CAMPANAC.Powered by public lands intelligenceMore Than Just Parks

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers · KS

Lucas Park

Closedrecreation.gov lists every site closed this weekend, read 16:34 UTC

Why it’s closed, and what’s open near here Tell me when it comes back

Right now: Closedrecreation.gov lists every site closed this weekend, read 16:34 UTC
A night: $12–$28When it reopens, per site
Sites: 96In the agency’s record

Photos · U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

148 ftLongest rig

1,730 ftElevation

2,265 ftWater · Wilson Lake

16.5 miNE of Russell, KS

0%Tree cover

The place

the agency’s own description · what’s there · 4 notices

In the agency’s own words

Lucas Park Campground is located on the north side of Wilson Lake in the wide open spaces of central Kansas. Keep reading

Recreation

Boating is the most popular pastime on the lake, with plenty of room for water skiing, wake boarding, jet skiing, sailing and more. Populations of many game fish species have been enhanced by a stocking program conducted by the Kansas Department of Wildlife, Parks and Tourism. Walleye, Large and Smallmouth bass can be found in abundance in the lake, as well as White bass, Striped bass, and channel and flathead catfish. Several trails are available to visitors, including the Bur Oak Nature Trail, a 3/4-mile nature walk located adjacent to Sylvan Park. The Rocktown Hiking Trail, located in the western part of Lucas Park, is a 3-mile loop trail situated in a 305-acre wildlife area. Massive red sandstone rock formations rise 15 to 30 feet above the ground and give the visual impression of a city skyline, giving it the name Rocktown. Trail brochures are available at the trail entrance. Wilson Lake also offers hunting opportunities for a variety of game animals, including pheasant, quail, prairie chicken, whitetail deer, turkey, waterfowl and rabbit.

Facilities

Lucas Park Campground offers 98 modern campsites, including a large group site that offers 15 campsites with electric and water hookups and a large group shelter. Campsites offer sweeping views of the lake and access to hiking trails, a boat ramp and fishing dock.

Natural Features

Wilson lake, known as the "clearest lake in Kansas," is located in the Smoky Hills of North Central Kansas--a rolling landscape of hills, buttes and hazy valleys. Also known as Post Rock Country, the area contains thousands of miles of stone fenceposts and buildings that have been constructed out of the area's local limestone. This and other unique geologic formations and mixed grass prairie lands provide an excellent scenic backdrop for recreation around the lake.

Nearby Attractions

Visitors may enjoy exploring other recreation areas around the lake, such as Sylvan and Minooka Parks as well as Wilson State Park, located on the south side of the lake. The nearby town of Lucas is known for its unique artistic spirit and attractions, while the town of Wilson and other close by communities offer visitors a rich historical heritage to explore.

Source: Recreation.gov data (RIDB), full extract · Aug 23, 2026

What the agency tells you

Rule

Off-road vehicles are not permitted

Rule

Park Attendants may not be present. Camping Day Use hang tag for boat ramp use are available at the entrance booth in the black box.

Rule

Limit of one RV and one tent or two tents per camp pad

Everything else this campground posts · 1

Rule

Don't Move Firewood: Protect your forests from tree-killing pests by buying your firewood locally and burning it on-site. Visit Dontmovefirewood.org for further information.

Read them on the agency’s own page →

Source: recreation.gov facility notices, quoted verbatim · Sep 9, 2026

Tents and rigs

Sites: 96 · 1 tent-only, 1 group
Hookups: 71 electric, 18 water
Longest rig: 148 ft
Accessible sites: None listed
Pets: Allowed
Shade: Every site

Source: Recreation.gov campsite records · Aug 23, 2026

Facilities

Dump station: Yes; recreation.gov lists “Dump Station”
Boat ramp: Yes
Stay limit: 14 nights; recreation.gov facility rule maxStay

Source: Stated in the agency description · Aug 23, 2026

Around the campground

On the water: Lake; Boating; Fishing; Hiking; Hunting; Swimming; Water sports; Wildlife viewing
Night sky · 3rd darkest of 57 in KS: Bortle 3

Source: Recreation.gov activity records · Aug 23, 2026

Night sky: VIIRS Day/Night Band annual cloud-free composite, VNL V2 2024 (Earth Observation Group, Colorado School of Mines), read at the published coordinate · Sep 8, 2026

Nothing to book until it reopensread 16:34 UTC

recreation.gov lists every site closed this weekend

Every one of the next thirty nights is in recreation.gov’s record and not one site is being offered on any of them. That’s a campground closed or not yet released for booking, not a sold-out one.

