NASA Scenic Byway to Space
NASA Scenic Byway to Space is a State Scenic Byway in Mississippi. Within Mississippi it covers roughly 30 miles. The map below shows its route. Use “Plan a drive” to open it in the Road Sorties route planner — already routing along NASA Scenic Byway to Space with scenic roads turned on, ready to add your own stops.
Mississippi's NASA Scenic Byway to Space runs about 30 miles around the buffer zone of NASA's John C. Stennis Space Center, from the MS 607/MS 604 junction near the south gate to Texas Flat Road at the north gate. It's one of six connected 'Byways to Space' routes, along with the Pearlington, Westonia, Logtown, Napoleon, and Santa Rosa byways, that together trace the East Pearl River country the space center now occupies. Before NASA arrived, this stretch was home to the logging and shipping towns of Gainesville, Napoleon, Santa Rosa, Logtown, and Westonia, whose roughly 700 families were relocated in the 1960s to clear the buffer zone for what's now the nation's largest rocket engine test facility. Visitors can tour Stennis's exhibits on rocket testing and early space exploration, including real astronaut suits, at the visitor center near the byway's northern end. The drive itself is quiet piney backroads and river bottomland, its main draw the ghost-town history hiding behind NASA's fences.
- Stennis Space Center
- Byways to Space network
- ~30 miles
- East Pearl River
- relocated logging towns
- rocket engine test facility
- buffer zone
Plan a drive on NASA Scenic Byway to Space →
What is a State Scenic Byway?
State Scenic Byways are roads a state has formally recognized for their scenic, natural, historic or cultural value — each state's own curated collection of drives worth taking slowly.
Where to Stay along NASA Scenic Byway to Space
1 campground or RV park sits within about 5 miles of NASA Scenic Byway to Space.
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