After delays, Palo Pinto state park has a new target date to open. Here’s a look inside.

Inside Look stories give Star-Telegram subscribers exclusive sneak peeks and behind-the-scenes reporting. Story suggestion? Editors@star-telegram.com.

The superintendent of Palo Pinto Mountains State Park gestures at the green landscape in front of him, pointing past a pavilion under construction to the rolling hills beyond.

When he looks at the railroad tracks snaking around those hills, Superintendent James Adams imagines bandits on horseback chasing after a train like in an old Western movie.

“This place, so much of it is the Wild West still,” Adams said. For years, he’s described this future park as “like the Hill Country, but in North Texas.”

It may be a slice of Hill Country heaven, but the state park still isn’t open to visitors — although, Adams said, more than a few have tried to drive past the construction signs, and the superintendent’s own house, to get a glimpse.

Palo Pinto Mountains State Park — in Strawn, a city of fewer than 1,000 people a little over an hour drive west of Fort Worth — was supposed to open in 2023, during the state parks system’s centennial year. Now, Adams says, he expects it to open in summer 2025.

The much-anticipated opening will mark the first time in many years that the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department has opened a new state park. The most recent was Resaca de la Palma, deep in South Texas, in 2008. North Texas hasn’t seen a new state park open since Lake Tawakoni, east of Dallas, in 2002.

Within easy driving distance of Fort Worth, Palo Pinto Mountains will be of particular interest to residents of the Metroplex. Some of those visitors may have gone previously to Fairfield Lake State Park, halfway between the Metroplex and Houston, which the state lost to a developer last year.

[MORE: How Fairfield Lake's developer fought Texas on eminent domain and won]

Planning and construction has been slowly chugging along at Palo Pinto Mountains for more than a decade. But, as trails and buildings begin to take shape, the vision for the “Metroplex’s playground” is becoming clearer.

‘This is our opportunity to get this right’

Park construction is a lengthy process, which is something the residents of Strawn have learned firsthand.

The first land purchases for the nearly 5,000-acre park were completed in 2011, and the city of Strawn donated crucial land along the 90-acre Tucker Lake in 2014.

But the property was undeveloped ranch land at the time. That meant that the park had to be built effectively from scratch — everything from utilities, such as water and electricity, to new roads and trails, to the headquarters and maintenance buildings that will be park staff’s homebase.

[MORE: How a shooting at the Mule Lip Bar led to new state park in Texas]

A Parks and Wildlife press release in 2014 said the park was still “not expected to open to the general public for at least several years” — and the actual timeline has taken full advantage of that hedged phrasing.

“It took a while for it to sink in that this wasn’t going to happen overnight,” said Danny Miller, who is Strawn’s city administrator.

As the state parks system headed into its centennial year in 2023, Parks and Wildlife officials began hyping the opening of Palo Pinto Mountains. In press releases, the department specifically tied the park opening to the centennial celebration. Officials also said that the event would mark the first in the department’s plan to open a new state park every two years.

JJ Fleury, the director of Texas State Parks’ planning and geospatial resources program, said that the department is learning from the construction of Palo Pinto Mountains, and will use those lessons to create a more streamlined process in the future. It’s part of the parks system’s shift into the modern era, Fleury said.

That shift also includes a focus on building accessibility and sustainability into parks, starting with Palo Pinto Mountains. That includes, for instance, designing trails that are both easier to maintain and easier to access.

As much of the park as possible, including the walkways to scenic overlooks and down to the shore of Lake Tucker, have been designed to meet ADA standards. With accessibility baked into the design, Adams said, more people will be able to enjoy the core features of the park.

“We wanted this to be a park for everybody,” Adams said. “It adds a lot to the area and (there’s) plenty for folks to come back to experience.”

The new state park also has what Fleury described as “heavy front-country development,” with development focused in a more confined area, leaving a light footprint on the back portion of the park.

“This is our opportunity to get this right,” Fleury said.

But getting it right has taken a lot of time, in the case of Palo Pinto Mountains.

And while officials touted a 2023 opening, they never gave an official opening date. By mid-2023, Adams knew it wasn’t going to happen.

