The Wendell H. Ford Western Kentucky Parkway is a 98.5-mile (158.5 km) freeway running from Elizabethtown, Kentucky to near Nortonville, Kentucky. It intersects with Interstate 65 (I-65) at its eastern terminus, and I-69 at its western terminus. It is one of seven highways that are part of the Kentucky parkway system. The road was renamed for Wendell H. Ford, a former Kentucky governor and United States senator, in 1998. Previously, it was simply the Western Kentucky Parkway, and often called the "WK Parkway" or "the WK" because of the acronym once used on its signs. The parkway carries the unsigned designation Kentucky Route 9001 for its entire length.
Trailblazer signage for the Western Kentucky Parkway (1998-2007 shield) on U.S. Route 641 in Marion, Kentucky
Parkway co-signed with I-69 near Dawson Springs, before section was signed only as I-69
Elizabethtown is a home rule-class city and the county seat of Hardin County, Kentucky, United States. The population was 28,531 at the 2010 census, and was estimated at 31,394 by the U.S. Census Bureau in 2020, making it the 11th-largest city in the state. It is included in the Elizabethtown–Fort Knox, Kentucky Metropolitan Statistical Area, which is included in the Louisville/Jefferson County–Elizabethtown–Madison, Kentucky-Indiana Combined Statistical Area. The Elizabethtown Metropolitan area had a 2019 estimated population of 153,057, making it the 5th-largest metropolitan area in the state.
Hardin County Old Courthouse in downtown Elizabethtown
The Brown Pusey House
The Samuel B. Thomas House
A banner remembers John Hunt Morgan's role in the history of Elizabethtown, KY. A Confederate cannonball is imbedded in the blue building at left (the ball is visible just below and to the left of the nearest second-story window).
