Tag: gatlinburg area information

The Gatlinburg Convention Center features over 148,000 square feet of meeting and exhibit space and is a popular alternative to the average day-to-day convention center landscape. That, and you’re within a hop, skip, and a jump from downtown Gatlinburg and all the great attractions, shopping opportunities, and restaurants.

Looking to stay on budget and have your meeting go as planned? The Gatlinburg Convention Center is at your service. The services are exceptional, from planning to setting up site inspections and supplying informational brochures, they’re ready to assist you. And the center’s kitchen is fully staffed with an accomplished chef, providing exceptional food, flowers, wine and spirits for groups from 10 to 3,000.

The Great Hall provides 67,000 square feet of exhibit space, 60,000 square feet of which is free-span with a ceiling height of 30 feet. It can accommodate 6,000 people, 350 booths or be divided into three separate halls for smaller events.

In March of 2006, an additional 50,000 square feet was added with the opening of W.L. Mills Conference Center adjoining the Convention Center. This expansion added a beautiful 17,000 square foot Ballroom and allowed us to revitalize our Mills Auditorium, creating a venue that takes your breath away as you enter the room! Both the Ballroom and Mills Auditorium are ideal for any type of event – from a formal banquet or general session, to a themed celebration.

The Convention Center Gallery area is 38,200 square feet, including 18 meeting rooms, pre-function space, two private parlors and a special VIP/media suite.

Meetings in Gatlinburg are enhanced by the wide variety of accommodation options. Gatlinburg is home to numerous Smoky Mountain cabins and chalets. These accommodations are available with a variety of locations: from downtown overlooking the Little Pigeon River, to a mountaintop overlooking the Smoky Mountains to secluded natural surroundings.

No matter what your preference, the Gatlinburg Convention Center can accommodate your needs and desires

Don’t jump to conclusions if you see parts of the Smoky Mountains actually smoking this spring. What you’re seeing likely isn’t a forest fire, but a prescribed burn being carried out by the National Park Service to fortify the Smokies from such wildfires and help replenish the majestic landscapes that everyone has come to know and love.

Needless to say, these burns are being carried out by design this spring in the Smokies. Burns like these planned ones are commonplace most years, especially in areas like Cades Cove. It’s just one of the ways that the Cove maintains its lush meadows, which in turn makes it a haven for Smoky Mountain wildlife. If someone is carrying a camera with them in the Townsend, TN area, they’re likely headed to Cades Cove or they’ve already been there.

In fact, there are plans for several intentional burns through the month of May.

In addition to replenishing areas of the park, official said the controlled burns also drastically reduce fuel that can build up and produce wildfires near homes located close tot he national park and help restore diverse tree populations in the forest.

The burns will not only occur in Cades Cove, Wears Valley and Lynn Hollow are scheduled for prescribed burns as weather permits this spring.

Despite these prescribed burns, the Cades Cove Loop Road will remain open, though visitors may experience brief delays because of drifting smoke or safety concerns as firefighter work along the road.

Fire management officer Dave Loveland said 600 acres of fields burned earlier in the cove look great as spring arrives.

A completion date for roadwork on Newfound Gap Road looks to be within sight. Round the clock roadwork has been ongoing according to the contractor repairing US 441 (Newfound Gap Road) – the site of a January landslide took out a large, football field-sized section in North Carolina.

Accordingly, the main road between Gatlinburg, TN, and Cherokee, N.C., is scheduled to reopen by May 15. Incentives have been put into place if the work is done earlier and there are penalties if the project falls behind schedule.

Officials with the Great Smoky Mountains National Park tell the Knoxville News Sentinel that Phillips & Jordan Inc. of Robbinsville, N.C., started working through the night this past week to speed up the completion date so that it would be finished by the summer tourism season.

In January, heavy rainfall and an underground stream combined to loosen thousands of tons of rock, soil and trees, which slid the length a football field down a slope during the mid point of the month.

A football field-sized gap now makes up the roadway. Officials say an estimated 9,000 dump truck-loads of dirt, rock and roadway crashed 45-50 feet down the side of the mountain.

Engineers believe a subsurface spring underneath the area was a large factor in causing the landslide. It’s unknown how long the spring had been there. That, combined with the heavy rain that week, caused the collapse. In all, 8 inches of rain fell in the area between Monday and Wednesday the week of January 14.

At the time, it was considered an active landslide because of the continuously flowing springs underneath the road’s surface.

The Society of American Travel Writers has included the lights of Winterfest on its list of The Top 10 Lesser-Known (But Just as Bright!) Holiday Lights in the U.S.