Max stay14 nights2-night minimum on weekendsthe facility record

A night, when it reopens$12–$28plus $8 to reserve, once per bookingthe agency’s rate schedule

If plans change$10 to cancel$10 to change a reservationrecreation.gov’s schedule

Runs itU.S. Army Corps of EngineersBooked through recreation.govthe agency’s record

Tell me when it reopens

Watch for it to come back

One email when the agency reopens it, plus More Than Just Parks dispatches. Unsubscribe any time.

We check the agency’s own record once an hour, at 40 minutes past, and write the first time it stops saying closed.

Scanners that check every few minutes exist, and most of them charge. This one is free, it reads the same calendar, and it won’t always be first.

Free forever, no booking kickbacks.

Every line of the receipt · 13

What you actually pay

The sign priceU.S. Army Corps of Engineers

A night, when it reopens$12–$28

Tent Only Nonelectric$12

Standard Electric$20

Standard Nonelectric$28

Group area, a night$225

Rates for the season the campground is in now, Sep 16, 2026 to Dec 31, 2026.

The booking feerecreation.gov

Reservation fee, booked online$8

One fee per reservation, however many nights you book, and it’s non-refundable. $9 if you book by phone, $3 in person.

Pass discounts only apply to the recreation (or use) fee for the facility. Other charges such as electricity or water hookups, reservation or other fees are not eligible for a discount.

If your plans changerecreation.gov

Change fee, moving to dates outside your booking$10

Cancellation fee$10

Cancelling the day before, or the day of$10 + your first night

No-show$20 + your first night

Who keeps the booking fee

The agency’s own policy text says the reservation fee and the cancellation processing fee are “retained by the reservation service contractor”, and that a campground concessionaire will decline to refund them because “they did not receive these fees”. Recreation.gov is run under contract by Booz Allen Hamilton. What share of your booking fee the contractor keeps isn’t published in any federal dataset we can read, so we print no number for it. Our reporting on the contract →

How we know this receipt · 4

Sign price: recreation.gov facility rate schedule, quoted as the agency publishes it · Oct 1, 2026

Booking fee, change fee, cancellation fee, no-show: Rules and Reservation Policies, Recreation.gov, the published fee schedule, curated by hand into lib/reservation-fee-schedule.json (9 rows, each carrying its own verbatim sentence). The publisher states these policies were last updated September 2019. · Sep 9, 2026

Who keeps the booking fee: Recreation.gov facility policy text, Dead Swede Campground (facility 234221) · Not on the national policy page. This is agency policy text recreation.gov publishes on individual campground pages; this site holds it verbatim on 45 active campgrounds (campground_rules.cancellation_description, scripts/load-facility-rules.mjs). · Sep 9, 2026

The contract: Reservation Gods: Who Stole Our Campsites and Sold Them Back to Us, More Than Just Parks, April 2025 · Apr 1, 2025

Source: Recreation.gov data (RIDB), full extract · Aug 23, 2026

Why this page can’t say why

recreation.gov lists every site at Lucas Park closed this Friday and Saturday night. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has published no closure notice we hold, so this page can’t say why, and it won’t fill the gap with a guess. A closed night isn’t a sold-out one: the reservations its record still carries were taken before the sites were closed.

Closure: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers status record · Oct 16, 2026

There’s no notice to quote and no reason to argue with, so this page offers you the watch and the list below, and no letter.

recreation.gov availability, read 16:34 UTC · rules read Sep 9, 2026 · rates Oct 1, 2026 · How we know all this

Seen something wrong here? Tell us.

The sites

96 sites · which ones have room · the site map

The sites, ranked

from 93 mapped sites

85 ftbetween you and the next site, typically

96%of tent sites sit clear of electric or RV sites

Most roomLoop LPAR 104 968 ftLoop LPAR 096 411 ftLoop LPAR 095 316 ftLoop LPAR 093 260 ftLoop LPAR 097 242 ft

Least roomLoop LPAR 038 50 ftLoop LPAR 041 50 ftLoop LPAR 027 52 ft

Source: Derived by CAMPANAC from recreation.gov per-site coordinates (nearest-neighbor distance) · Oct 12, 2026

