Are there any plans to add more public launches on Minnetonka?

It’s hard to imagine how anyone got on the water twenty years ago without the big Gray’s Bay and Maxwell launches. At that point, I alternated between North Arm and the small launch on Gray’s Bay and could always find a place to park. Today, it’s hard to imagine where we’d be without Maxwell and the current Gray’s Bay.

Does anyone know how that current Gray’s Bay came to be? Did the marina that was there just make a deliberate decision to sell the land to the state/county to allow for the public launch? You know if they instead sold it off to another marina company or even as a housing development they would’ve gotten more money.

Has anyone heard of any other plans to acquire more land in this way to create more launches? Or maybe officials don’t want to add more for fear of adding even more boats to an already crowded waterway.

There are already quite a few launches, parking is the biggest concern, they are already tightening up parking restrictions on the west end of the lake.

Would have to agree with dustin, lots of launch points already the issue is parking. The launch at grays bay has been around since I’ve been fishing tonka so I dont know anything about a marina that was there. Would like to know though

I would assume the locals would vigorously fight anymore public access points on their lake.

https://www.tpl.org/our-work/grays-bay-lake-minnetonka

Found this that talks briefly about it

Dutchboy wrote:

I would assume the locals would vigorously fight anymore public access points on their lake.

Dont talk about my lake like that

I agree with Q. The Dnr lists 10 accesses, sounds like a lot, but the lake has 14,ooo acres! Hundreds of miles of shoreline. To compare I just looked at Forest that one has 3 acceses for about 2100 acres so that’s much more per acre and I’m sure parking is much better too. Hard to believe but ‘Tonka actually does not get a lot of fishing pressure for any one species (bass and skis get some pressure) Don’t cry in your beer figure out a way to get on the lake at odd times which would probably be better for fishing anyway. Good Luck

tim hurley wrote:

I agree with Q. The Dnr lists 10 accesses, sounds like a lot, but the lake has 14,ooo acres! Hundreds of miles of shoreline.

The number of total accesses is misleading. There are only 3 on the lake that have a large number of parking spaces and 2 others that have maybe 15 max. The rest of them offer few parking spots. For example the launch I typically use only has 4 parking spaces and my other go to has only 1. Personally I’m fine with what’s available.

I’ve been on Tonka once. And have no desire to go back. Not sure why anyone would want to fight that crowd to fish

Access of course is short for accessibility, if the lake has 10 launches and 10 total parking spaces its not as accessible as the lake with one launch and 100 parking spaces. I don’t mind the fishermen as much as the VERY Big boats that bounce you around, they are hard to avoid too because of all the channels. Lake consistently puts out nice fish though. Go super early on a weekday, off by noon and you might be ok.

Public accesses aside, Tonka has a high density of homes on the shoreline, many with multiple boats docked at them, many marinas with dozens of boats each and many bars and restaurants on the shoreline. Lots of boat traffic, but if you’re serious about fishing it get out there early and get off by noon. I rarely fish it weekends except early spring and late fall. I know there are guys who night fish it, but that’s not enjoyable for me.

I got on Tonka for first time this Saturday around 6 a.m. and parking was good with no stress on the launch. We got in around noon, and Gray’s Bay became a whole different animal. Frankly it was like an episode out of the Twilight Zone, and some YouTube “World Stars” could have been discovered there I’m sure. I seen 2 minor fender-benders while waiting to get my boat out of the water, and rigs were lined up 5 deep on the road, waiting for someone to pull out of the lot.

Gramps and me would launch out of north arm almost everyday some weeks when I was a kid. No big deal back then. That was before all the milfoil set in. Anyone remember fishing the shoreline off Maxwell there with all those pads? Man that was some good fishing in of itself. At times we wouldn’t even launch the boat.

I agree with lack of access. Dad and me launched off one the other week to only find out there were no parking spots, by permit only. Seriously?

Do a lot of work around that area these days, off 15, 51, 19, 101 etc. Last week I drove by and around lunchtime both north arm and Maxwell I couldn’t see one open spot, full!

Sucks when im trying to spot on spot and have to completely change course to avoid getting swamped by waves in the 14′.

Jasiu wrote:

I got on Tonka for first time this Saturday around 6 a.m. and parking was good with no stress on the launch. We got in around noon, and Gray’s Bay became a whole different animal. Frankly it was like an episode out of the Twilight Zone, and some YouTube “World Stars” could have been discovered there I’m sure. I seen 2 minor fender-benders while waiting to get my boat out of the water, and rigs were lined up 5 deep on the road, waiting for someone to pull out of the lot.

I’ve experienced this many times before too. The riff raff usually shows up around 11am. And most of them are completely clueless on how to launch a boat in a timely, efficient manner. The crappie, bass, and muskie fishing out there is pretty good though, so I risk it sometimes. In the summer like this, I pray for rain. It keeps a ton of people off the lake.

I fished Tonka A lot for many year. Now that I’ve moved to central Minnesota I cant believe I ever fished a lake that crowded. I normally was at the landings at daybreak and was off the water by 10:00am at the latest. I knew it was time to get off once all the crazy Tuna Boats started showing up and I could hear 10 different loud crappy music songs at the same time. Now if there are 3 or 4 other boats on the lakes I fish its a lot. My buddy wont fish a few of the lakes I like to fish because he ONCE saw a wakeboard boat or waterskier on the lake while he was there

Highly doubt there will be anymore large scale access construction.If you need a parking spot and hate boat traffic launch at 10p.m or later on any week night and you will likely be the only boat on the water.Besides the Mississippi River Tonka has the best fishing in the metro you just have to fish it at the rite times-night time or rainy cloudy and windy overcast days.Not saying fish cant be caught on nice days I just wont deal with the headaches that come with them.

Wasn’t that long ago they added the regional park and access off of county road 44. Never know.

Isn’t there a public access on Carson’s Bay? Although I’ve never actually used it, I’ve seen it from the water. The issue there is that people have to park on the side of the road, don’t they?

gimruis wrote:

Isn’t there a public access on Carson’s Bay? Although I’ve never actually used it, I’ve seen it from the water. The issue there is that people have to park on the side of the road, don’t they?

the parking spots for that access are reserved for people with a permit

fishthumper wrote:

I fished Tonka A lot for many year. Now that I’ve moved to central Minnesota I cant believe I ever fished a lake that crowded. I normally was at the landings at daybreak and was off the water by 10:00am at the latest. I knew it was time to get off once all the crazy Tuna Boats started showing up and I could hear 10 different loud crappy music songs at the same time. Now if there are 3 or 4 other boats on the lakes I fish its a lot. My buddy wont fish a few of the lakes I like to fish because he ONCE saw a wakeboard boat or waterskier on the lake while he was there

When deciding which lake to go to, I take into account the weather due to the fact that I don’t want to be on a popular lake when the weather is nice. I’m not going to fight those loud people with loud boats that make big wakes. I’d rather not deal with those types of people.