It's official: the State of North Carolina now owns Chimney Rock Park.
According to a news brief from the Asheville Citizen-Times, the state has bought the park for $24 million, and Gov. Mike Easley will announce the purchase in a news conference today.
"A private donation helped boost the price the state was willing to pay, said Charlie Peek, spokesman for the N.C. Division of Parks and Recreation" said the paper.
"The state parks system had long been in negotiations with the owners of the 1,000-acre property in Rutherford County."
Officials with the property originally wanted $55 million, but the "anonymous donation of $2.35 million allowed the state to go above its appraisal price, Peek said."
In somewhat related news, the Associated Press is reporting that tourism was up at North Carolina's mountain parks last year.
Tourism increased in western North Carolina's national parks last year, despite high gas prices that hovered around $3 a gallon.
The Great Smoky Mountains National Park saw its largest increase in to
urism in five years and the Blue Ridge Parkway reported a 6 percent increase in visitors.
The Smokies reported a 2 percent increase in the number of visitors in 2006, to 9.4 million people, according to numbers released Friday. Visitation to the park peaked in 2000 with 10 million visitors a year.
Tourism attractions in surrounding communities and the region's proximity to metropolitan areas kept numbers high, officials said.
The mountain economies near the parks thrive on visitors, who spend $652 million a year at local hotels and restaurants in communities that border the parks.
No comments:
Post a Comment