Hal Rogers Parkway
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The Hal Rogers Parkway, formerly named the Daniel Boone Parkway, connects London and Hazard in southeastern Kentucky. This toll road opened in June 1975 and the tolls were removed June 1, 2003. The original extent of the highway was to be 65.70 miles instead of today's 62.90, with that mileage to have been used on a limited-access London bypass. This, however, was not completed.
[edit] Renaming controversy
U.S. Representative Hal Rogers was the forerunner in getting the tolls lifted on the Daniel Boone Parkway. Former governor Paul Patton, to thank him for removing the tolls on the highway, renamed the Daniel Boone Parkway the Hal Rogers Parkway.
This stirred a lot of controversy among Kentucky residents and descendants of Daniel Boone who were offended that the famous pioneer, who discovered Kentucky, was renamed for a sitting congressman whose main accomplishment was getting the tolls lifted off of the parkway. Soon after, the Associated Press picked up the controversy regarding the renaming of the parkway and outrage over the renaming has been heard across the United States and as far as the United Kingdom.
The toll booths were dismantled soon after the tolls were removed in June 1 of 2003 and new Hal Roger Parkway signs replaced the Daniel Boone Parkway signs. The two at-grade toll booths at Exit 34 and 44 were converted into regular intersections and the mainline toll booth near London was dismantled.
It is the only parkway in the state of Kentucky to be almost exclusively two-lanes with the occasional truck lanes on the hills. There is a center paint divider with rumble strips added as a safety feature. The only at-grade intersections are at Exit 34 and 44, from the western terminus at US 25 to KY 192, totaling four-miles, and from milepost 58 to Exit 59.
[edit] "Future Interstate 66 Corridor"
The parkway was designated a part of the "Future Interstate 66 Corridor," a proposed four-lane Interstate utilizing the existing Cumberland and Hal Rogers Parkway, among other routes, across the southern tier of Kentucky. It cannot be signed as an Interstate until it has permanent connections to the east and west, both of which have not been determined due to the King Coal Highway in West Virginia being demoted to a corridor-standard roadway for US 52.
