Nine days ago, on August 1, a few hundred runners lined up at the parking lot off Connector 3 Road, along Poe Branch Creek, for the start of the Still Hollow Half Marathon and 10K. They carried water bottles duct taped to their hands if they had to, because Wild Trails, the nonprofit that puts on the race, requires every participant to bring some form of hydration before they'll let you toe the line. It was hot, as early August in Enterprise South Nature Park always is. The first six miles ran wide and soft through pedestrian-only trail, and then the half marathon course peeled off into the park's more remote bike trails, where the steepest climb on the whole route sits between miles nine and ten.
None of that is unusual for this park. What's unusual is that as recently as January of this year, a chunk of the ground those runners crossed was still on the table to become an industrial site.
The Proposal Nobody Saw Coming
In October 2025, the Chattanooga Times Free Press revealed a plan from Hamilton County Mayor Weston Wamp's office to open 500 acres of Enterprise South Nature Park to industrial development. The paper described the plan as long-secret before it became public. Once it was out, the response was fast and loud. A nonprofit formed specifically to fight the proposal, and a petition against it cleared 12,000 signatures.
By January 6, 2026, Wamp's office announced the plan would not move forward. The park's roughly 2,800 wooded acres, once part of the Volunteer Army Ammunition Plant, stayed intact.
What A Deed Restriction Swap Actually Means
The mechanism behind the proposal is worth understanding, because it says something about how protected this land actually is. The plan wasn't a simple rezoning. It was structured as a deed restriction swap: the county's existing promise to keep Enterprise South as recreational land forever would be lifted, and in exchange the county would make a new promise to preserve McDonald Farm in Sale Creek instead. Because Enterprise South is former military land, the swap would have needed sign-off from the federal Interior Department before it could happen at all, according to the Times Free Press.
That detail matters more than the acreage number. A "forever" designation on parkland can, in practice, be renegotiated if enough parties agree to trade it for something else. Enterprise South wasn't saved by a law that made it untouchable. It was saved because enough people objected loudly enough, in time, before the federal approval process ever started.
Wamp's office framed the reversal around future planning rather than retreat, saying county and state officials would work to find other sites for job creation while building out a broader vision for McDonald Farm.
What Was At Stake On The Ground
The opposition wasn't abstract. Residents who spoke up pointed to three concrete losses: a mountain bike trail that would have been destroyed, the possibility of disturbing human remains at an abandoned cemetery on the property, and the simple fact of industrial activity landing in a park many of them use several times a week.
That's the part of this story that's easy to miss if you only read the headline. The trails at risk weren't hypothetical lines on a master plan. They're the same named trails a regular still rides today.
The Trails Worth Knowing By Name
If you use this park, you already have a favorite loop. Here's how the system actually breaks down, based on official park data and trail-tracking records.
| Trail | Difficulty | Distance | Good For |
|---|---|---|---|
| Poe Run Path to Hidden Lake | Easy | 3.0 miles, 236 ft of gain | Evening walks, dogs, families new to the park |
| Black Forest Connector | Easy (green) | About 0.9 mile | A warm-up loop or a first ride for a new mountain biker |
| Black Forest, TNT & Log Rhythm | Intermediate | About 9 miles of connected singletrack | Cross-country riding and longer trail runs |
| Atlas Loop | Advanced (blue) | Singletrack with jumps and berms | Experienced riders only, closes one hour before the park does |
| Boulder Point Loop | Easy | Out to Boulder Point, back through Hidden Lake | A longer hike or run with a natural turnaround point |
Poe Run Path holds a 4.7-star average across nearly 1,200 AllTrails reviews, which tracks with how often it comes up as the easiest entry point into the park. Atlas is named for the Atlas Powder Company, which once operated on this site, and its difficulty rating isn't decorative. The park's own FAQ is blunt about it: ride within your limits, because the trail closes an hour before the park does regardless of where you are on it.
A few park rules are worth carrying in your head before you go. Hours run from 7 a.m. to a posted closing time that shifts through the year, so check the kiosk when you arrive rather than assuming last month's schedule holds. Leashed pets are welcome, and waste stations are stocked along the main paths. Grilling and open flames aren't allowed anywhere in the park, and nothing, plant or animal, leaves with you. Two of the old ammunition bunkers, numbered 28 and 50, are open for public viewing as a nod to the site's history. The rest stay closed.
Where Things Stand Now
The plan is off the table as of January 2026, and that's real. But the county's language about identifying other sites for job creation is a reminder that this particular fight is closed, not that the underlying question is settled forever. Deed restrictions on former federal land can be revisited again under a future administration or a future budget cycle. The reason Enterprise South is still whole today is that thousands of people who use these trails made their objection impossible to ignore before the federal review process ever got moving.
That's a useful thing to know if you're one of the regulars who was out here on August 1 for Still Hollow, or if you're just someone who takes the dog down Poe Run Path most weekends without thinking much about how the park stays the way it is. The trails you use didn't survive because a document guaranteed they would. They survived because the people who use them showed up.
If you're new to the area and looking for the kind of neighborhood where a park like this is a five-minute drive rather than a special-occasion trip, that's part of what makes Ooltewah worth a closer look. Bridge City Realty is a locally owned, family-run brokerage that knows this side of Hamilton County from the trailheads to the closing table, and we're glad to talk through what daily life here actually looks like whenever you're ready.
