Historic Recreation and Tourism
While recreation wasn’t one of the Corps’ main goals in creating Lake Lanier, it soon became a major feature of the reservoir. People traveled from Atlanta and beyond to visit Georgia’s new 690 miles of shoreline. Popular activities included boating, camping, and fishing.
It is hard to overstate the importance of recreation to Lake Lanier and its surrounding communities. By 1971, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers boasted that Lake Lanier was their most visited site in the United States, with annual attendance of almost 11 million. In the same year, the New York Times declared that the reservoir was “The Most Popular Man-Made Lake in America.” The rise of tourism drove development throughout the formerly rural area.