Lakeland, Fla. - With Community Development District funding approved, developers of a new golf course community called Bridgewater will begin construction of a Steve Smyers-designed golf course in late September.
The CDD, a private agency that sells and manages community bonds to pay for the common areas of developments, including golf courses, gave the go-ahead after meeting with Bridgewater developers. The group is led by Riverview-based site developer Kearney Development Co. and Phillips Development of Raleigh, N.C.
The 600-acre Bridgewater property contains 228 acres of lakes and will devote 200 acres to the daily-fee golf course, leaving the remainder to develop 800 houses around the lakes. The housing, as well as a restaurant and clubhouse, are being built by Kearney, and the golf course will be constructed by Niebur Golf of Colorado Springs, Colo. Kearney plans to build 50 houses per quarter until the community is complete.
Smyers called the planned golf course a model of how golf can interact with, and enhance, the environment. About 24 acres of overgrown, distressed wetlands will be dug out and improved by clearing out trash growth and planting native materials.
The project will create a 165-acre wildlife corridor consisting of 64 acres of upland native plantings in trees and grasses, such as slash pines, sabal palms, cord grass and paspallum, and the remainder lowlands and wetlands.
Smyers said that only 67 acres of turfgrass will be maintained, adding that the wetlands will mark the low areas, while the trees, grasses and shrubs will delineate the high areas.
“The golfer, will be able to read the strategy of the course through the vegetation – how the bunkers, greens and fairways fit in context to this natural look and feel,” he said. “Where we have a mound we will have upland vegetation. Lowland vegetation will mark low areas.”
Meanwhile, Bridgewater Golf Club will stress moderately priced golf for juniors, seniors and beginning golfers.
Playing to a par-71 over 5,000 to 7,100 yards, Bridgewater will be a core golf course, with no adjacent housing.
The property is about 15 miles from Disney World.
Smyers designed three courses that are listed among the top 100 modern layouts in America: Wolf Run Golf Club in Zionsville, Ind., Old Memorial in Tampa, Fla., and Southern Dunes Golf & Country Club in Haines City, Fla. His Blue Heron Pines East Course, which opened in May 2000, is rated one of two daily-fee tracks among the Top 20 in New Jersey.
