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The Chicken Steps are a classic case of Louisville lore being considerably larger than the thing itself. They are, in the end, just a steep public shortcut between Vernon Avenue and Brownsboro Road. The name is the fun part: one story says neighborhood chickens used to roost on earlier wooden steps; another says local boys called each other “chicken” for refusing to climb the bluff before steps existed at all. Nobody seems to know for certain. The concrete version dates back at least to the early 1970s, and neighbors have repeatedly fought to keep the public passage open. Underwhelming in person, perhaps, but impressively overqualified in folklore.