29 counties unite to support Blue Ridge Parkway future
File photo
The boards of county commissioners and county supervisors in the 17 counties in North Carolina and 12 counties in Virginia that host the Blue Ridge Parkway have passed resolutions of support calling for funding to repair the national park and implement the Blue Ridge Rising Action Plan.
On Jan. 12, Yancey County in North Carolina became the 29th county in the national park’s corridor to adopt the resolution.
Through Blue Ridge Rising, the Blue Ridge Parkway Foundation is working with a wide variety of partners representing tourism, economic development, education, workforce training, natural resource conservation, cultural heritage, nonprofits and government agencies to implement strategies that unite the region.
The Blue Ridge Rising Action Plan, created through more than three dozen local and re-gional listening sessions, marks the first time in the national park’s history that these counties are working together to implement travel, tourism and outdoor recreation strategies that will have wide-ranging benefits throughout the parkway corridor.
In 2025, the foundation secured a three-year, $5.13 million matching grant from the Appalachian Regional Commission to support regional strategies to advance cultural and recreational tourism. This grant was made under the Appalachian Regional Initiative for Stronger Economies, which is an ARC initiative that aims to drive large-scale, regional transformation through multistate collaborative projects across Appalachia. Additional funds secured will go toward the required match for the ARISE grant.
The parkway is the most visited unit of the National Park System, with 16.7 million visitors in 2024 — more than Yellowstone, Grand Canyon and Yosemite combined. In the same year, visitors spent $1.5 billion and supported 15,700 jobs, creating a total annual economic output of $1.9 billion.
