Tennessee State Route 386
State Route 386 (SR 386) is a major east–west state route, signed north-south, located in Davidson and Sumner counties in Tennessee. It is known as Vietnam Veterans Boulevard and serves as a bypass for U.S. Highway 31E (US 31E) and a connector to Hendersonville and Gallatin from Nashville. A majority of the route is a four-lane controlled-access highway.
State Route 386
State Route 386
17.24 mi (27.75 km)
1981–present
Hendersonville to Gallatin, Tennessee
History[edit]
The route that is now SR 386 was originally proposed to provide more convenient means of transportation to Nashville for residents of Hendersonville, which had grown significantly in the 1960s and 1970s. The Hendersonville Transportation Study of 1978 listed 35 priority projects with the section through Hendersonville as number 1 and the connection to I-65 as number 2. A 1980 transportation study conducted for Nashville and Davidson County initiated the project.[1]
Construction began on the first section, located in Hendersonville, in March 1981.[2] This section, located between SR 258 (New Shackle Island Road) and US 31E, was completed in 1983, and the section between the US 31E connector and SR 258 was completed in 1987. These sections were initially referred to as the Hendersonville Bypass. Construction began on the extension to I-65 in 1988. The segment between Two Mile Pike and Conference Drive was opened on April 5, 1990,[3] and the final leg of the original bypass was opened to traffic on October 4, 1990.[4]
Beginning in 2003, the highway was extended east to Gallatin in two separate projects after that city experienced further growth and transportation needs.[5] This was completed on June 15, 2007.[6]
In 2010 TDOT began studying the possibility of extending the route further east into Gallatin.[7] Also that year the speed limit was reduced from 70 to 65 mph in Sumner County and warning signs were installed around the curve near US 31E in an effort to improve safety on the highway that had developed a high rate of traffic accidents.[8] Early into the route's history it began to experience congestion problems during rush hour. Future plans including widening the highway to six lanes.[9]
On December 1, 2011, a 176 vehicle pileup on SR 386 near the easternmost exit with US 31E resulted in two deaths and 16 injuries.[10] Dense fog and black ice were believed to have contributed to the cause of the accident.[11]
In 1987, SR 386 was renamed the Vietnam Veterans Boulevard after the efforts of the Sumner County chapter of the Vietnam Veterans of America.[12] In 2012 the chapter worked with the Tennessee General Assembly to install signs along the highway, located each about a half mile apart, that list the names of the 25 Sumner County residents who died in the Vietnam War.[13]
In the summer of 2023, the signs were changed on all of the roads that SR 386 intersects to be signed as east-west, although signs on SR 386 are still signed as north-south.
TDOT (Tennessee Department of Transportation) has also announced that SR 386 will be widened from its western terminus at I-65 to one of its exits with US 31E.