Georgetown, KY

Toyota's Georgetown plant began assembling the RAV4 Hybrid in June 2026, forty years after the factory started producing vehicles. The same month, the company broke ground on a new paint facility designed to cut carbon emissions by 30 percent and annual water use by about 1.5 million gallons. Toyota reported nearly 10,000 workers, more than $12 billion invested, and 15 million vehicles assembled at the plant. Its public Experience Center opens Tuesday through Thursday, using interactive displays and factory tours to show how vehicles move through production. The older city remains visible around Main Street, the Scott County courthouse, Royal Spring, and Georgetown College. Founded as Lebanon by minister Elijah Craig, the settlement was renamed for George Washington in 1790; the spring that drew early settlers is now a small downtown park.

Georgetown College, chartered in 1829, occupies a 104-acre campus with antebellum academic buildings, residence halls, and about 1,350 undergraduate and graduate students in fall 2024. Daily recreation has a larger footprint north of downtown. The Pavilion contains two basketball courts, an eight-lane lap pool, a leisure pool and slide, fitness rooms, an indoor track, meeting space, and a 10,000-square-foot skate park; its 2026 calendar included community swim lessons for local second graders. Georgetown-Scott County Parks and Recreation maintains more than 500 acres across over 11 sites and schedules youth programs, tennis, aquatics, fitness classes, and free park events. Along North Broadway, Yuko-En on the Elkhorn, Kentucky's official Japanese friendship garden, links the city's Bluegrass landscape to the international relationship that grew with Toyota.