WEST POINT, Ga. - Before the Chattahoochee River reaches the Columbus Riverwalk, it passes through West Point Dam. The dam, built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and finished in 1975, holds back West Point Lake, a 25,900-acre reservoir with 525 miles of shoreline on the Georgia-Alabama line. It helps manage floods downstream, makes electricity and draws campers, boaters and anglers.

The lake stretches 35 miles along the Chattahoochee. The Corps describes the land around it as rolling fields and forests with outstanding fall foliage. Here is a look at the lake by the numbers.

Built After Decades of Floods

Before the dam, the Chattahoochee often flooded West Point, Ga., and Valley and Lanett, Ala. Local communities asked the federal government for help in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The Flood Control Act of 1962 authorized the Corps to design and build the dam.

The Corps' Savannah District handled design, land acquisition and construction, which began in the mid-1960s and took about 10 years. When the project was finished in 1975, operations were handed to the Corps' Mobile District, which still runs it. The Mobile District marked the dam's 50th anniversary with a free public event at Hardley Creek Recreation Area on June 13, 2025.

"We want as many people as possible to help commemorate the golden anniversary of West Point Project," operations project manager Jay Jamison said before the event, WTVM reported. The Corps waived day-use fees at all lake parks that weekend. It also sought photos and memorabilia from people who built the dam.

Flood Control and Power

Congress authorized the project for flood control, hydroelectric power, navigation, fish and wildlife development and general recreation, according to an archived Corps project page. Water quality was added as a purpose later. The dam is 7,250 feet long and controls runoff from a drainage area of 3,400 square miles.

The lake can hold 604,000 acre-feet of water, WRBL reported in 2025. In Columbus, the river reached 55 feet in the late 1920s, before the dam existed, according to a NOAA gauge cited by WRBL. The highest reading so far in 2025 at that point was just under 23 feet.

The powerhouse has three generators that produce enough electricity each year to serve about 24,000 homes, according to the archived Corps page. The dam's stored water also supports navigation on the 260-river-mile Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint waterway from Apalachicola, Fla., to Columbus. "I don't think a lot of people realize the importance of it, what it's done," Corps hydropower operations manager Ron Stuckey told WRBL.

A Recent Drawdown

Lake levels can also shift for maintenance. Starting Aug. 1, 2025, the Corps lowered the lake from 635 feet to 625 feet to repair a concrete spillway pier, WRBL and WSB-TV reported. It reached 630 feet by Labor Day and 625 feet by Oct. 1.

Repairs were scheduled through Jan. 15, 2026, with levels then returning to normal. The Corps said it chose the target by balancing flood risk, hydropower and recreation. Boaters should check current levels before launching.

Parks, Camping and Fees

The Corps lists boat ramps at 34 public recreation areas around the lake, plus two privately owned, full-service marinas. More than 20 day-use parks offer picnic shelters, ball fields, tennis and basketball courts and hiking trails. The Lakeside Trail is popular with mountain bikers.

Day-use passes cost $5 per vehicle and $20 per bus, according to Recreation.gov. Rocky Point Recreation Area has one of three designated swim areas, open May through Labor Day. Hardley Creek Park, the only Corps park below the dam, has paved trails and a kayak launch.

Recreation.gov lists four Corps campgrounds on the lake, and stays are limited to 14 consecutive nights. Nightly rates below are the ranges posted there in October 2026. Campsites are reserved through the same site.

The Corps also waives day-use fees on its national fee-free days. The last one in 2026 is Veterans Day, Nov. 11, according to a Corps memo. Camping and group shelter fees still apply on those days.

Fishing, According to Georgia DNR

The Georgia Department of Natural Resources lists largemouth bass, spotted bass, crappie, hybrid bass, Gulf striped bass and channel catfish as the lake's best bets. Largemouth bass have a 14-inch minimum size limit, and most run 12 to 15 inches and weigh about a pound. The DNR has stocked more than 4.2 million largemouth bass since 2016 and plans to stock again in 2026.

Spotted bass make up most of the lake's black bass, and the DNR encourages anglers to keep their limit since spots have no length limit. Most hybrids are longer than 14 inches and weigh 2 to 4 pounds or more, and the DNR says several 30-plus-pound stripers are in the lake. Crappie fishing is second only to bass in popularity, with 10-inch fish common.

The DNR calls West Point one of the most productive catfish lakes in middle Georgia. Bank anglers can use public fishing piers at the McGee Bridge and Rocky Point access areas. The DNR notes that fish often feed more aggressively when water is being released from the dam.

How to Visit

The Corps' West Point Lake office is at 500 Resource Management Drive, West Point, GA 31833, and the phone number is (706) 645-2937. The office is open 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., daily from April through September and weekdays from October through March. Visitors can call ahead for park and lake conditions.

West Point Lake sits upstream from Columbus along the Chattahoochee, with the dam at West Point. The DNR's 8,952-acre West Point Wildlife Management Area near LaGrange charges no fee to access the land, but a license is required to hunt or fish there. The DNR's local fisheries office can be reached at (706) 295-6102.