A brand new podcast explores the historical past discovered alongside Bicycle Route 76 in Virginia’s Blue Ridge, and its potential to be a significant biking vacation spot within the area.
Greater than 300 miles of the US Bicycle Route 76 convey cyclists via Virginia’s Blue Ridge area. From Breaks Interstate Park on the Kentucky border to Rockfish Hole west of Charlottesville, the route climbs over mountains, follows rivers and streams, and passes via cities, farmland, and forests.
Fifty years in the past, this route was mapped as a part of the planning for the Bikecentennial, designed for cyclists to have fun America’s 2 hundredth birthday. A number of thousand riders accomplished all or substantial elements of the route in the summertime of 1976, following distinctive indicators marked with a bicycle and the quantity 76. Within the Nineties, most of this identical route was formally acknowledged as United States Bicycle Route 76, and the indicators (largely) stay in place alongside this route throughout Virginia. Usually referred to as “the Transamerican,” the route is utilized by cyclists using throughout the nation, taking multi-day journeys, or, mostly, on day rides close to their properties.
Route 76 via the Blue Ridge follows the unique intent of Bikecentennial planners by following largely rural roads. At the least three-quarters of the miles throughout the Blue Ridge are on rural roads: often simply two lanes, typically with a middle line and marked shoulders, however typically with no traces or shoulders. Some sections run parallel with, and briefly on, busier roads, together with Route 11. Simply over 20 miles are on the Blue Ridge Parkway, between Tye River Hole and Rockfish Hole. Cyclists spend little or no time using via cities and cities, though these places do present alternatives to search out lodging, meals, shops, and museums.
Cyclists on Route 76 within the Blue Ridge will encounter many hills, with difficult ascents and rewarding descents. Westbound riders climb up Afton Mountain and the even steeper climb to Channels State Forest, with a 7% grade over three miles. Eastbound riders climb from Vesuvius to Tye River Hole, extensively thought-about the steepest climb on your entire Transamerican Bicycle Route. The best factors are alongside the Blue Ridge Parkway and within the Mount Rogers Recreation Space, difficult rides with repeated ascents and descents with low visitors, glorious roads, and exquisite views.
Historical past is current all alongside the greater than 300 miles of this part of Route 76. That’s why I began the Bike 76 VA podcast, which provides cyclists (and native residents and guests) 30 episodes that discover historical past throughout your entire stretch of Route 76 in Virginia. Every episode makes use of a location to discover broader themes throughout greater than 500 years of Virginia historical past. Episodes are spaced about each 20 miles alongside the route, so a bicycle owner averaging 60-80 miles would cowl three or 4 episodes in a day. The episodes are 15-20 minutes in size, designed for listening on the finish of biking day, whereas making ready for the day’s trip, or on breaks alongside the route.
My purpose with this mission was to offer extra context for riders, to encourage them to suppose extra broadly in regards to the locations and other people encountered alongside the route, and to attach the origins of this route, within the 1976 Bikecentennial, with the upcoming semiquincentennial commemoration in 2026.
Many rural roads originated as strolling trails for searching, migration, and commerce. Indigenous communities had been typically situated in valleys in proximity to streams or rivers, and thus strolling routes allowed for communication between teams and the mobility mandatory for rising crops, foraging in forests, and buying and selling with different communities. The primary European explorers adopted these identical strolling routes as they moved inland, displacing Indigenous communities which largely retreated additional into forested or elevated areas.
Cyclists will observe how Route 76 follows the contours of the land, alongside streams and creeks or via gaps in ridges, thus confirming the centuries of foot journey which established these routes.
European settlement reworked relations with Indigenous peoples in addition to the land in ways in which stay evident within the current. As cyclists trip alongside the valleys west of the Blue Ridge, they’re following the identical common route taken greater than two centuries in the past by European settlers searching for land to determine farms, construct church buildings, and maintain communities. Essentially the most seen proof of sustained group presence are church buildings which record founding dates way back to the early nineteenth century.
Enslaved folks lived and labored in Appalachian Virginia previous to the American Civil Conflict. Enslaved folks in some counties west of the Blue Ridge made up one-fifth of the inhabitants, thus confirming the significance of slave labor to financial growth and political energy. As cyclists trip Route 76, they’re typically observing fields the place enslaved folks lived and labored throughout many generations within the many years earlier than emancipation.
Within the late nineteenth century, the enlargement of railroads facilitated transportation on the identical time that market demand grew for pure assets extracted from Appalachia. Timber introduced the primary financial growth to the Blue Ridge. Most Virginia forests had been clear lower within the late nineteenth century, as timber corporations established work camps, constructed railroads, and transported lumber for shipbuilding, house development, and heating gasoline. The timber business introduced work alternatives to native communities and contributed to financial development. As soon as a area had been clear lower, nonetheless, the business moved elsewhere, depriving communities of labor and leaving companies to fail. Proof of boom-and-bust cycles might be seen in deserted railway traces and closed mills alongside Route 76.
The financial dislocation of communities evident within the 50 years for the reason that Bikecentennial resulted from financial and demographic shifts. The interstate highways bypassed many of those communities, depriving them of tourists and shifting companies nearer to main exits. Small industrial vegetation misplaced markets to nationwide and international rivals. Populations decreased in lots of communities. Dickenson and Smyth counties have 15% fewer folks now than fifty years in the past (over the identical interval, Virginia’s inhabitants nearly doubled). Native companies that served communities had been unable to outlive as demand declined, and lots of closed their doorways, leaving empty storefronts nonetheless seen alongside Route 76.
However I consider cyclists will help revive these communities, with Route 76 having the potential to offer a lift within the type of leisure tourism. The Virginia Creeper Path, the New River Path, and the Blue Ridge Parkway have nationwide reputations as locations for multi-day biking journeys. And Route 76 might be the identical, because it approaches main biking facilities, together with Roanoke, Charlottesville, Staunton, and Waynesboro. Most significantly, Route 76 can convey cyclists into small cities, thus offering alternatives for lodging, meals, and different actions that help native communities.
All the historic connections outlined listed here are explored via podcast episodes alongside the route from Breaks Interstate Park to Charlottesville. The 4 episodes distributed alongside an 80-mile part in southwest Virginia present a way of each vary of historic themes and the variety of biking experiences. The Logan Creek episode (27) examines the historical past of forests in Appalachia, from the regenerative practices of Indigenous Individuals to the clear-cutting of the late nineteenth century, which formed the atmosphere now encountered by cyclists. Route 76 and the Appalachian Path intersect in Damascus, so episode 26 explores the similarities and variations in outside recreation with roots in twentieth century visions of human-powered exploration. The Troutdale episode (25) examines how small cities within the early twentieth century skilled industrial booms resulting from railroad enlargement and manufacturing booms, adopted by financial dislocation inflicting inhabitants declines evident now in deserted companies and houses alongside Route 76. The Mill Creek episode (24) paperwork the lynching of Raymond Byrd in 1926, which can also be commemorated by a historic marker on Route 76 in downtown Wytheville. For cyclists, the expertise of using this part, that includes a mix of rural roads, difficult climbs, rewarding descents, and exquisite surroundings, is enhanced by studying extra in regards to the historic forces that formed communities alongside this route.
Tom Ewing is a professor of historical past at Virginia Tech (Blacksburg) and director of the Bike VA 76 mission, which options 30 podcast episodes, weekly weblog essays, and different supplies about Route 76 in Virginia: https://bike76-va.vt.domains/house/.
