Ramblin' Raft Race

The race was associated with consumption of alcohol and illegal drugs, both by the rafters and the thousands of spectators that lined a route that began at Morgan Falls Dam in Sandy Springs and ended at the shallow raft take-out a few hundred yards north of I-285 in Vinings.

In 1978, amid increasing environmental concerns in the country, President Jimmy Carter signed a bill creating the Chattahoochee River National Recreation Area.

By 1980, the race’s last year, the National Park Service had to budget an extra $50,000 to bring in additional rangers, some from as far away as Washington, D.C., to handle the large crowds that attended the event.

In addition, local authorities began to crack down on the event's participants by issuing citations for public drunkenness, and in 1980, Fulton County towed an estimated 4,000 cars.

[1][2] Studies by the Georgia Wildlife Foundation found that the raft race itself wasn’t actually harming the river to any significant degree, as the clean-up of litter was manageable.