Chickamauga Reviews Input About Park Roads
By Kathryn Jorgensen
June 2002 - FORT OGLETHORPE, Ga.

Six months after its Roundabout Festival celebrating relocation of U.S. Highway 27 to a new four-lane, six-mile roadway, officials at Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park recently solicited public comments about restrictions on traffic through Chickamauga Battlefield.

Superintendent Patrick Reed said there have been some complaints about restricting commercial vehicles and lowering speed limits on Lafayette Road (formerly U.S. 27) and Reeds Bridge Road to 30 mph.

The park recently held two open houses to hear residents’ comments, and welcomed comments in writing. Reed said that while no one wants park roads opened up to big commercial vehicles again, there were questions about the speed limit and smaller commercial vehicles.

The two-lane Lafayette Road goes past the visitor center right through the battlefield and used to carry 18,000-20,000 vehicles a day, including 1000 tractor trailers. The core of the battlefield runs on both sides of Lafayette Road, and the main battle lines "weave back and forth across this road." With the tour road using portions of Lafayette Road and crossing it at one point "we have had some near misses and serious accidents," said Reed.

After the new highway opened the state gave the National Park Service responsibility for old Route 27 and the speed limits were lowered from 45 to 30. Reed said they are considering whether to raise the speed 5 miles an hour at the southern end away from the visitor center.

"The whole idea is that Lafayette Road not be a thoroughfare," he said. It still gets light commuter traffic. Compliance has been pretty good, he said, but people tend to drive 10 miles an hour over the speed limit.

With the bulk of the traffic diverted there is "a much better and much quieter atmosphere inside the battlefield," according to Reed. The number and severity of accidents inside the park has been reduced.

The commercial traffic restriction is an issue on McFarland Gap Road/Reed’s Bridge Road, the old east-west state highway which skirts the north edge of the park. Reed said the issue here is defining smaller commercial vehicles and deciding whether they should be given limited access. Responding emergency vehicles may use park roads, but one issue is whether wreckers returning from accident scenes may return through the park. Right now the park says no.

Public comments were taken under advisement and a decision will be made in the next few weeks. Also, this summer a transportation study which will look at the impact of relocating Route 27 and re-gional transportation needs will begin. The area is growing and has become a bedroom community for Chattanooga. Reed said the question is how to meet those needs without impacting the battlefield.

Some 500,000 to 600,000 people annually visit Chickamauga Battlefield. The 5200-acre park was the country’s first national military park and the largest. The veterans who created it intended to pre-serve a larger battlefield but land speculation drove up prices.