A local breaks down what may be the biggest season of change since tourists started flocking to the mountains

One thing about life in the Smoky Mountains is that change is always just around the bend. One season, you’re doing big business selling pancakes, racing go-karts or touting your special and authentic brand of moonshine.

The next season? Your life works are gone. Paved over for a parking lot, remodeled for a new restaurant, or rebranded into something newer and cooler and bigger and better and bolder than what had been the year before.

Living in the Smokies all these years, I’ve gotten a little immune to it. Things come. They go. The mountains and I remain; one of us is a little more eternal than the other. Ob-la-di, ob-la-da, life goes on, you know?

But this year? This year – the year of our Lord 2025 – feels vastly different. The sheer number of projects that have opened, are opening, or are under construction surpass any season in my memory. We are facing an avalanche – or maybe a tidal wave – of new projects from one side across Gatlinburg, Pigeon Forge and Sevierville.............

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