All 96 sites

96 of 96 sites located

Standard21Tent only1RV / electric70Group1Type not stated3

001 002 003 004 005 006 007 008 009 010 011 012 013 014 015 016 017 018 019 020 021 022 023 024 025 026 027 028 029 030 031 032 033 034 035 036 037 038 039 040 041 042 043 044 045 046 047 048 049 050 051 052 053 054 055 057 058 059 060 061 062 063 064 065 066 067 068 069 070 073 074 075 077 078 079 080 081 082 083 084 085 086 088 090 093 094 095 096 097 098 099 100 101 102 104 105

Aerial · Esri World Imagery

Sites: recreation.gov (RIDB), coordinates as published · Aug 23, 2026

Imagery: Esri World Imagery

SleepsTakes aUp to

The price is derived by CAMPANAC, not published per site: the per-night rate this campground publishes for each site’s own site type. 93 of the 96 sites listed carry one, and a site whose type has no published rate sits out of the price rather than being called free.


LPAR	001	standard electric	52 ft	30 amp	83 ft	499 ft	$20
LPAR	002	standard electric	45 ft	30 amp	80 ft	519 ft	$20
LPAR	003	standard electric	41 ft	30 amp	76 ft	440 ft	$20
LPAR	004	standard electric	43 ft	30 amp	81 ft	458 ft	$20
LPAR	005	standard electric	54 ft	30 amp	76 ft	411 ft	$20
LPAR	006	standard electric	39 ft	30 amp	77 ft	385 ft	$20
LPAR	007	standard electric	50 ft	30 amp	87 ft	315 ft	$20
LPAR	008	standard electric	49 ft	30 amp	77 ft	327 ft	$20
LPAR	009	standard nonelectric	50 ft		101 ft	228 ft	$28
LPAR	010	standard nonelectric	46 ft		104 ft	154 ft	$28
LPAR	011	standard nonelectric	148 ft		101 ft	121 ft	$28
LPAR	012	standard electric	47 ft	30 amp	101 ft	219 ft	$20
LPAR	013	standard electric	37 ft	30 amp	94 ft	118 ft	$20
LPAR	014	standard electric	41 ft	30 amp	86 ft	140 ft	$20
LPAR	015	standard electric	44 ft	30 amp	85 ft	212 ft	$20
LPAR	016	standard electric	73 ft	30 amp	77 ft	233 ft	$20
LPAR	017	standard electric	44 ft	30 amp	77 ft	156 ft	$20
LPAR	018	standard electric	44 ft	30 amp	80 ft	177 ft	$20
LPAR	019	standard electric	49 ft	30 amp	60 ft	297 ft	$20
LPAR	020	standard electric	43 ft	30 amp	91 ft	276 ft	$20
LPAR	021	standard electric	56 ft	30 amp	60 ft	347 ft	$20
LPAR	022	standard electric	42 ft	30 amp	76 ft	183 ft	$20
LPAR	023	standard electric	44 ft	30 amp	70 ft	227 ft	$20
LPAR	024	standard electric	42 ft	30 amp	76 ft	150 ft	$20
LPAR	025	standard electric	75 ft	30 amp	72 ft	178 ft	$20
LPAR	026	standard electric	37 ft	30 amp	53 ft	234 ft	$20
LPAR	027	standard electric	45 ft	30 amp	52 ft	256 ft	$20
LPAR	028	standard electric	43 ft	30 amp	72 ft	189 ft	$20
LPAR	029	standard electric	32 ft	30 amp	68 ft	263 ft	$20
LPAR	030	standard electric	39 ft	30 amp	82 ft	208 ft	$20
LPAR	031	standard electric	43 ft	30 amp	106 ft	266 ft	$20
LPAR	032	standard electric	48 ft	30 amp	92 ft	369 ft	$20
LPAR	033	standard electric	40 ft	30 amp	88 ft	325 ft	$20
LPAR	034	standard electric	43 ft	30 amp	88 ft	412 ft	$20
LPAR	035	standard electric	41 ft	30 amp	59 ft	331 ft	$20
LPAR	036	standard electric	47 ft	30 amp	94 ft	420 ft	$20
LPAR	037	standard electric	43 ft	30 amp	55 ft	310 ft	$20
LPAR	038	standard electric	37 ft	30 amp	49 ft	286 ft	$20
LPAR	039	standard electric	45 ft	30 amp	71 ft	380 ft	$20
LPAR	040	standard electric	48 ft	30 amp	71 ft	356 ft	$20
LPAR	041	standard electric	42 ft	30 amp	49 ft	280 ft	$20
LPAR	042	standard electric	45 ft	30 amp	80 ft	339 ft	$20
LPAR	043	standard electric	80 ft	30 amp	125 ft	351 ft	$20
