Nashville skyline at night

Welcome to the Nashville District

About the Nashville District

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has played a vital role in the development and growth of the nation in peace and in war. For more than 200 years, the Corps has supported the nation’s river-based commerce, protected established population centers, provided disaster response and constructed military facilities to protect our shores. Today, the 750 civilians and U.S. Army officers of the Nashville District continue to serve the region, the Corps, and the Nation by providing collaborative water resource engineering solutions, world class public infrastructure management, and environmental stewardship for the Cumberland-Tennessee River Systems.

The Nashville District office is located in the Estes Kefauver Federal Building in Nashville, Tenn.  The federal building has been the home of the district headquarters since 1974. The civilians and U.S. Army officers of the Nashville District serve the region, the Corps, and the Nation by providing collaborative water resource engineering solutions, world class public infrastructure management, and environmental stewardship for the Cumberland-Tennessee River Systems. 

 


 

 

Nashville District Facts

  • Our geographic area touches seven states and covers 59,000 squares miles. 

  • This geographic area is represented by 14 senators and 20 Congressmen.

  • The Nashville District is comprised of 782 team members, 50 percent of whom are in 49 field offices.

  • In Fiscal Year 2014, Nashville District handled 3,921 regulatory actions meeting all of the Office of Management and Budget performance metrics, issuing 75 percent of Individual Permits in less than 120 days and more than 90 percent of General Permits in less than 60 days.

  • The Nashville District has the capacity to produce more than 914 megawatts of clean electricity from nine hydropower plants in the Cumberland River basin. 

  • The Nashville District hydropower plants had an availability rate in 2010 of 97.14 percent

  • We annually generate about $44 million in revenue from the sale of this power. Of this revenue, $32 million was returned to the U.S. Treasury.

  • This District operates and maintains 1,175 commercially navigable river miles, almost 10 percent of the total within the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.  

  • As of 2010, the District's flood control projects have prevented more than $750 million in flood damages.

  • District team members operate and maintain 14 navigation lock projects, nine on the Tennessee River, four on the Cumberland River, and one on the Clinch River.

  • More than 73 million tons of commodities passed through these 14 locks in 2010.

  • There were 47,000 commercial and recreational lockages in 2010.  Our locks are consistently operational for more than the Corps of Engineers' goal of 97 percent of the time. 

  • Wilson Lock in Alabama has the highest single lift east of the Rocky Mountains, between 93 and 100 feet, depending on the current river water level.

  • The District's in-house divers make more than 200 dives each year, and have done so for 50 years without a single accident.

  • Chickamauga Lock on the Tennessee River has an equally impressive safety record; 62 years with no lost-time accidents.

  • Lakes in the Nashville District were some of the most popular in the nation in 2020. Nashville ranked as the 4th most visited district in USACE with more than 19 million visitors. These recreation users had an economic impact on the region of more than $852 million.

  • In 2020, four Nashville District lakes ranked among the top 25 in USACE-wide visitation.

  • In 2020, the district’s 53 commercial concessionaires and four state park marinas produced more than $114 million in gross receipts. 

  • Lake Cumberland has the only operating gristmill in the Corps, a National Historic site, which has survived fire, rebuilding, and time. The mill has a 40-feet overshot waterwheel, the largest of its kind in the world.

  • Two district lakes, Lake Cumberland and Dale Hollow, make it possible for National Fish Hatcheries to be co-located just downstream.  Water, which is withdrawn from deep in the pool, supplies the Hatcheries with the necessary water temperature that trout require to flourish.  And those same structures, along with Center Hill Dam, make it possible for those species to do well downstream of the dams because of their inherent mission of flood damage reduction that requires water storage over long periods of time. 

  • The total capacity of water in Corps lakes is 4.07 million acre-feet.

  • The total authorized municipal and industrial water supply storage is 39,972 acre-feet.