As I head home I am finally finding some scenic routes to follow. Today I deviated slightly from the normal route between Huntsville, AL and Cleveland, Tennessee so I could drive a section of interstate highway that is designated as scenic. To be honest, today’s scenic section was not great but I am just on the western edge of the Appalachians and the next few days will, hopefully, be almost all on scenic roads.
I made two stops in Chattanooga, TN on the way. Since I am a sucker for small, unusual museums I could not resist the International Towing and Recovery Hall of Fame and Museum – perhaps I should have tried harder. The first purpose-built vehicle for towing broken down vehicles was created in Chattanooga in 1913 by a car dealer who realized it would be better to bring the cars to his garage than try to fix them on the roadside. The museum has on display everything from the earliest to the biggest and the fastest North American tow trucks but there is almost nothing else and all are fully restored which seems a shame in a museum. As I left I commented that I would have liked to have seen explanations of how the different equipment was used and read stories of interesting rescues and the daily work of recovery. It could have been so much more interesting and educational than it was.
I then drove into central Chattanooga to enjoy some fresh air and take a walk over the Tennessee River on the Walnut Street Bridge. It was built in 1891 and was the first bridge to connect Chattanooga with the communities on the north shore which, at the time, were separate but are now part of the city. The bridge was closed to traffic in 1978 and left to decay for a decade before being renovated as a pedestrian bridge and the centerpiece of a large urban renewal project. There are small parks and cycle paths at both sides of the bridge and the construction continues in much of the downtown area.
This is a very early tow truck, built and used in Chattanooga from 1913. It’s basically an upscale car with the towing hook added. 
The museum says this is the biggest tow truck ever built in North America. The ones on the TV series “Ice Road Truckers” seem bigger to me but that’s probably just the camera adding a few pounds..
The Walnut Street Pedestrian Bridge as seen from Coolidge Park on the north side of the river.
A lot of construction is underway on the south (downtown) side of the bridge.
Urban renewal produces strange scenes at times. Here we have the pedestrian bridge at the top, a busy multi-lane road in the middle and a ziz-zag path and cycleway leading to the river walk below that.
The Hunter Museum of Art stands on a bluff overlooking the river with this glass bridge taking pedestrians over the road seen in the picture above. The contrast between the old and new wings is quite severe.
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