Cypress Knoll Golf and Country Club in Palm Coast, Fla., and Mooresville (N.C.) Municipal Golf Course are both on track to reopen in September; Winter Park (Fla.) Golf Course and SunRidge Canyon Golf Club in Fountain Hills, Ariz., will each reopen October 1; Rockwood Park Golf Course in Fort Worth, Texas is scheduled to reopen in late October or early November, unveiling a $4.48 million makeover; and Wanakah Country Club in Hamburg, N.Y., accelerated phase three of its master plan, with the final phase set to begin in 2017.
Golf courses across the country are reopening their doors this fall to show off renovations.
—Cypress Knoll Golf and Country Club, formerly Cypress Course and Cypress Knoll, is set to re-open on September 10 in Palm Coast, Fla. The course was purchased by Flagler County residents Doug Brown and his wife Janice Reid, who live on the golf course, the Palm Coast Observer reported.
“After a summer of hard work improving the grounds, we are ready to welcome our Flagler County neighbors,” Doug Brown said in a press release. “My father bought the property that I eventually built my house on in 1972, and I didn’t want the course to fall into disrepair.”
There was a buy offer on the table that was getting ready to expire, and Doug and Janice Brown made the decision to purchase the golf course in less than 24 hours. The couple retained the five-person grounds crew and plan on adding approximately 20 new jobs. The new owners plan on reopening the restaurant, and a Par 3 Pitch and Putt will be installed in the future. In addition to staff, they have had seven people, mostly Cypress Knoll residents, volunteering to help improve the grounds. They will reopen, with the back nine becoming front nine, the Observer reported.
—Mooresville (N.C.) Municipal Golf Course is still on track to reopen this month, and the clubhouse is projected to open in April, the Statesville (N.C.) Record & Landmark reported.
Course Manager Luke Steimke updated the town board on the project’s progress in regards to road construction, memberships and the clubhouse. Steimke showed photos and video of the course and the nearly completed back parking lot, which includes 120 spaces. An exact opening date has not been determined due to road construction and unpredictable weather. Steimke told commissioners that the course is being treated and maintained as if it’s already opened, the Record & Landmark reported.
Steimke said he and Jeremy Elliott, PGA professional for the course, have been working on marketing tactics for the course. To date, Steimke said they have sold 63 memberships ahead of the course opening for a total of 79 members which includes family memberships. When the course closed in 2014, it had 24 members, the Record & Landmark reported.
Twelve tournaments at the course are already scheduled for the remainder of 2016 and seven have been scheduled in 2017 thus far. Construction on the clubhouse is scheduled to begin in a few weeks, the Record & Landmark reported.
—The newly renovated Winter Park (Fla.) Golf Course has quickly become one of the rarest nine-hole golf courses in the country, and is ready to celebrate its grand reopening.
Events will include an official ribbon cutting on October 1, followed by a VIP Invitational Tournament, member sneak peek, family ice cream on the green. On October 2, public play will begin.
Golfers will experience drastically noticeable different playability on the newly renovated course that offers more challenges to their game, such as:
• Sand traps, contours, undulations, and varying elevations have replaced the previously flat landscape.
• Tee boxes were moved to line the player down the fairway, aiming their drive away from the roads and moving vehicles.
• Greens are now three times larger than what players have experienced in the past, which offers new pin placement opportunities and requires new strategies.
The course officially closed for renovations March 1, 2016. Field crews and course designers physically removed all of the 50+ year-old sod and exposed the surface to its core. New irrigation was installed that simultaneously fertilizes while watering the grounds. In April, the sprigging of the course began and was done by hand as an alternative to planting seeds. Over 800 bushels of Bermuda grass (type 419) sprigs were used per acre on this 44-acre property and took one month to complete. The result is lush, green grass that will help the consistency of the hitting surface as well as the speed of the greens.
—SunRidge Canyon Golf Club in Fountain Hills, Ariz., will reopen October 1, with a new logo and slightly new look and feel.
This year’s improvements include:
• The removal of several fairway bunkers to expand the fairways on holes #2 and #15
• The construction of a new bridge and wash pass ways on hole #11 for cart traffic and pace of play
• New tee box construction on holes #11 and #18
• Desert brush removal throughout the property
• Makeover of the men’s and women’s locker rooms in the clubhouse
• Crews also performed a deep-tine aerification in August and will be overseeding in September, making for excellent reopening conditions on October 1st
• Hot Stix Club Fitting has moved their headquarters to the practice facility and 1,000 square feet has been added to their location.
• A new Club Car golf cart fleet
Recent course renovations have improved the playability and agronomic conditions at SunRidge Canyon.
—Construction at Rockwood Park Golf Course in Fort Worth, Texas is scheduled to reopen in late October or early November, unveiling a $4.48 million makeover. The front nine is complete with new tees, greens, bunkers, cart paths, irrigation, drainage and grass, Golf Course Architecture reported.
“The biggest challenge has been Mother Nature,” architect John Colligan said. “The 1938 John Bredemus design was very flat with no subsurface drainage and there was over 20 inches of rain during the first part of the Summer, along with temperatures which were much cooler than normal. The cooler temperatures set back the turf farms which created a big demand when the grass was ready to harvest.”
—A highway drainage project altered the backdrop of Wanakah Country Club’s 15th hole in Hamburg, N.Y., and prompted the club to accelerate phase three of its master plan. The club created a 15-foot berm behind the green, covered with over 60 evergreen trees. In addition, a creek that flows alongside the green was re-routed, following Wanakah’s master plan.
The board of directors recently approved implementation of the final phase of the master plan, to commence this fall and be completed in 2017, touching on the eight remaining holes that have not been renovated. Improvements to the layout’s drainage, which historically has been problematic because of Wanakah’s flat topography and heavy clay soil, will continue.
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