The 20-year-old, members-only Lincoln, Neb. club would continue to offer 18 holes of golf if the sale goes through, but the course would be reduced from a 7,000-plus-yard, par-72 layout to 5,400 yards that would play to par 68 or 69. Cutting the property size would “dramatically” reduce maintenance costs and property taxes and make the club’s “private golf, dining and social-club business model more cost-competitive for the next two decades,” ownership said.
A proposed apartment-complex project would mean big changes for the golf course at Yankee Hill Country Club (YHCC) in Lincoln, Neb., the Lincoln Journal Star reported.
Chateau Development, which owns several apartment complexes in Lincoln, has plans to buy 51 acres on the southeast corner of the club’s course, the Journal Star reported. According to a letter sent to members of the club, the sale is scheduled to close in January. Club owner Guy Lammle told the Journal Star in an e-mail that it will be business as usual at the club until then.
If the sale goes through as planned, Yankee Hill CC has a plan in place to still have an 18-hole golf course, but with a smaller footprint, the Journal Star reported. Plans call for a 5,400-yard course that would play to a par of 68 or 69. The current par-72 course at Yankee Hill, which opened in 1998, is a little more than 7,000 yards.
Construction of the new course layout would start early next year and ideally be done by late summer or early fall, according to the letter sent to members, the Journal Star reported. It would likely open for play in early 2021.
While construction is going on, golfers would still be able to play on an interim 10-hole course, the Journal Star reported.
The letter, which is signed by Lammle and his daughter, Amy Wieseler, YHCC’s Club Manager, acknowledges that the golf business “has been and will continue to be a challenge nationwide,” the Journal Star reported.
Cutting down the size of the property from more than 150 acres to 105 will “dramatically” reduce maintenance costs and property taxes, the letter said.
“We expect this will make our YHCC private golf, dining and social club business model more cost-competitive for the next two decades,” it added.
Lammle emphasized in his e-mail that the club is in no danger of closing, the Journal Star reported. “If the sale does not close, it will be business as usual for our operations in 2020 and beyond,” he said.
Yankee Hill opened in 1999 and for many years operated as a semi-private club, with memberships available but not required to play golf on the course, the Journal Star reported. It switched to a membership-only model in 2015.
Stefan Gaspar, managing partner of Chateau Development, said development plans for the apartment complex are “very preliminary,” and declined to provide any details to the Journal Star.
Gaspar said he has had a couple of meetings with staff from the Lincoln-Lancaster County Planning Department about the project, and is planning to host a neighborhood meeting on October 29.
According to a letter sent to homeowners about the neighborhood meeting, the development would include both apartments and town homes, the Journal Star reported.
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