LPAR	044	standard electric	77 ft	30 amp	97 ft	372 ft	$20
LPAR	045	standard electric	103 ft	30 amp	97 ft	463 ft	$20
LPAR	046	standard electric	103 ft	30 amp	103 ft	377 ft	$20
LPAR	047	standard electric	126 ft	30 amp	103 ft	473 ft	$20
LPAR	048	standard electric	84 ft	30 amp	98 ft	405 ft	$20
LPAR	049	standard electric	80 ft	30 amp	98 ft	432 ft	$20
LPAR	050	standard electric	98 ft	30 amp	143 ft	492 ft	$20
LPAR	051	standard nonelectric	83 ft		183 ft	187 ft	$28
LPAR	052	type not stated	68 ft			185 ft
LPAR	053	standard nonelectric	68 ft		85 ft	210 ft	$28
LPAR	054	standard nonelectric	57 ft		85 ft	229 ft	$28
LPAR	055	type not stated	73 ft			258 ft
LPAR	057	standard nonelectric	49 ft		107 ft	306 ft	$28
LPAR	058	standard electric	54 ft	30 amp	91 ft	288 ft	$20
LPAR	059	standard electric	57 ft	30 amp	80 ft	379 ft	$20
LPAR	060	standard electric	57 ft	30 amp	71 ft	303 ft	$20
LPAR	061	standard electric	59 ft	30 amp	55 ft	404 ft	$20
LPAR	062	standard electric	65 ft	30 amp	81 ft	418 ft	$20
LPAR	063	standard electric	65 ft	30 amp	71 ft	293 ft	$20
LPAR	064	standard electric	54 ft	30 amp	72 ft	365 ft	$20
LPAR	065	standard electric	51 ft	30 amp	76 ft	264 ft	$20
LPAR	066	standard electric	54 ft	30 amp	102 ft	212 ft	$20
LPAR	067	standard electric	27 ft	30 amp	85 ft	187 ft	$20
LPAR	068	standard electric	25 ft	30 amp	71 ft	185 ft	$20
LPAR	069	standard electric	27 ft	30 amp	89 ft	215 ft	$20
LPAR	070	standard nonelectric	45 ft		71 ft	256 ft	$28
LPAR	073	standard electric	80 ft	30 amp	161 ft	402 ft	$20
LPAR	074	standard electric	50 ft	30 amp	72 ft	356 ft	$20
LPAR	075	standard electric	57 ft	30 amp	165 ft	521 ft	$20
LPAR	077	standard electric	35 ft	50 amp	91 ft	610 ft	$20
LPAR	078	standard electric	35 ft	50 amp	62 ft	586 ft	$20
LPAR	079	standard electric	35 ft	50 amp	65 ft	498 ft	$20
LPAR	080	standard electric	35 ft	50 amp	62 ft	583 ft	$20
LPAR	081	standard electric	35 ft	50 amp	65 ft	485 ft	$20
LPAR	082	standard electric	35 ft	50 amp	86 ft	569 ft	$20
LPAR	083	standard electric	35 ft	50 amp	55 ft	450 ft	$20
LPAR	084	standard electric	35 ft	50 amp	96 ft	456 ft	$20
LPAR	085	standard nonelectric	96 ft		159 ft	163 ft	$28
LPAR	086	standard nonelectric	113 ft		159 ft	73 ft	$28
LPAR	088	standard nonelectric	103 ft		98 ft	102 ft	$28
LPAR	090	standard nonelectric	115 ft		98 ft	101 ft	$28
LPAR	093	standard nonelectric	99 ft		259 ft	104 ft	$28
LPAR	094	type not stated	87 ft			170 ft
LPAR	095	standard nonelectric	35 ft		316 ft	340 ft	$28
LPAR	096	standard nonelectric	89 ft		411 ft	188 ft	$28
LPAR	097	standard nonelectric			242 ft	165 ft	$28
LPAR	098	standard nonelectric			153 ft	249 ft	$28
LPAR	099	standard nonelectric			153 ft	199 ft	$28
LPAR	100	standard nonelectric			161 ft	307 ft	$28
LPAR	101	standard nonelectric			135 ft	373 ft	$28
LPAR	102	standard nonelectric			135 ft	415 ft	$28
LPAR	104	group standard electric	50 ft	30 amp	968 ft	303 ft	$225
LPAR	105	tent only nonelectric			232 ft	372 ft	$12

Price: Derived by CAMPANAC: each site takes the per-night rate this campground publishes for the site’s own site type (recreation.gov rate schedule). recreation.gov publishes no per-campsite fee, and a site whose type carries no published rate is left blank rather than called free · Oct 1, 2026

OpenStreetMap has no toilet mapped within 1 km of this campground, so no site here carries a toilet distance. That’s a gap in the map, not a finding about the campground.

