Riverkeepers Launch Water Safety Guide
Chattahoochee Riverkeeper is excited to announce the return of Swim Guide for the summer of 2026. From Memorial Day through Labor Day weekends, CRK will publish a Swim Guide, an interactive map with red or green lights, to help you decide if it is safe for primary contact recreation at popular swimming spots on the Chattahoochee River.
Each Thursday, CRK staff, interns, and volunteers collect water samples at popular recreation sites and analyze them in the laboratory for E. coli bacteria. On Friday afternoons, CRK will publish the data on a new interactive dashboard in addition to the official Swim Guide website.
“We launched a Swim Guide program because we want people to feel safe recreating on the Chattahoochee River,” says Jessica Sterling, CRK’s Technical Programs Director. “Water quality on the river has improved a lot over the last 30 years and we have the data to show it. We want to spread the word about the many recreational opportunities on the Chattahoochee.”
This is the second year that CRK has published a weekly Swim Guide that includes swimming spots throughout Lake Lanier, Metro Atlanta, West Point Lake, and Columbus. This year, CRK added several new sites, including four new sites on the Chattahoochee River below the Chattahoochee River National Recreation Area.
It is important to note that samples are only collected once a week, and water quality conditions can change quickly. If it has rained in the last 48 hours, if the river is high and muddy, or if the water in a lake has a bright green color, CRK recommends using caution when coming into contact with the water.
CRK monitors water quality at more than 300 stream, river, and lake sites year-round on a weekly basis through the Neighborhood Water Watch program. The water quality data are available to the public on the Neighborhood Water Watch database.
