NC 208 is closed to all but through traffic. That’s what the Asheville Highway is called once it hits the North Carolina line. But GPS is still sending traffic this way and it will be doing so for quite some time. In the meantime, local officials are urging TDOT to put up signs informing drivers that there is no access to North Carolina through Greene County, despite what their GPS says.
With the washout of I-40 in North Carolina and I-26 in Erwin, GPS and navigation software is turning to one route to send traffic – the Asheville Highway. It is a problem that officials are trying to figure out how to deal with.
What we call the Asheville Highway is called NC 208 once it gets into North Carolina. It winds its way 25 miles from the edge of the Cherokee National Forest here in Greene County, around a hundred curves of all shapes and sizes before it turns into a four-lane just outside of Marshall, North Carolina. The curves are so sharp in some places, that two 60′ tractor trailers can’t go around the curve at the same time. Some of the curves are so sharp, a truck has to take both lanes to make it around, and even then about once every couple of months, a semi gets stuck in one of the hairpin curves.
The route climbs a total of 4,534′ as it goes up and down mountain sides. It’s a long slow drive when you get behind a tractor trailer. Now imaging all of the tractor trailers that used to go a different way all coming into town. That’s been happening for three days, and for three days it’s caused accidents that have choked traffic to a standstill.
North Carolina officials notified Greene County Sheriff Wesley Holt that their side of the highway was being closed to anything but local traffic. There have been too many large heavy trucks cut the corners too sharp and cause damage to the road shoulder. They’ve had to stop in curves to let each other pass, backing up and pulling forward to squeeze by one another.
GPS has re-routed traffic down through Paint Creek, in an attempt to turn them on to River Road which leads into Hot Springs. The only problem is that road no longer exists. It was washed away by the French Broad. A tractor trailer wrecked on Rollins Chapel Road today spilling a small amount of diesel fuel, and for two days in a row, semis have had to back out of Paint Creek after getting stuck.
Marhsall Lane in Greeneville is becoming a mess as traffic headed south on the highway gets redirected through Newport to I-40, and vice versa.
Local officials are attempting to work with state and federal officials to have signs put up on the interstate warning of the lack of North Carolina access. The alternative route, however, is for all that traffic to drive five extra hours and 325 extra miles to Wythville, Virginia and back down to Asheville, North Carolina.
