The Pipeline, september 13, 2013

     A 537-acre spread adjacent to Flagstaff, Arizona’s Little America Hotel is slated to become the city’s largest master-planned community. Little America Hotels & Resorts, a company founded by the late Robert Earl Holding, believes the property can accommodate 1,415 houses, a second hotel with meeting space, a retail/commercial area, and an 18-hole golf course. The venture is no sure thing, as residents in the area have raised concerns about the availability of water, but the head of a local citizens’ group told the Arizona Daily Sun that the developers “have bent over backwards to allow the community to be involved.” Holding, who grew up poor during the Great Depression, was worth $3.2 billion when he died in April, according to Forbes. He owned Sinclair Oil Company, the Sun Valley ski resort in Idaho, four Little America hotels, and a huge cattle ranch that occupies parts of Wyoming and Montana. Forbes believes that Holding’s son Stephen will run the business.

     Billy Casper Golf is trying to persuade government officials in Hendry County, Florida to endorse its plan to build a municipal course in the city of LaBelle. BCG has pitched a proposal to build and operate an 18-hole, Jerry Lemons-designed track with a short-game practice area. It thinks the facility will attract 41,000 rounds a year and generate $1.2 million in revenues against annual maintenance costs of just $450,000. Some of the county commissioners are receptive to the idea -- “The businesspeople of LaBelle want to do this,” one of them insisted at a public meeting -- but others fear that Casper’s estimates are pie in the sky. “These numbers just don’t add up,” a commissioner groused, noting that the municipal course in nearby Clewiston gets “more like 15 to 16,000 annual rounds.” The Clewiston News reports that the matter will be discussed again in the future. BCG is hoping to open the course by the end of 2014.

     Earlier this year, Robert Trent Jones, Jr. was in northern Argentina, slinging bon mots and posing for photographers at the ceremonial groundbreaking for a municipal golf course he’s designed in Termas de Rio Hondo. “My goal is to make a course that golfers from all over will want to play,” he said at the event. Golf Club Rio Hondo, Jones’ first course in Argentina, is part of an economic-development effort taking place in Santiago del Estero Province. The province, Jones later explained, is “a poorer section of the country that’s regenerating” with a new airport, a new auto race track, and, before too long, his new golf course. It hopes these attractions, when combined with the popular hot springs in Termas de Rio Hondo, will generate tourist traffic and create jobs.

     Angel Cabrera, the professional golfer from Argentina, is transforming a golf course near Punta del Este, Uruguay into his first “signature” design. Cabrera’s re-invented Los Tajamares Golf Club, which will stretch to more than 7,000 yards, is expected to open in early 2014. “My goal is to create one of the world’s best golf courses on a unique property in partnership with an owner who shares a special vision,” Cabrera said. The owner is Alejandro Bulgheroni, an Argentine who aims to bring a touch of Tuscany to his 10,000-acre Agroland estate in the village of Garzon, Maldonado. Bulgheroni is growing vineyards and olive trees on his property, along with almond, pecan, and chestnut trees. The golf construction is being done by Landscapes Unlimited, a U.S. firm, with local contractors. Punta del Este, the center of a vacation area that’s been called “the St. Tropez of Uruguay” and “the Riviera of South America,” is also where Las Piedras, a community featuring an Arnold Palmer-designed course, is under construction.

     Treading water since 2008, the planned Paul Lawrie “signature” golf course near Donald Trump’s resort in Aberdeenshire, Scotland has again bubbled to the surface. Muir Group recently told the Aberdeen Evening Express that development plans have been prepared and that it expects local officials to rule on the project this fall. “Despite the current economic climate,” Ronnie Muir said, “the Muir Group remains wholly committed to its delivery.” Lawrie’s 7,400-yard, par-73 course will take shape at Blairs College, an ancient, ramshackle property that Muir plans to transform into a community with 280 single-family houses (some of them “affordable” units) and an upscale hotel with meeting space. Lawrie, who lives within eyesight of the abandoned college, believes the course will be worthy of hosting an event on the European Tour. “I have lots of ideas and am itching to get started on my first course design project,” he says on his website. Lawrie will co-design the course with Robin Hiseman, an architect from Berkshire, England-based European Golf Design.

     The original version of the preceding post first appeared in the July 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.

     Before the end of the year, Erik Larsen expects to break ground on his first major project since leaving Arnold Palmer’s design firm in 2011. The new owners of Selva Marina Country Club in Atlantic Beach, Florida have appointed him to raze the property’s existing layout and replace it with a 6,815-yard track. Rick Wood, the leader of the new ownership group, told the Florida Times-Union that the community, to be renamed Atlantic Beach Country Club, will be “the perfect place for families or empty nesters seeking an active, beach lifestyle in a quiet, close-knit community.” Larsen, a former president of the American Society of Golf Course Architects, expects to unveil the new course roughly a year from now. Selva Marina’s E. E. Smith-designed course, which opened in 1959, was built on property that was once home to Atlantic Beach Golf Course, a venue that closed during World War I. Smith’s track formerly hosted the Greater Jacksonville Open, the event that became The Players Championship.

      A South Korean group has agreed to build what’s been called the “biggest and most expensive tourism project” in the Subic Bay area. Resom Resort Company plans to build Subic Resom City on 750 acres in the Subic Bay Freeport, the former U.S. naval base that’s been converted to civilian uses. The Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority, which controls development in the area, expects the company to produce a “world-class” destination that will include a casino, overnight accommodations and vacation housing, several hotels, a theme park, a water park, a duty-free shopping area, a wellness center, a spa, and a championship-caliber golf course. Resom is no stranger to the golf business. The company owns a golf course in Shandong Province, China, and one of its three resorts in South Korea -- Resom Ocean Castle on Anmyeondo Island -- has a golf course. Subic Resom City is expected to open in 2017 or 2018.

     The original version of the preceding post first appeared in the July 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.

     A Hong Kong-based casino company wants to buy property on Hengqin Island, Macau’s sparsely populated next-door neighbor, and it may build a golf course on part of it. Galaxy Entertainment Group, Ltd. owns and operates a handful of casinos and hotels on Macau, the world’s most popular gambling destination, including the Galaxy Macau on the Cotai Strip and the StarWorld Hotel & Casino. Lui Che Woo, the company’s wealthy founder, recently committed nearly $8 billion to expand his leisure-related operations, and he hopes to spend part of the money on a non-gaming resort on Hengqin. No details have been released, but Galaxy officials appear to have golf on their minds. “We believe what we can develop on Hengqin Island will be very complementary, whether it’s a golf club, a golf resort, golf course, or other amenities,” the firm’s CFO told the Macau Business Daily.

     The original version of this post first appeared in the June 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.

     Swan Golf Designs, a British firm, has been commissioned to design a golf course for a planned resort community outside Kunming, the capital of Yunnan Province, China. As is its habit, unfortunately, Swan isn’t willing to share any important details related to the unnamed resort or explain how it could be built in the presence of a moratorium on golf construction. In a press release, the firm reports that the community will take shape in Mile, roughly 50 miles southeast of Kunming, and that the course will have “a traditional golfing theme,” unlike the “the American resort style of course that dominates China’s existing golfing stock.” It appears that the rest of the property has adopted the American style, however, as it’s been master-planned to include houses, a hotel, and the obligatory spa. Construction could start later this year.