Fast Pace Health plans Rocky Top center
Franklin, Tennessee-based Fast Pace Health wants to build an urgent-care medical clinic in Rocky Top, and is expected to seek approval of its plans at the city’s next Planning Commission meeting June 15.
City Manager Michael Foster said the company – which opened a similar clinic in Clinton in October 2019 – has its sights set on a vacant lot at 510-514 N. Main St. for its building.
The property is across the street from Glenn’s Pizza and next door to a motel and Mexican restaurant. The site now is owned by Vanguard Investment Properties Inc. of Jacksboro, which bought it in 2009, according to Anderson County property records.
That lot, measuring just under an acre, has been vacant since probably the 1990s, Foster said. There is still a building foundation on the lot, but the structure has long been gone, he added. It previously housed a gas station and later a restaurant.
Foster said the Planning Commission will review and consider the plans on June 15, then the plans will come before the City Council at its regular meeting June 17.
“When they get the site plan approved, it’s going to move pretty fast,” he said. “They will still have to do some grading on the site before starting construction.”
It will be the first medical clinic in Rocky Top in at least two years, Foster said. A previous Covenant Health clinic and physicians’ offices on South Main Street closed more than two years ago, and that property is now on the market for sale.
“We’re excited to see it come in,” Foster said. “They seem to have a good reputation. The Fast Pace in Clinton always seems to stay busy.”
Multiple attempts by The Courier News to reach Fast Pace Health for comment about its plans for Rocky Top were not successful Friday and Monday.
But according to its website (fastpacehealth.com), the company now has 141 walk-in clinic locations in Tennessee, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi and Indiana.
The clinics are open seven days a week, require no appointments, and accept most major health insurance plans, the website notes.
No opening date has been mentioned yet for the planned Rocky Top clinic, but Foster said he believes the company took only about six months to build the Clinton location on South Charles G. Seivers Boulevard and get it open for business.