Frank Protiva, vice president of Shephard-Wesnitzer, an Arizona civil engineering and surveying firm, recently presented “Golf Course Design and Engineering for Affordable Golf” to the Urban Land Institute during the Developing Golf Courses and Communities Conference in Las Vegas. Protiva’s presentation focused on creating affordability in golf course design. Todd Jester of Jester Design and Dan Devere of Flagstaff Ranch Golf Club presented with Protiva.
“It was a privilege to be invited to speak to this national assemblage of golf and development professionals about implementing affordable golf courses,” Protiva said. “There are many opportunities to create courses that are both affordable and functional.”
Protiva stressed key ways to create an affordable golf course community, including working with existing conditions as much as possible and minimizing areas of irrigated turf. Starting the project with a team consisting of a golf designer, land planner, engineer and superintendent is also important for successfully creating an affordable golf course design, Protiva said.
The Urban Land Institute facilitates the open exchange of ideas, information and experience among local, national and international industry leaders and policy makers dedicated to creating better places. The mission of the Urban Land Institute is to provide responsible leadership in the use of land to enhance the total environment. Urban Land Institute members commit to the best in land use policy and practice.
Construction tips that Protiva’s presentation provided involved minimizing earthwork techniques, keeping higher elevation on the outside of a dogleg, and putting lakes in lower elevations. He also recommended avoiding bridges and bulkheads in the course design.
Protiva said an important aspect of creating an affordable golf course community is fitting the course to the site. Advantages to this approach include minimizing earthwork cost and facilitating operation and maintenance. In many cases, this feature is also easier to permit. Protiva also discussed what works well and what to avoid for specific features of a course such as the greens, sand bunker, grass bunker, tees, fairways and irrigation, and techniques for efficient integration and environmental mitigation and enhancement.
Protiva also discussed the transition period between construction and grow-in. Each topic covered introduced a substantial element to the comprehensive plan of creating an affordable golf course through design and engineering.
