INFAMOUS ROANE COUNTY STRETCH OF I-40 APPEARS IN TN MAGAZINE
Ongoing discussions about safety on Roane County’s stretch of Interstate 40, prompted by multiple accidents over the past year, have highlighted the highway’s challenging history. According to an article in TN Magazine, the first segments of I-40 in Tennessee opened on December 1, 1961, including a 22-mile stretch near Jackson and a 35-mile section between Kingston and Knoxville.
However, the difficult portion west of the Kingston bridge, climbing over the mountain into Cumberland County, was not completed until August 21, 1974. This delay stemmed from the steep 9-mile stretch between Cumberland County and Harriman, where crews spent eight years stabilizing the route across a major geological fault running from Kentucky to Alabama along the eastern slope of the Cumberland Mountains.
More details are available at tnmagazine.org/interstate-40.
