The US Forest Service has announced that the Roan Mountain Recreation Area will be closed for major renovations for the 2024 season. Among the Roan Mountain closures are the recreation area, rhododendron gardens, Roan high bluff, Cloudland parking area, and Cloudland Trail. Carver’s Gap and the Appalachian Trail will remain open, but there is limited parking at Carver’s Gap. The plan is to have crews working through the late summer/early fall season and reopen in the 2025 season which begins in May.
The region represents “one of the richest repositories of temperate zone diversity in existence,” according to the Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy, including 33 species federal or state listed as threatened and endangered.
Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy, a nonprofit land trust, transferred 91 acres, known as the Roan Mountain Gateway, to the U.S. Forest Service in 2021. The property was the last privately-owned land on N.C. 261 before reaching Carvers Gap, so its conservation helped to forever protect the scenic views from Round Bald and Jane Bald, mountaintops covered in grasses, rock slabs and shrubs along the Appalachian Trail.
The repair project was chosen among a select number nationwide to be funded by the Great American Outdoors Act, the release said. The legislation, passed by Congress and signed into law by former President Donald Trump in 2020, established the National Parks and Public Land Legacy Restoration Fund.
The fund was created to address a backlog of deferred maintenance on federally managed public lands by providing $285 million for 450 projects in 38 states and Puerto Rico. Just under $2.5 million in GAOA funds will be used for the Roan Mountain site reconstruction.
Some renovations on the Roan have already begun, with crews drilling a new well and replacing the current water distribution system, the U.S. Forest Service said. Upcoming improvement plans include road surface improvement, replacing curbs and fences, rehabilitating picnic sites, replacing flooring in the visitor center, new interpretive signs and repairing damage on the observation decks
For more information call the U.S. Forest Service District Office at 828-689-9694
Photo: Entrance to the rhododendron gardens trail atop Roan Mountain
Photo Credit: Mitchell County Government
