Our friend Nick Baggett — US Army Corps of Engineers’ (USACE) Lake Lanier Natural Resource Manager — kindly sent lakelanier.com links to the updated USACE website.
Nick’s help makes the search for open boat ramps on Lake Lanier a simple process. You won’t have to rely on rumors or guesswork anymore. This means no more surprises at 5 AM when you pull into a park to launch your boat and find that the ramps are high and dry.
But … lake levels change. Sometimes hourly. If the boat ramp you’re thinking of using is only inches away from being closed, please consider calling the USACE to double-check. The phone number for the office at Buford Dam is 770-945-9531.
Lake Lanier’s Open Boat Ramp Database
Sorry if this looks complicated. All you have to do is figure out the current water level, then plug that number into the Boat Ramp Elevation Database. A second later you’ll have a colorful, accurate picture of which ramps are open, which are closed and which ones are marginal.
- Click Here for Lake Level Database
- Look for today’s date. (Months are listed across the top and Dates are listed on the vertical column on the left.)
- Jot that lake level number down.
- Click Here for the Boat Ramp Elevation Database page
- Scroll down until you see the Boat Ramp Elevation Database
- If you’re familiar with Excel files, find cell D-5.
- Otherwise, look for the gray box that says “Enter Current Elevation.”
- Enter Today’s Water Level in the box that contains the number “1071.0” — and hit “Enter.”
- Voila! The ramps that are closed have the word “NO” in a red box. Open boat ramps will have the word “YES” in a bright green box. Ramps that are open — but not by much — will have the word “YES” in a yellow box.
If you don’t have a computer, you’ll have to rely on what folks tell you about open ramps. Usually that’s, “I heard the middle ramp was open last week … at that old park … down the side road … near the bridge where Bubba goes crappie fishin.”
