News Release

Road Preservation Project Continues at Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania NMP

The park will be repaving the Chatham parking lot in late March and resurfacing park roads starting in April.

NPS Photo

News Release Date: March 9, 2025

Contact: Mary O'Neill, 540-834-3431

FREDERICKSBURG, VA. — On March 24, 2025, Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania NMP will begin a maintenance project to repave the Chatham parking lot and to rehabilitate road surfaces throughout the battlefields. Chatham may be inaccessible to vehicles while the project is ongoing. The resurfacing of parks roads will leave sections of the roadway unsuitable for bicyclists for at least three months.

Chatham Repaving

The Chatham parking area repaving project originally scheduled for the fall is set to begin during the week of March 24, 2025. The project should take approximately 2 weeks. When parking at Chatham is not possible, the Chatham grounds will be available by foot from the trail at Pratt Park. Please check the park website or social media platforms for updates during the project.

Road Surface Rehabilitation

Starting April 21, 2025, and continuing through mid-May, the next phase of the road preservation project includes paving rehabilitation of all park road surfaces except Lee Drive at Fredericksburg. Work will include the milling and overlay of failing pavement, chip sealing roadways, repairing road shoulders, patching as necessary, and the addition of geotechnical fabric and pavement markings.

A chip seal surface is an aggregate (a brownish pea-gravel) distributed on a thin base of emulsified asphalt. Warm weather and the use of the road by vehicles helps the aggregate adhere to the asphalt. This process can often take eight weeks or more. While the work is going on and until the aggregate and asphalt bond, loose aggregate will make park roads unsafe for bicyclists. This will be the case throughout the construction period and for approximately eight weeks after work has concluded.

Chip seal is often used on low-traffic, low-speed roads like those in the park. The color of aggregate can be selected to be more compatible with the surrounding landscape. The surface also reduces vehicle speeds, an important consideration on park roads, where vehicles, pedestrians, and bicyclists often intermix.Construction activity should cause only minor disruptions of vehicular traffic. Signs and flaggers will warn cyclists and pedestrians of the upcoming work. The National Park Service will provide additional details on the timing of work as the project develops. 


These infrastructure improvements will help maintain the park for current and future visitors. The projected timeline is subject to change due to weather or other unforeseen factors.