Mississippi Park Connection and the National Park Service are restoring Coldwater Spring to an oak savanna prairie with blufftop woodlands and wetlands.

The National Park Service acquired responsibility for Coldwater in 2010 and began demolishing a dozen decrepit buildings that sat vacant for more than a decade. Coldwater housed the Bureau of Mines Twin Cities Research Center for almost 50 years, from 1949 to 1996, before Congress closed all Bureau of Mines centers nationwide.

Since the Park Service assumed responsibility, Coldwater has gone from an office park to a public park. Now, Coldwater is part of an unbroken expanse of green space near the Mississippi River, stretching from Minnehaha Falls Regional Park to Fort Snelling State Park.

Volunteers are an integral part of the park's restoration. More than 1,000 volunteers donated over 3,500 hours restoring Coldwater Spring in the first year of restoration alone. Since the park opened in September 2012, volunteers have planted more than 600 trees, along with many more shrubs and native flowers and grasses. At the 2014 National Public Lands Day, 160 volunteers planted trees, shrubs, and native prairie plants. Recently at the 2019 National Public Lands Day, more than 100 volunteers planted 1,000 native prairie plants.

While Coldwater Spring's restoration continues, more visitors are coming to the park to play and learn. School children come to the park for educational programs or habitat restoration. Thousands of visitors come for recreational programs including snowshoeing, birding, hikes, the Bark Ranger program, and more. See our calendar for upcoming events.

Check out the Coldwater Spring Facebook page for more scenes from the park.