WALLA WALLA, Wash. – Rooks Park will open to vehicle traffic for the spring-summer recreation season on Sunday, April 1, Walla Walla District, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, officials announced, today.
The park is located at the end of Rooks Park Road, about 2 miles east of Walla Walla, Washington. Visitors may notice new maintenance work completed during winter months on the Mill Creek levee bordering the south edge of the park. The newly shaped portions of the levee were recently seeded with a park-lawn grass mixture. Mill Creek Dam and Bennington Lake Project staff ask visitors to avoid those areas until the grass is established for foot traffic.
Rooks Park is part of a group of recreation areas associated with Walla Walla District’s Mill Creek Dam and Bennington Lake project. The groups of recreation areas include Bennington Lake and the Mill Creek Recreation Trail. The lake and trails are open year-round. Rooks Park is seasonally open to vehicle traffic from April through mid-October, but accessible year-round to pedestrians. Park restrooms will be open on Sunday, April 1. The Rooks Park picnic shelter can be reserved using the online national reservation website at
www.Recreation.gov.
Corps recreation planners invite the public to "play it safe" while having some warm-weather fun. Although above-water temperatures are becoming warmer, springtime water temperatures can be cold enough to cause hypothermia – a severe lowering of core body temperature. State boating, hunting and fishing regulations apply to visitors at Corps sites. Hunting on Corps property is allowed only in designated areas and seasons.
For more information on Corps parks, visit
www.nww.usace.army.mil/corpsoutdoors. Keep up with events at Mill Creek Dam and Bennington Lake on Facebook at
www.facebook.com/millcreekdam.
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Release no. 18-029