With water spilling onto U.S. 441, Paynes Prairie Preserve State Park is as high as it’s been since 1998 and water managers are not sure when levels will begin dropping.

A lot of the water filling the prairie is water that caused Newnans Lake to overflow, closing parts of Lake Shore Drive on the lake’s western edge. That water flowed through Prairie Creek and has now crept westward through the prairie to U.S. 441.

It is all a result of saturation from a summer full of heavy rain plus about 10 inches dropped by Hurricane Irma, said Michael Daly, water resources data manager of the St. Johns River Water Management District.

“We had the wettest summer on record for Gainesville followed by Hurricane Irma, which happened to be a really big rainmaker,” Daly said, adding that water flow at a culvert into the prairie “is still going up but Prairie Creek has peaked and started to decline. We can’t guarantee when the rate the water will go down because we don’t know how much rain we might get.”

The Florida Department of Transportation closed the northbound and southbound outside lanes of U.S. 441 late last week and they remained closed Tuesday. The water was most severe northbound, covering almost the entire lane.

In the late 1800s the prairie used to have so much water that steamboats and barges ferried people from Rocky Point to Black Point. The landing at Rocky Point was located on the Gainesville side of the prairie about where today's northbound lane of U.S. 441 enters the prairie basin. Black Point was the same lane's end on the south side of the prairie.

Since then, water levels have varied but have only occasionally reached U.S. 441.

Data from the National Weather Service shows rainfall records were set in June at 16.86 inches and July at 16.70 inches.

The portion of Alachua County including areas that include Newnans Lake have a terrain base of clay, which does not absorb water as fast as sandy soil. The rain left the ground saturated, creating flooding in the lakes, creeks and rivers — including the Santa Fe River — in that area.