Golf carts can’t run loose at the UT Golf Club, now that the eyes of a new satellite tracking system are always upon them.
Founded by supporters of a collegiate athletic program that had just been named “America’s Best” by Sports Illustrated in 2002, it’s not surprising that The University of Texas (UT) Golf Club has enjoyed impressive growth since it opened in Austin in 2003. Conceived as a permanent home for the University’s storied men’s and women’s programs, as well as a place where all Longhorn enthusiasts could enjoy golf and social festivities with fellow fans, the club has made steady gains in six years towards its membership and activity goals, with 430 local members and another 300 regional members now accounting for 28,000 annual rounds on its championship-caliber, Bechtol Russell-designed course.
Like all great athletic programs, to ensure continued success a golf club must stay ahead of the competition through a mix of exciting innovation and solid preparation and control. That’s what led the UT Golf Club to convert its fleet of 72 golf cars a little over a year ago after a new supplier, Club Car, won management over with what General Manager/Director of Golf Steve Termeer calls a “fantastic-looking” customized design featuring the Longhorns’ distinctive logo, orange-and-white colors, and car ID numbers reminiscent of those found on the football team’s helmets (see photo, bottom right).
The staff was further intrigued when Club Car suggested that the club become a beta site for a new course management system it was developing with GPS Industries. The UT Golf Club didn’t have any chronic problems with golf car loss or abuse, but it saw that the Guardian Satellite Vehicle Control system could help it enhance its competitive edge in three important areas: maintaining pace-of-play, minimizing course damage, and ensuring optimal safety and service levels.
The pace-of-play gains would come from providing golfers with yardage readouts on small LCD panels mounted in the cars’ dash areas. By quickly providing accurate, real-time, satellite-based distance measurements, the panels have eliminated the need for the club to provide members with handheld laser guns and sped up play by 10 percent, Termeer estimates.
Whether they’re in the game or on the sidelines, each of the customized cars in the 72-vehicle fleet of the University of Texas Golf Club is never out of mind, thanks to tracking through the Guardian Satellite Vehicle Control system. | The system allows the club’s golf staff to easily define restricted regions of the course as conditions warrant; cars straying from accepted paths will have messages displayed on their LCD panels and be subject to deceleration or complete shutdowns. |
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The remaining benefits come from features that aren’t as apparent to golfers—unless they should happen to get a little too eager to have their car recreate one of the breakaway runs of Longhorn great Earl Campbell. The club’s golf staff can easily program the system to outline and redefine restricted areas as conditions warrant—and whenever a car strays into a premapped restricted zone, the LCD panel sends a message that asks the operator to return to an unrestricted area. If that isn’t enough to keep golfers on the straight and narrow, the system can also be programmed to slow a vehicle’s speed, or stop it completely.
This has become a valuable feature, the club’s golf staff reports—not only to protect sensitive, low-growing native buffalograss used in the course’s roughs because of its ability to thrive in Austin’s dry conditions, but also to ensure safety around the clubhouse and other high-traffic areas or parts of the course where speed must be limited.
Just as importantly, the Guardian system provides complete car diagnostics before the fleet goes out each day, and also while vehicles are on the course. “Knowing all of the cars we’re sending out are fully charged and in good working order, and that the chances are greatly reduced any of them will end up sitting on the course, waiting for a tow-out, is a huge benefit, both for us and for the golfer,” says Head Golf Pro Greg Garner. “As you might know, it can get pretty hot out there.”
Guardian can also track and archive evidence of the exact route taken around the course by any specific car, should that be needed if questions arise about who went where, and when. But while that feature can certainly provide a valuable level of protection for the club in the event of accidents or other extreme situations, what Termeer likes most about the system is the understated way in which it provides and collects information, for both the golfer and the management staff.
“We’ve never been a big fan of cumbersome GPS systems with big monitors that try to send too many messages and can get in the way of the experience,” he says. “But at the same time, we detest having to put up stakes or ropes, or needing marshals to play ‘state trooper’ on the course. [Guardian] strikes the right balance to help us properly manage things without being too intrusive or ‘Big Brother-ish.’ ”
But even subtly, Guardian is providing another way to put the UT Golf Club on the map. “It’s giving us a unique edge in the local market,” Garner says. “Even better, it’s certainly produced savings through reduced manpower, because we’re not putting up stakes and ropes and we don’t need to provide the [laser devices], which cost $250 each.
“Most of all, it’s paid off through the performance reliability and preventive maintenance benefits,” he adds. “From what we’ve seen, it would certainly make sense for any type of facility to add it as a standard club amenity. In fact, I think you’d be crazy not to.”
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