Exclusive: Mount Mitchell ready to reopen, but state says it can’t move until feds repair Blue Ridge Parkway

North Carolina officials say Mount Mitchell State Park could welcome visitors back as early as mid-September — but the park remains closed until the National Park Service (NPS) reopens the Blue Ridge Parkway access road. It is the highest peak east of the Mississippi River.

The park signaled preparations in a Tuesday Facebook post advertising six seasonal jobs — four gift shop clerks and two park attendants — to work from “mid-September through mid-November (weather permitting),” with $15 an hour pay and optional housing.

Pressed for details, state officials said the timeline is out of their hands. “We do not have a definitive reopening date yet, as Blue Ridge Parkway has not provided that yet,” Kris Anne Bonifacio, public information officer for the N.C. Division of Parks and Recreation, told WCAB News. “We are preparing to open for day use on the day that the National Park Service opens the section of the Parkway that connects Mount Mitchell State Park towards Asheville. We are hopeful that will be as early as mid-September." 

Mount Mitchell, at mile marker 355, sits just north of active federal repair zones. According to the Blue Ridge Parkway website, crews are reinforcing slopes, removing debris, and repairing shoulders at those sites with funding from the Emergency Relief for Federally Owned Roads program. The NPS lists the status as “construction in progress."

Photos posted by NPS show landslides that swept away trees, debris, and guardrails — all triggered by Hurricane Helene nearly a year ago.

While the state is hiring staff and preparing facilities, it cannot open the park until NPS restores road access. Earlier this month, NPS celebrated progress elsewhere, reopening an eight-mile section near Sparta and a 38-mile corridor between Asheville and Mount Pisgah. For now, Mount Mitchell remains off-limits — not because the state isn’t ready, but because federal repairs stand in the way.