paul Broun, R-Ga., said this week the route of the highway could pass the Northeast Georgia mountains and instead head for Greenville, S.C. Holly Demuth, executive director of the Stop I-3 Coalition, said Monday that despite the change, the road could still harm the region by spurring more residential development. The Stop I-3 Coalition also opposes improvements or widening of U.S. Highway 64, or Corridor K, through the Ocoee Gorge in Tennessee, between Chattanooga and the North Carolina border." Read more... 11/18/07, Chattanooga Times Free Press Corridor K study coming to an end "An economic study showing the impact of a Chattanooga-to-Asheville, N.C. highway on a 23-county area will be completed by mid-December, officials said. Ed Cole, chief of environment and planning for the Tennessee Department of Transportation, said U.S. Highway 64, or Corridor K, could be part of a three-year work plan handed to the Tennessee General Assembly in May." Read more... Most businesses support Corridor K? What do YOU think? 10/16/07, Cherokee Scout Survey: 84 percent support Corridor K "Snow is aware that some people fear Corridor K"s association with I-3, but he doesn"t think the project will provide an 'impetus' for I-3, a controversial interstate proposal that would stretch from Savannah, Ga. to Knoxville, Tenn., that Snow opposes. Read more... 9/24/07, Chattanooga Times Free Press Corridor K economic meetings set "Details of an economic study in the area affected by a Chattanooga-to-Asheville, N.C., highway will be presented in a series of public meetings next month, officials said.They are the final stages of an eight-month study looking at the biggest factors influencing growth and decline in the corridor area of Southeast Tennessee and western North Carolina, said Melissa Ziegler with Wilbur Smith Associates of Knoxville. 'Somewhere in this, there is an answer, a collaborative answer," Ms. Ziegler said. "I don't know what that is.'" Read more... 2/8/07, Hiwassee River Watershed Coalition, Inc. What it will be is "an open book" as citizens from three states comment on Corridor K "Nine Tennessee counties rate this project their top priority" Read more...
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