[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 180 (Wednesday, November 14, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Page S6954]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                         Great Smoky Mountains

  Mr. President, I suggest two more things that Tennesseans can be 
grateful for this Thanksgiving.
  One, there is a new 16-mile section of the Foothills Parkway, 
creating a spectacular view of the Great Smoky Mountains, and, two, 
because the air is now so much cleaner, you can actually see the 
mountains from this spectacular drive.
  In the 1990s, on the clearest days, according to the National Park 
Service, you could see for around 50 miles in the Smokies. Today you 
can see more than 90 miles on the clearest days. Even on the haziest 
days, visibility has improved. In the 1990s, visibility was less than 
10 miles. Today you can see more than 30 miles on the haziest days, 
according to the Park Service.

  While that is still less than the natural visibility of 150 miles on 
the clearest days--by natural visibility, I mean the blue haze the 
Cherokees used to sing about that exists because of the moisture in the 
Smokies--and 90 miles on the haziest days, we have made great 
improvements in the last two decades, and visibility is continuing to 
improve in the park.
  The new section of the Foothills Parkway between Walland and Wears 
Valley is one of the prettiest drives in America. If you want the best 
view of the highest mountains in the Eastern United States, you will 
drive the Foothills Parkway. Last Sunday, when my wife and I drove it 
on the third day, it was open; it was packed, most of it with local 
people taking pictures of each other because they were so astonished by 
the view. It was a view so magnificent it surprises even those of us 
who grew up driving through the Smoky Mountains. Soon this drive will 
attract many of the more than the 11 million visitors who come to our 
park each year--twice as many as any national park.
  But 16 years ago, these visitors would not have had such a good view. 
In 2002, the year I was elected to the Senate, the National Parks 
Conservation Association said that the Great Smoky Mountains National 
Park was the most polluted park in America. There were 3.5 million 
people who would visit the park in the summertime and the air was 
hazardous to breathe. The views were extremely limited due to 
pollution. Instead of the blue haze I mentioned earlier, we saw smog. 
The Great Smoky Mountains had become the great smoggy mountains just 16 
years ago. Then a lot of people went to work. Federal clean air 
regulations, which I supported, required cleaner burning diesel fuels 
and cleaner vehicle engines, which also helped lower emissions. This 
especially helped the Smokies because of the large number of visitors' 
vehicles and because three interstates carry heavy truck traffic 
through nearby Knoxville, TN.
  I also voted to support other Federal clean air regulations that 
limited emissions from smokestacks of sulfur, nitrogen, and mercury and 
established rules to prohibit dirty air from blowing from one State 
into another. I have always thought that operating a coal-fired 
powerplant without air pollution control equipment on it was like 
driving at night without the lights on. We have equipment and TVA has 
proved, as other utilities have, that you can burn coal in a clean way 
if you will simply put on pollution control equipment for mercury, 
nitrogen, and sulfur.
  One of the biggest impacts, therefore, came in 2008, when the 
Tennessee Valley Authority began installing pollution control equipment 
on some of its coal-fired powerplants near the park. TVA has invested 
nearly $6 billion to reduce air emissions. That is money out of our 
pockets--we ratepayers. These efforts have resulted in a 94-percent 
reduction in sulfur dioxide emissions and a 91-percent reduction in 
nitrogen oxide emissions. Nitrogen and sulfur emissions have harmful 
effects on human health, the environment, and visibility.
  Those of us who live near the park can see the impact of TVA's 
actions almost immediately. Today, TVA has installed some type of 
emission control equipment on all of its coal-fired powerplants and 
continues to improve that equipment so that the air will become even 
cleaner.
  Over the years, I met and worked with mayors in counties surrounding 
the park who did what they could locally to make the air cleaner; that 
is because one of their top priorities is clean air. The Sevierville 
Chamber of Commerce, when I walked in there not long ago, told me it 
was their top priority because tourists come to spend money in 
Sevierville and Pigeon Forge to see the Smokies, not to see the smog. 
Now ground-level ozone that creates the smog that is harmful to human 
health and the environment and reduces visibility has improved 
significantly--by 36 percent according to the Great Smoky Mountains 
Association. All of the counties in the region around the park meet the 
EPA's environmental quality standards for ozone pollution.
  On the parkway, in 1944--that was the year Congress first authorized 
the Foothills Parkway--this is what was going on: Allied Forces were 
invading Normandy Beach, Franklin D. Roosevelt was President, and Bing 
Crosby was singing ``I'll Be Seeing You.'' The State of Tennessee began 
acquiring right-of-way to the parkway and donating it to the Federal 
Government.
  In 1960, the construction of the parkway actually started. Dwight D. 
Eisenhower was President. Elvis had just come home from 2 years in the 
Army, and American women were wearing beehive hairdos. That was 1960, 
when construction on this parkway began.
  When I became Governor in 1979, the State had completed acquiring the 
right-of-way, and the State took the lead on 10 miles of the parkway 
between Carrs Creek and Wears Valley. Then construction halted because 
of environmental problems.
  By the time I got to the Senate in 2002--the same time the Smokies 
was declared the most polluted national park--all of the parties had 
agreed on a plan to build bridges to complete the so-called 1.65 mile 
``missing link'' on the parkway. Then President Bush's administration 
and the 2005 Federal highway bill, President Obama's administration, 
and Governor Bill Haslam's State administration in Tennessee all 
chipped in effort, time, and taxpayer money to finish the job after 50 
years and $200 million of construction.
  Since it was first authorized, it has taken 75 years to build a 
parkway and two decades to make the air clean enough so that visitors 
can see the mountains for 90 miles. So if you are looking for something 
else to be grateful for on Thanksgiving, try being grateful for the 
many visionaries, park officials, road builders, engineers, scientists, 
editors, and political leaders who have had the foresight to make it a 
priority to build the Foothills Parkway and clean up the air so that we 
can see the mountains. It has taken 75 years, but the views are so 
picturesque that it has been well worth the wait.