‘It’s clearly taken longer than we thought’

Palo Pinto Mountains’ 2023 opening date quietly slipped out of official remarks, until the year came to a close without seeing the proverbial park gates open.

Adams said construction has caused some delays — some related to the pandemic and others because of unforeseen landscape challenges. But the other factor is that, he said, the 2023 opening was planned as a soft launch that would’ve given visitors access to only a small portion of the park.

As 2023 moved along, it became clear that the layout would not have allowed visitors to safely access certain areas while others, including the main road, remained under construction, Adams said.

Now, without the pressure of the centennial celebration, the park will open when it’s fully complete. Adams thinks that’ll likely be around summer 2025.

“It’s clearly taken longer than we thought it would,” Adams said.

When the Star-Telegram toured the park in April, it was clear that a lot of work had been accomplished — and that there was a lot more still to do.

The maintenance building had just been completed, Adams said. The headquarters was mostly beams and joists, with no walls yet constructed. The main road had been built up enough to be passable in “most weather,” Adams said, with rocks and construction debris still piled alongside it. The sidewalks along the lake were taking clear shape, but the only signs of the planned fishing pier were a few posts jutting out from the lake.

The park, while closed to visitors, was alive with activity.

At the lakeside, the sound of a saw grinding against stone filled the air. Adams pointed out the sites of long-gone lakefront cabins that belonged to a different era. He talked about the extra work that’s gone into making the sidewalks and eventual boardwalk ADA-compliant, so that more people can access and enjoy the park.

And when the grind saw pauses for a moment, you can hear the wind moving through the trees above and the water lapping against the shore below.

After seven years as superintendent of an unopened state park, Adams is looking forward to sharing the park with visitors soon.

‘It really is just such an awesome place’

For North Texas residents, Palo Pinto Mountains State Park will provide much-needed outdoor recreation opportunities.

Compared to other states, Texas has a low percentage of publicly accessible land. The recent loss of Fairfield Lake State Park – which was about a two-hour drive from Fort Worth and 90 minutes from Dallas — has meant even fewer options.

When the park opens, “I think we’re going to be inundated with people,” Adams said in a March interview. “There are a lot of folks really interested in seeing this place open, and a lot of us here that are super excited about getting to share this place with everybody, because it really is just such an awesome place.”

The park is expected to draw tens of thousands of annual visitors, who will have to drive through the city of Strawn on their way into and out of the park’s only entrance. Miller, the city administrator, said that route was Strawn’s primary stipulation when it donated land for the park.

For a city of fewer than 1,000 people, the prospect of so many passers-through will be a game-changer.

Jeff Hinkson, the president of Strawn’s chamber of commerce, said he expects to see tourism become the major driver of the city’s economy.

Hinkson said that, historically, the city’s economy was based on agriculture, especially ranching, as well as oil and gas. Miller said the school district is currently the largest employer.

But the park’s opening will bring a whole new range of possibilities, particularly for tourist-focused businesses such as restaurants and breweries, as well as outdoors outfitters. New staff at the park could also mean more kids for the school district, Miller said.

Hinkson said it’s still not clear to Strawn residents what type of businesses will be most in demand. But the city is preparing to adapt to the new expectations that tourists will bring.

“For a small town of only 650 people, it is a town that has become very aware of the opportunities that lie ahead,” Hinkson said.

Hinkson said the city is also bracing to feel the impact of the Metroplex’s rocketing growth, particularly as Fort Worth expands westward along the I-20 corridor. That growth, plus the park opening, will have a big impact on Strawn, Hinkson said.

“We feel like there’s going to be a significant residual effect to the economy locally,” Hinkson said. “We think that tourism will quickly be the primary driver of the economy.”

Miller thinks local residents will use the park regularly, too. Some of those residents are a little skeptical of the opening timeline, given the delays. Still, Miller said, the city is looking forward to meeting its new neighbor in earnest.

“We had been a very sleepy community for many years without much change,” Miller said. “And when the park came along, people were like, ‘Hey it’s time, we’ve got to take advantage of this.’”