Tennessee Code Title 42. Aeronautics § 42-4-108

(a) Any participating or creating municipality may acquire any interest in land within the boundaries of the creating or participating municipality by gift, purchase, lease or condemnation, and may transfer such interest to an authority by sale, lease or gift. The transfer may be authorized by ordinance of the governing body of the municipality without submission of the question to the voters and without regard to the requirements, restrictions, limitations, or other provisions contained in any other general, special, or local law.

(b) Notwithstanding subsection (a) to the contrary, an authority in a county having a metropolitan form of government with a population of more than five hundred thousand (500,000), according to the 2020 federal census or a subsequent federal census, shall proceed in accordance with title 29, chapter 16, in the acquisition of property by eminent domain proceedings authorized by this chapter. For the purpose of making surveys and examinations relative to eminent domain proceedings, it is lawful for the authority to enter upon the land, doing no unnecessary damage. Notwithstanding another law to the contrary, an authority may take possession of any property to be acquired by eminent domain proceedings at any time after the commencement of the proceedings. The authority shall not be precluded from abandoning the proceedings in a case where possession of the property has not been taken, even after a trial jury in circuit court has rendered a verdict as to damages for the property taken and at any time prior to the entry of a final decree disposing of the entire eminent domain proceedings.