Blue Ridge Parkway 751935  ·  1987  ·  milepost 304

A site about the 469-mile Blue Ridge Parkway: where the road runs, how it was built, and the rules that keep it looking like this.

Ridges stacked to the horizon in layered blue haze

A road that took fifty-two years and was never allowed to be useful

Begun in 1935 as Depression public works, finished in 1987 by a bridge built from the top down. Nothing may be sold along it, and the view across land the Park Service does not own was bought anyway.

Green Knob Overlook, milepost 350.4 in North Carolina. The Park Service puts the overlook at 4,760 feet; the ridges behind it fall away toward the Black Mountains.

Photo: 2019-07-21 Green Knob Overlook -- Blue Ridge Parkway (NC) · Wikimedia Commons

The road climbs from 649 feet at the James River to 6,047 at Richland Balsam. The numbering runs the other way.

2,000 FT4,000 FT6,000 FT 050100150200250300350400450 James RiverMP 63.6 · 649 FTMabry MillMP 176.1 · 2,855 FTLinn CoveMP 304.4 · 4,100 FTRichland BalsamMP 431.4 · 6,047 FT

Elevation against milepost, schematic between the marked points. Elevations as published by the National Park Service.

A vintage red car drives along the curving Linn Cove Viaduct amid autumn foliage

The reverse S-curve at milepost 304.4. Seven piers carry 1,243 feet of deck around the flank of Grandfather Mountain.

Photo: MDB 2658-Linn-Cove-Viaduct-Red-Car-4x3 · Wikimedia Commons

The Build  /  milepost 304.4

The last gap, built from the top down

The Linn Cove Viaduct opened in 1987 as a segmental concrete bridge built without a haul road below, specifically so Grandfather Mountain would not be cut.

Read this one first →

Five ways in

Layered blue ridges stretch to the horizon beyond forested slopes with autumn foliage High Ground

Why the road is where it is

Ridge routing, gaps, and the view it was drawn for.

4 pages → Long barracks-style buildings and parked vehicles in a valley construction camp surrounded by hills The Build

Fifty-two years of construction

Public works, camps, masons and the last gap.

5 pages → Empty two-lane road curving through bare and evergreen trees under an overcast sky The Rules

The rules that keep it looking like this

No commerce, no billboards, and bought views.

4 pages → Five men play zither, two fiddles, guitar and banjo together in a front room Music

The country it runs through

Ballads, banjos and where the recordings came from.

4 pages → Wooden overlook sign for Rockfish Valley with hazy mountains and farmland below Mileposts

How the road is described

Numbering from Rockfish Gap, and the landmarks on it.

4 pages →

Mileposts  /  0 → 469

Where the line actually runs

The Parkway is described by one number and one direction. Milepost 0 is at Rockfish Gap in Virginia and the count runs south, ending at 469 outside Cherokee — so every landmark, overlook, tunnel and viaduct on the road has a fixed address, and the addresses only increase.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

The seven marked points, in milepost order

  1. 1Rockfish GapMP 0Mileposts
  2. 2Peaks of OtterMP 86Mileposts
  3. 3Mabry MillMP 176.1Mileposts
  4. 4Linn Cove ViaductMP 304.4The Build
  5. 5Mount MitchellMP 355.4High Ground
  6. 6Craggy GardensMP 364High Ground
  7. 7CherokeeMP 469The Build
Geometry: Blue Ridge Parkway landmark coordinates, projected

How the road is described →

Kept going by

Organisations whose work travels the same ridgeline as ours.

Twenty-one pages. Every one of them is on the archive.

The whole list →