The Pipeline, october 12, 2012

nicaragua The Great Recession has claimed many victims, but not David McLay Kidd’s golf course in Nicaragua. The 18-hole track, the centerpiece of a 1,670-acre resort community called Guacalito de la Isla, is scheduled to make its debut in January 2013. “We were building through the worst of the recession,” notes the Bend, Oregon-based designer. Kidd, who I’m guessing is slightly biased, calls his creation “the first top-notch golf course in Nicaragua” and reports that “there wasn’t a single dime spared” to make it so. All those dimes came out of the pockets of Carlos Pellas, Nicaragua’s richest and most powerful individual. His Grupo Pellas controls several dozen companies, including the nation’s leading sugar producer, a rum maker, a Toyota dealership, and a bank that operates in every Central American nation. I don’t know if Nicaragua will ever emerge as a golf destination, but I’ll say this: If it does, deep-pocketed people like Pellas will lead the way.

Some information in this post originally appeared in the May 2009 and November 2009 issues of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.

united states Also next year, the Pascua Yaqui Tribe expects to open an 18-hole layout at its Casino del Sol Resort outside Tucson, Arizona. It’ll be a “championship-style” course, according to a press release, and it’s been dubbed sewailo, a Native American word that translates as “flower world.” The track will bear the “signature” of Notah Begay III, an American Indian (part Navajo, part Pueblo) who used to play on the PGA Tour, although the architectural heavy lifting was done by Ty Butler, who operates out of JMP Golf Design Group’s office in Belmont, California. The golf club will be managed by Troon Golf, which reportedly operates six other golf properties owned by U.S. tribes.

canada For the better part of the past decade, Ian Andrew has been blogging about some of the big issues that confront golf development, in particular playability and sustainability. Now a pair of Canadian clubs are giving the Brantford, Ontario-based architect a chance to put his theories into practice. Andrew has been tapped to prepare master plans for renovations of Carleton Golf & Yacht Club in suburban Ottawa and Hillsdale Golf & Country Club in suburban Montreal. The scope of the work hasn’t been fully detailed, but Andrew provided a hint in a recent press release. “Golf is supposed to be fun,” he said. “Playability and difficulty can co-exist on a golf course, but one is often ignored in favor of the other.”

australia The long-awaited relocation of Chirnside Park Country Club has moved to its penultimate phase: construction. Today the club is in Chirnside Park, a northeastern suburb of Melbourne, where it has a crumbling clubhouse and an ever-shrinking, 1960s-era course that’s seen better days. By mid 2013, however, the club is expected to move to new digs in nearby Lilydale, where it’ll have a longer, more modern course that’s been designed by Phil Ryan of Victoria-based Pacific Coast Design. The construction is being funded by CSR Limited, a development firm that plans to build something like 500 single-family houses on the club’s existing property.

Some information in the preceding post originally appeared in the December 2009 and December 2011 issues of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.

france For most of us, the 2018 Ryder Cup is just a glimmer on the distant horizon. But the European Tour is already preparing a master plan for improvements to the event’s host venue, the Albatross course at Le Golf National in suburban Paris. The master plan is being created by Ross McMurray of European Golf Design, the architect who designed Celtic Manor’s Twenty Ten Course, the site of the 2010 Ryder Cup. McMurray’s proposed changes aren’t expected to be dramatic, as the stadium-style, 7,347-yard track, co-designed by Hubert Chesneau and Robert Von Hagge, is extremely well-liked by touring pros. Golf World ranks it as the #5 course in Europe.

Some information in the preceding post originally appeared in the July 2012 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.