Lula Lake Land Trust

An Partner Of Georgia Land Trust

The Lula Lake Land Trust, established by the will of Robert M. Davenport in January of 1994, seeks to protect and preserve the natural beauty and abundant resources within the Rock Creek watershed for the benefit of present and future generations by fostering education, research and conservation stewardship of the land.

As early as 1958, Mr. Davenport began to acquire pieces of property that would later form the core of the land trust project. These original acquisitions included two exquisite natural features, Lula Lake and Lula Falls. Mining, clear-cut timber harvests, garbage dumping and unrestricted public access had left much of the surrounding land denuded of its beauty and apparent value, giving Mr. Davenport the opportunity to quietly amass several hundred acres throughout the 1960′s and 1970′s. Once closed to public access in the early 1980′s, he began rejuvenating the land by cleaning up the dump sites and replanting timbered areas. The current attractive condition of the property is a tribute to his hard work.

Mr. Davenport had talked to his family about long-term goals for Lula Lake such as preserving the property and conducting biological inventories to identify any rare or unique plants and animals. One such species, Virginia spirea (Spiraea virginiana), was found on the property and previously known from only one other location in Georgia. When learning this, Mr. Davenport became completely convinced of the importance of preserving this unique area for future generations. By his untimely death in 1994, he had acquired more than 1,200 acres around Lula Lake and since then, the Land Trust has increased protection within the watershed to more than 7,800 acres.

Lula Lake Land Trust protects the natural beauty of the Rock Creek watershed and Lookout Mountain

Expanding protection and trails

Since its creation in 1994 with a gift of the lake and falls and the 770 acres surrounding them, the Lula Lake Land Trust has directly protected more than 7,800 acres.

Lula Lake Land Trust’s original project area is the 40,000-acre Rock Creek watershed, and the bulk of the trust’s 5,000 acres is along Rock Creek and its major tributary, Long Branch. The remaining acreage is protected by conservation easements or is owned by Cloudland Canyon State Park. Our donation of land to leverage federal funds allowed the state park to nearly DOUBLE its size from 1999 to 2003, which also created an unbroken conservation landscape more than 9,000 acres big and 20 miles long, including the original land of Cloudland.

In 2010 and 2011, our focus continues to be on the incredible success of the “Cloudland Connector” trail project, a multi-use trail (horses, mountain bikes, and hikers) that connects this huge landscape and makes it safe and fun for everyone. In the fall of 2009, we held a ribbon cutting at our Nick-A-Jack trailhead with all of our partners to celebrate the completion of the first 5.8 miles of this trail, which ends at Lula Lake Road just south of Thompsonville.

Today, the next 4.3 miles of connector trail are under construction, with an additional 17 miles of world-class mountain bike terrain on the land donated by the land trust to the state of Georgia several years ago to add to Cloudland Canyon. The trailheads, of similar function to the Nick-A-Jack trailhead, will be at the 5-Points mountain biking area and at Ascalon Road. The Southeastern Off Road Biking Association (SORBA) is overseeing the development of these trails. This group is the same one that brought us a similar facility at Raccoon Mountain. Mountain bikers from all over the county are traveling to Chattanooga to enjoy this venue, and we are expecting the same thing at 5-Points.

In 2011, our plan is to build with our partners the remaining 4.8 miles of trail that will finish the southern connection to the original State Park. By that time, we will have updated our “master facilities plan,” published for years on the front page of our web site, so that we can focus on the next phases of this huge private initiative that lies between two important public parks, Cloudland to the south and the Lookout Mountain Unit of the National Military Park to the north.

And, we are adding land. Ninety acres were donated to the land trust, and, we are raising funds to acquire key tracts as they become available. Our partner, the Georgia Land Trust (GLT), has added several conservation easements in the watershed, and our land acquisition fund is intended to allow us to accelerate the success of this program. Georgia Land Trust currently holds more than 160,000 acres of conservation easements, including all of the conservation easements in and around the Lula Lake Land Trust.

Lake Falls Meadow in winter is one of Lula Lake Land Trust's beautiful scenes