Taking A Walk

by Dwayne Phillips

Today we walked from where we left off yesterday (about five miles south of Pulaski) to the outskirts of Wytheville. We sort of passed through Fort Chiswell, Virginia. Cloudy all day with drizzle all afternoon. No heavy rain though.

All the walking was rural. Most of the time Interstate 81 was 50 feet or less to my left. It was noisy. Houses, gas stations, and other businesses tend to cluster around the Interstate exits.

Fort Chiswell is a place that doesn’t really exist. A real fort was built here in 1758 for use in the French and Indian War. The place sort of went to ruin in the 1800s and the original foundations were covered over by Interstate 77. That doesn’t seem like a nice thing to do to something with so much history, but…

Again, there is no Fort Chiswell. The people who live here in this place that isn’t here use Max Meadows, Virginia as their postal address.

Here is a photo of the Fort Chiswell Historical marker. The only way to see this marker is to be on East Lee Highway. If you are driving, you will probably miss it. That is too bad, as it is an impressive marker put here by the Daughters of the American Revolution in 1924. (The marker itself is 84 years old!)

It is hard to imagine, but this Interstate highway area was once a frontier gateway. This was the edge of America for decades. The marker also commemorates the Wilderness Road. People passed through here to settle Tennessee and Kentucky.

East Lee Highway is a frontage road on the north side of I-81. I write that it is a frontage road as it is not Route 11. Route 11 is a concurrency with Interstate 81. That means it is the same road.

Please read this paragraph slowly and carefully as I try to explain a double wrong-way concurrency. U.S. Route 11 is a concurrency here with U.S. Route 52. They form a wrong-way concurrency as Route 11 is going south while Route 52 is going north. The same is true here for I-81 and I-77. They form a wrong-way concurrency as I-81 is going south and I-77 is going north. Given there are two wrong-way concurrencies all on one road, this is a double wrong-way concurrency. See, look at the photo for proof:

The photo also indicates how close to the interstate we walked all afternoon. I could spit and hit the cars, not that I would do that of course except for demonstration purposes.

Now, if you understand a double wrong-way concurrency, please explain to me the current house loan, credit crunch, congressional bailout that gave tax credits to wooden arrows for children situation.

Wikipedia’s explanation of the mess (the double wrong-way concurrency) is pretty good.

I put today’s two photos on the Fort Chiswell Wikipedia page. I don’t know how a place that doesn’t really exist got a Wikipedia page, but that’s the way it is sometimes.

ONE MORE THING – somehow magically we are back on U.S. Bicycle Route 76.  I have no idea how that thing winds around. I suspect that someone is moving the signs to put them in our path every week or so.