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This Project Is Wasteful and Destructive

One of our greatest values is we sing and believe in America the Beautiful.

This week 16 members of Congress joined me in sending a letter urging Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne to stop work on the $600 million ‘Road to Nowhere’ through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and provide a compensatory cash payment to Swain County, NC.

Considering the significant environmental and economic costs associated with building the “Road to Nowhere

The United States made a commitment to Swain County in 1943, when we flooded a highway for the construction of the Fontana Dam. But there is no obligation to satisfy that commitment to compensation by building another road. A road through the Park would damage the largest and most pristine wilderness area in the eastern United States and cost at least $600 million, more than 75 times the annual roads budget of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

We need to try to keep our country, about which we sing, beautiful.

Tags Appalachian Trail Dirk Kempthorne Geography of the United States Great Smoky Mountains National Park Hospitality North Carolina Old growth forests Person Career Tennessee Valley Authority

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