While I’m terrified of heights, my fear picks and chooses where and when it wants to manifest itself. I have zero fear or anxiety about flying, for example. And I spend quite a bit of time hiking up the sides of mountains, which doesn’t usually bother me unless there a very high vertical drop right off a trailside, but even then, it’s kind of a case by case basis. Something that consistently renders me helpless though, is driving along a steep drop off. When my brother and I take hiking trips out west, he has to drive on most mountain roads, and often times I have to lay down in the backseat so I can’t see what’s going on outside the car. It’s a real phobia.
My brother and I recently visited New River Gorge National Park (and Preserve!) up in Fayetteville, West Virginia. It’s been on our radar for a while now, and at just under four hours from Asheville, a long overdue sojourn. We arrived separately on Friday in time to watch the sun set over the New River Gorge Bridge. Saturday we went white water rafting (which I think I may become addicted to soon?), and then Sunday we did a sunrise hike in a more remote portion of the park, visited a ghost town in the park’s confines, hiked along the rim, and then drove down one side of the gorge, crossed the river, and up the other side.
I was nervous about the drive down the gorge. It’s steep and the roads were predictably switchbacked, but surprisingly, the drive didn’t bother me at all. When we were almost back to the top, I noted how weird it was that I didn’t care, and Shawn pointed out that is was probably because the roads down and up were both guardrailed the entire way, not just at the scary parts, which lead me to wonder, why aren’t guardrails more prevalent on roads with very steep drops? Like, it feels like it should be mandatory.
Back in January, I had a scary black ice incident while driving back from a sunrise hike at the Roan Highlands in Carver’s Gap. Driving back somewhere I think probably had a Bakersville address, I hit a patch of black ice and pirouetted down the road a couple hundred yards, ultimately landing in a ditch full of Helene debris that royally fucked up my car for a few months, but had I landed on the other side of the road, I would’ve been falling a couple hundred more yards down the side of the mountain. Since I wasn’t going fast, a guardrail would’ve prevented that. Seeing first hand how easily that could’ve happened, it somewhat surprises me that you don’t hear about more accidents on perilous mountain roads.
That might, however, be by design (if you have a tinfoil hat, maybe now is the time to put it on).
This train of thought makes me think the first time Shawn came to visit me in Asheville five years ago. We wanted to hike Mt. Mitchell, which entails a rather harrowing, switchback filled drive from Old Fort to the furthest edges of Burnsville, where the trailhead is. The ride up, while terrifying, was unremarkable. However, on the ride back down, we passed a large group of motorcyclists off their bikes on a pulloff, peering over a guardrailless embankment. We thought maybe they were just fascinated by the drop. We didn’t know anything tragic had happened until fire trucks started flying up the mountain. Since it’s a very thin road, we pulled over at the next pull-off, where we sat for a while as a parade of emergency vehicles climbed past. We were pulled over for long enough that we got out of the car to stretch, as did the woman pulled over behind us, a local whom we started chatting with.
“One of the motorcyclists went over the side of the mountain,” she said rather blithely. Maybe sensing our shock, she added, “It happens often on this hill. It’s famous for motorcyclists but doesn’t have guardrails everywhere, and many don’t research how dangerous it is.”
We did some Googling the next day to see whether the poor guy lived (the woman we were chatting with made it seem like, based on her experiences at least, that it was probably a 50/50 chance). Nothing. And not to brag, but I like to think I have better than average Google sleuthing skills (SEO strategizing is a big part of my 9-5). Thinking it might materialize after the weekend, I continued searching daily for the remainder of the week. Nothing. I then did some rough searching about whether or not there are reports of many motorcycle crashes in that area, and came up with very little. Based on what that woman said, it’s not uncommon, yet it’s also not reported.
Do I think there’s some grand conspiracy here? Not really. I think there’s maybe just some good local PR at play. Western North Carolina is, after all, an economy based on tourism. Do you know what dissuades tourists from visiting? Reports of dead or injured tourists, even if, a bulk of the time, the tourists themselves are at fault.
I remember asking a shuttle driver up in the Adirondacks years ago how many people get lost on hikes. He said a lot. I then asked how many of them get hurt or die. He said a lot. I wondered why we don’t hear about that. I will paraphrase his answer, but essentially, “it doesn’t behoove a tourist town to report on tourist deaths, especially when it’s often, ya know, their fault.” I wouldn’t be shocked to learn that’s what’s happening over in Mitchell County.
But…I’ve really digressed. We were talking about guardrails and why they aren’t more prevalent.
Here’s what the illustrious Google AI Overview told me.
Not all roads have guardrails due to various factors, including cost, road width, safety considerations, and maintenance challenges. Guardrails can be expensive to install and maintain, and they may not always be the most effective safety measure, especially on narrow roads or in areas prone to snow and ice. Additionally, some roads are built on unstable terrain or through areas where guardrail installation would be impractical or damage the landscape.
Additionally, it pointed out that often, roads aren’t stable enough or wide enough to implant guardrails that will offer more than peace of mind (though honestly, I’d be very cool with some more piece of mind).
What doesn’t help with peace of mind is that most of the guardrails in the U.S. were designed for cars that weigh far less than what they do now, and that, effectively, most modern guardrails only offer peace of mind.
The more you know…
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