Winterfest lights are displayed in the cities of Sevierville, Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg. The display ranks 8th on the society’s list, which also includes light displays in Kauai, Hawaii; Charlotte, N.C.; Pine Mountain, Ga.; and Louisville, Ky.

The Winterfest lights will remain lit through this month.

“Designs include snowflakes, rocking horses, waterfalls, trains, bears, a gristmill and toy soldiers, all lining the Parkway leading to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park,” the society notes.

“I guess it’s no surprise that people are recognizing our beauty,” said Brenda McCroskey, Chief Executive Officer of the Sevierville Chamber of Commerce. “A lot of people have been coming here to enjoy the holiday festivals and the shopping, for a long time.”

But, she added, “There has not been that much recognition on a national level.”

Based in Milwaukee, Wis., the Society of American Travel Writers is an organization of more than 1,100 journalists, public relations workers and other professionals. It was founded in 1955.

“Notices like these are much more powerful than direct advertising,” said McCroskey of the list. “This comes from an unbiased source. This says someone else who has credentials thinks we’re doing a good job.”

Honors related to Sevier County’s winter offerings are rare, McCroskey said. “We tend to get recognition more for springtime and summertime activities.”

Winterfest was established to boost the Sevier County economy during the cold months. Upcoming Winterfest events include Wilderness Wildlife Week, the Tennessee Winter Special Olympics and the Rose Glen Literary Festival.

Though the recent Jan. 16 landslide destroyed nearly 200 feet of Newfound Gap Road (U.S. 441), most park activities and destinations remain open and accessible to visitors.

This according to officials with the park who said some roads are still being cleared on the Tennessee side due to debris from recent storms, “but as far as Newfound Gap, you can access all the hiking trails around there, and everything that’s normally open along that road. It’s just that small section past Newfound Gap Road, just a little past the parking lot, that’s closed.”

So campgrounds, trails and picnic areas, as well as popular destinations like Cades Cove and the views at Newfound Gap near the border, are still open, and everything will stay open barring inclement weather.

Basically, the only thing visitors can’t do is get to Cherokee, N.C., via Newfound Gap Road. That, and they also can’t see the landslide, though several people at the Sugarlands Visitor Center had come to the park Thursday for that reason.

Many have come to the park specifically to see the landslide and just pass the time for curiosity’s sake. But, unfortunately, those people are being turned away from that specific area of Newfound Gap Road. National park officials have said that no one would be allowed to see the landslide for themselves.

Of course, January and February are lower-visitation months for the park, so the indefinite closure won’t affect tourism as much as it could have.

Still, the park is doing whatever it can to spread word that most of its attractions are still open.

“I’ve had people stop in and think they couldn’t get past Sugarlands, but that’s incorrect,” on park official said. “There are some people coming in, but I hope to get the word out that there is still access further into the park.”

They said there’s still no timeline for when the park reopens the closed portion of Newfound Gap Road, and as far as the trails on that portion, officials are assessing the situation.

“We’re looking at what impact it has on the trails and finalizing ideas on what we could do to have access on those trails or educate people about what’s going to happen until the road’s completely fixed.”

The section of Newfound Gap Road that was washed away due to heavy rainfall last week is still influx as park officials attempt to figure out how to repair that portion of U.S. Highway 441 through the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. It’s primarily recognized as the main connector road between Gatlinburg and Cherokee, N.C.

A football field-sized gap now makes up the roadway. Officials say an estimated 9,000 dump truck-loads of dirt, rock and roadway crashed 45-50 feet down the side of the mountain.

Engineers believe a subsurface spring underneath the area was a large factor in causing the landslide. It’s unknown how long the spring had been there. That, combined with the heavy rain that week, caused the collapse. In all, 8 inches of rain fell in the area between Monday and Wednesday the week of January 14.

It’s still considered an active landslide because of the continuously flowing springs underneath the road’s surface.

When it ill be fixed is still anyone’s guess. The National Park Service is working with the Department of Federal Highways to come up with a plan, as well as the Eastern Federal Lands Highway Division (EFLH) to assist in the initial evaluation of the slide and develop repair solutions. Engineers have been on site since last week. The hope is that by the end of next week officials will know when construction can commence and how much it will cost.

During its busiest days, the 31-mile stretch of Newfound Gap Road can have up to 7,000 cars travel along it.

Newfound Gap Road will be open to visitors from the Gatlinburg entrance in Tennessee to the Newfound Gap parking lot as soon as it is possible. The road is open to Smokemont on the North Carolina side.