Paces Mill has been rebuilt in two halves. The first half is finished and was paid for. It's the part you drive into, park in and walk across. The second half has no funding yet. It's the part that meets the river: a visitor center, wide steps down to the water, overlooks and a pavilion. On a fall walk from the Cobb Parkway entrance down to the Chattahoochee, you start on brand-new ground and finish at a riverbank that looks much the way it did before the project began.
That split explains most of what Vinings neighbors will see at the park this season. It also explains why the next round of change is further off than the dates published last year said.
The finished half starts at the parking lot
The Cobb County Courier reported that Paces Mill reopened over Memorial Day weekend 2025 after about nine months of construction, with a ribbon cutting the following Saturday. That ribbon cutting and community day took place on June 7, 2025.
The work was called New Day Palisades. It's a joint project of One Cumberland, the Cumberland Community Improvement District and the National Park Service, with a total price of $15.8 million. Phase One cost $6.3 million. According to the Cumberland CID's announcement, the CID paid $4.3 million of that and federal appropriations covered $2 million.
Most of that money went into things you walk past without noticing. The same release lists a rebuilt main parking area and bus drop-off loop, new meadow space, bioswales and grading that catch stormwater, and rebuilt boardwalks and accessible paths toward the river. The New Day Palisades site also counts site grading, erosion control and a native meadow planted with prairie species as part of the finished phase.
The parking lot is the clearest change. The National Park Service lists 229 spaces in the Paces Mill main lot, plus a separate boat-ramp lot with six spaces, five of them oversized. The project's case for a rebuild rested on traffic. Paces Mill joined the National Park Service in 1978, had seen very few improvements since, and now draws more than 270,000 visitors a year. Phase One answered the parking and stormwater problems first, which is why the newest-looking parts of the park are near the entrance.
The meadow is where new ground meets the old trail
From the lot, the restored meadow is the next stop, and it's also where the trail begins. The National Park Service says the paved Rottenwood Creek Trail starts next to the large open meadow at the Paces Mill entrance. It follows the river, then climbs along Rottenwood Creek and joins the Bob Callan Trail at the park boundary. The Bob Callan Trail begins at Interstate North Parkway and Cumberland Boulevard.
That paved route matters for anyone bringing wheels. Within the Palisades unit, the park allows bikes only on roadways and the paved Rottenwood Creek Trail. So the meadow trailhead is the one spot at Paces Mill where a bike ride and a river walk start at the same place.
The wider Palisades unit on the Cobb side covers 302 acres, with about 3.5 miles of trail and just over 2 miles of river shoreline. Near the river at Paces Mill, the park has picnic tables and grills under a canopy of hardwoods. Late October is a good time for them, since the trees above the tables are turning.
The National Park Service mentions one seasonal detail that fits the date: Purple Gentian "braves the chill October winds at the river's edge." The same page names Great Blue Herons, Kingfishers, Ospreys and Mallards among the birds along the river corridor. The park also asks visitors to stay on the trails, since poison ivy is common.
At the water, Paces Mill is still the place floaters get out
Walk past the meadow and picnic grove and you reach the part of Paces Mill that Phase One left mostly alone: the river itself. The National Park Service describes Paces Mill as the last exit point for river floaters, not an upstream put-in, and says the last two boat launches on the float are here.
The park's launch page lists float distances that end at Paces Mill:
- From Whitewater Creek, 0.8 miles
- From Powers Island, 2.6 miles
- From Johnson Ferry, 6.8 miles
- From Morgan Falls, 8.6 miles
The summer tubing traffic is over. Nantahala Outdoor Center, which calls itself the only on-site outfitter in the recreation area, lists its metro tubing season as April through September. It also runs a Class I–II trip from Powers Island to Paces Mill. By the end of October, the people at the takeout are mostly paddlers, anglers and walkers.
The water doesn't change much with the seasons. The National Park Service puts the river at about 50 degrees Fahrenheit, which suits trout and can be dangerous for people. It counts 22 species of game fish in this stretch, including trout, and requires a valid Georgia fishing license and trout stamp. Before any time on the water, the park's current conditions page points river users to live water quality, release and flow information. When that page was checked on October 21, 2026, its alerts didn't include a Paces Mill closure.
A few practical notes before you pull in
The fee system is fully digital. Here's how it works, according to the park's fees page:
- A one-day entrance pass is $5, and an annual park pass is $40.
- America the Beautiful passes are accepted. Cash is not.
- A daily pass covers one private vehicle and everyone in it for that day.
- QR codes for paying are posted in the parking lots.
- Paying doesn't reserve a space or guarantee one will be open.
The park's own pages give slightly different hours. The parking listing says sunrise to sunset, while the Palisades activity page says half an hour before sunrise to half an hour after sunset. Daylight is getting shorter, so an after-work walk should start with the earlier closing time in mind. The fees page itself was last updated in February 2024, so check it before you go.
The river-facing half is still waiting on funding
The unfinished edge at the bottom of that walk is the subject of Phase Two, and the project's own figures show how much is left:
| Phase One | Phase Two | |
|---|---|---|
| Cost | $6.3 million | $9.5 million |
| Funding status | Funded | Funding needed |
| Main elements | Parking lot, bus loop, meadow, bioswales, grading, rebuilt boardwalks and paths | Visitor information center, expanded river entry points, more circulation improvements |
| Timing | Reopened Memorial Day weekend 2025 | Start planned for fall 2027, contingent on funding |
The project page says Phase Two aims to create "a distinct national park experience." It expects the full renovation to be done by spring 2028. The Cumberland CID's 2025 release describes the plans in more physical terms: an ADA-accessible visitor center with restrooms and changing rooms, an open-air pavilion, broad river steps below US-41, overlooks, and habitat and trail work. An earlier project FAQ adds environmental exhibits inside the visitor center and a redesigned parking area at the takeout.
Almost every item on that list is about getting closer to the water: steps down to it, overlooks above it, and a building where people change before or after time on it. None of it exists at Paces Mill today.
The schedule for that work has moved. The 2025 FAQ planned for Phase Two to start in fall 2026 and finish by spring 2027. The current project page moves the start to fall 2027, contingent on funding, and puts the overall finish at spring 2028. The New Day Palisades home page still shows both versions. Its summary says fall 2027, and a section lower on the page still says fall 2026. The current project page is the one to trust. For anyone who watched the 2024–25 closure and expected the riverfront next, that's at least another year of the river edge staying as it is, and the project page invites contributions toward the Phase Two total.
The trail connections around the park are also still being built
Paces Mill sits at the edge of a larger trail plan that is also partly finished. The Cumberland CID describes the planned Cumberland Sweep as a future multimodal link between the Chattahoochee River National Recreation Area, the Bob Callan Trail and Truist Park. Construction of Segment C, along Galleria Drive, is scheduled to start in 2026 and finish by 2028. For now, the paved route from the Paces Mill meadow to the Bob Callan Trail is the connection that already exists.
Segment C and Phase Two of New Day Palisades are both expected to finish in 2028. This fall, a visit means parking in a new lot, crossing a new meadow and reaching a riverbank that's still waiting its turn.
Paces Mill is one of the places I point to when people ask what everyday life near Vinings looks like, and it helps to know what's finished there and what's still on the way. If you're thinking about a home near the river or the Cumberland trails, or you just want to talk about what's changing in this corner of Cobb, Melanie Smith would be glad to hear from you. Let's Connect.