25 of 96 listed

Source: Recreation.gov data (RIDB), full extract · Aug 23, 2026

Getting there

the map and the coordinate · the agency’s directions

Coordinate38.95556, -98.51944

The mapSee it on the map

The driveDirections ↗

The agency’s pageOfficial page ↗

Where it is

Also near here

Sylvan Park1.7 mi

Minooka Park3.4 mi

Venango Park36 mi

Riverside (KS)39 mi

French Creek84 mi

Curtis Creek85 mi

Getting there

From Interstate 70, north of Wilson, Kansas, take exit 206 to Highway 232 north. Continue for 9 miles and follow signs to the park, located on the left.

Directions: Driving directions as the agency wrote them · Sep 9, 2026

Source: Recreation.gov data (RIDB), full extract · Aug 23, 2026

The weather

the next four days · the thirty-year normal

Next four days, and the thirty-year normal

Forecast

Today54°Mostly Sunny

Tonight30°Clear then Widespread Frost

Saturday62°Widespread Frost then Sunny

Saturday Night40°Clear

NWS forecast for Lucas, KS

Source: National Weather Service, ICT forecast office · Oct 16, 2026

Typical weather

Typical October night 43°F, day 70°F.

Coldest month of the year: typical January night 19°F, below freezing. Bring a bag rated colder than that, and expect ice in the water bottle.

100°32°10°

Daily high and lowDays with 0.10 in or more

A normal is the 1991-2020 average for the month, not a forecast: about half of all Julys are colder than the July line. The seven-day forecast above answers the other question.

Measured at: WILSON LAKE, KS (USC00148946), 2 miles away and 218 ft lower

Source: NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, U.S. Climate Normals 1991-2020, monthly normals · Sep 8, 2026

The land, and who answers for it

who answers for it

Who answers for this land

Lucas Park is in Kansas’s 1st congressional district. Its representative, Tracey Mann (R), votes on the laws that decide what happens to this land. Public-lands grade so far: F. See every public-lands vote →

Seen something wrong here? Tell us.

Source: U.S. Census district boundaries and the MTJP Congressional Public Lands Score

How we know

every fact on this page, and where it came from

Right now: recreation.gov lists every site here closed on Friday and Saturday night (read 16:34 UTC). U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has published no closure notice we hold, so the reason isn’t on this page. A closed night isn’t a sold-out one, and the reservations the record still carries predate the closure. That reading is ours, off the agency’s own booking record.

Sites on recreation.gov: recreation.gov’s own month availability payload for this facility, asked for October 2026, November 2026 and July 2027. It names 93 of the 96 campsites the agency files here, and every one of them carries an answer either way. A campground nobody has read carries no answer at all, never a no. · Oct 11, 2026

Elevation: USGS 3DEP elevation point query at this campground’s coordinate · Sep 7, 2026

Tree cover: NLCD Tree Canopy Cover 2024 (USDA Forest Service / MRLC), one 30 m cell at this coordinate, taken as the median across the 96 campsites here that carry a reading · Sep 9, 2026

Water: USGS National Hydrography Dataset, nearest perennial lake, reservoir, river or stream to this campground’s coordinate · Sep 8, 2026

Night sky: VIIRS Day/Night Band annual cloud-free composite, VNL V2 2024 (Earth Observation Group, Colorado School of Mines), read at the published coordinate: 0.11 mcd/m² of artificial all-sky glow, ranked against the 57 rated federal campgrounds in Kansas · Sep 8, 2026

Sky-glow model: Duriscoe, Anderson, Luginbuhl and Baugh (2018), a simplified model of all-sky artificial sky glow derived from VIIRS Day/Night band data, the National Park Service sky-glow model

Cell signal: the Army Corps’s own campground description, read as text by CAMPANAC. None of this is a measurement. It’s what the land manager published about the place, and phones, carriers and weather all disagree with each other; treat it as a warning, not a promise.

Nearest place of any size: Lucas, KS, 6.7 mi S. Straight line.

Nearest town: U.S. Census Bureau TIGER/Line 2024 places, measured by CAMPANAC to the town boundary; population is the ACS 2020-2024 5-year estimate · Sep 9, 2026