Ready to reevaluate your perceptions of golf course communities and their design? In this episode, host Donna DiMaggio Berger takes you behind the scenes with Erik Larsen, Golf Course Architect and former Vice President of the Arnold Palmer Design Company, as he reveals the intricacies of transforming landscapes into world-class golf courses. Erik has overseen golf course projects in 26 US States and 14 countries. He has designed courses used in tournament play, such as the US Open, the Bob Hope Classic, the Champions Tour, and more.
Tracing golf's roots in 15th-century Scotland and discussing the surprising statistic that only 25-30% of residents in golf course communities play golf, you'll gain a newfound appreciation for the sport's scenic allure and its broader community impact. Donna and Erik dive into the delicate balance of aesthetic beauty and functional safety in golf course design, especially within residential areas. Discover the evolution of design philosophies over the decades and the challenges of ensuring safety while maintaining visual appeal. They also delve into the emerging trends like par-three courses and 'fun golf' that make the sport more accessible to beginners and families, highlighting how these innovations are reshaping the golfing experience.
Lastly, they tackle the business side of golf, focusing on strategies to revive failing courses through creative residential development. Learn about the infill model and how repurposing empty spaces can breathe new life into struggling golf communities. With personal anecdotes and expert insights, this episode is rich with historical context, design strategies, and business acumen—making it a must-listen for anyone interested in the multifaceted world of golf course development.
Conversation Highlights Include:
- Designing golf courses in residential communities or HOAs
- How to ensure a golf course is mutually beneficial for residents, including those who do not play golf
- Noise and privacy concerns for residents living near the golf course
- Environmentally friendly golf course design
- Protecting and relocating wildlife
- How to revive failing golf course communities
- American courses vs. international courses
- Advice for developers or associations considering adding or renovating a golf course
- BONUS: Find out what it was like to work with Arnold Palmer!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hi everyone, I'm attorney Donna DiMaggio-Berger
and this is Take it to the Board, where we speak condo and HOA.
Today, on the Take it to theBoard podcast, we're trading the
boardroom for the fairway.
Whether you're a scratch golferor the kind who scratches their
head wondering why that littlewhite ball won't cooperate.
Our conversation today withgolf course designer Eric Larson
(00:24):
should be illuminating.
Eric and I are going to betalking about a game that's been
driving people to both theheight of excitement and the
depths of frustration forcenturies.
Speaking of centuries, golf isconsidered to be over 500 years
old, with its origins datingback to Scotland during the 15th
century.
While similar games involving aball and a stick existed in
(00:44):
ancient times, it was inScotland where the game began to
take on its contemporary form,including the concept of 18
holes and specific rules.
The earliest recorded mentionof golf was in 1457, when King
James II of Scotland banned thegame because it was distracting
his soldiers from their archerypractice.
We're so drawn to the sport ofgolf today, which is why I am so
(01:06):
happy to be able to discuss thetopic with Eric Larson.
Eric is an accomplished andexperienced golf course
architect, having designed andoverseen construction of nearly
100 golf courses around theworld.
He designed 95 Arnold Palmersignature courses as the project
architect for the Arnold PalmerDesign Company from 1983 until
(01:27):
2011.
Eric became Vice President ofthe Arnold Palmer Design Company
in 2003.
Eric was also the President ofthe Acclaimed American Society
of Golf Course Architects.
Eric has overseen golf courseprojects in 26 US states and 14
countries.
He has designed courses thatare used in tournament play,
such as the US Open 14 countries.
He has designed courses thatare used in tournament play,
such as the US Open, the BobHope Classic, the Champions Tour
(01:49):
and more.
So we are really excited tohave him on the podcast today.
Eric, welcome to Take it to theBoard.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
Thank you so much, Donna.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
So let's dig into it.
First of all I want to sayright off the bat I'm not a
golfer.
So I know the basics of thegame and I've lived on a golf
course for many years.
I even like to go to thedriving range from time to time,
but I never feel confidentenough to go out on my 18 hole
golf course.
I do okay on a par three, Iwill do that, but my dad was a
(02:17):
big golfer.
I have friends and law partnerswho have a love hate
relationship with the game, so Iam semi-fluent in golf.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Well, you cut across a broad spectrum right now, then
, actually, of all theinhabitants of golf course
communities, really only 25 to30% do play golf.
The others do not.
And you also mentioned that youlike a par three tournament.
Maybe we'll get into this atsome point, or a par three
tournament.
Maybe we'll get into this atsome point, or some par three
(02:46):
golf, and maybe we can get intothat.
But that is a it's not evenreally an emerging trend anymore
.
It is, it's now almost anecessity in a golf course
community, and particularly ifthere's renovation and
improvements being made.
Speaker 1 (03:01):
Well, that's.
That's a great statistic toknow, eric, that many of my
neighbors are probably like me,that they like the openness and
the beauty of living on a golfcourse, but they're not
necessarily golfers.
So we will talk about that.
But I first wanted to ask youwhat inspired you to pursue a
career in golf design.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
Well, it's actually a long story, I guess.
To start is I have worked ongolf courses and played golf
since I was seven, eight yearsold, in fact, my first job, you
know, I got thinking about it.
I've been working on golfcourses since I was nine.
I'm 70.
So do the math, do the math onthat, we'll just, we'll just get
(03:39):
my age out there, wait, wait,wait.
Speaker 1 (03:40):
Nine years old, there's child labor laws, eric.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
Well, wait, wait, wait, nine years old, there's
child labor laws, eric.
Well, I did it willingly, I'lltell you.
I don't even remember what Iwas making, but it wasn't more
than it was.
Not more than three or fourdollars an hour, I can tell you
that.
And but it was.
I was hooked from the start tobe out on the green grass and
the big open spaces and thisbeautiful playing field.
You know dynamic, because itchanges, and so I stayed in
basically agronomy, golf coursemaintenance through college,
even took turf grass andagronomy in college and got a
(04:12):
little.
I wanted to play, but I was notreally patient enough to make a
good player and my father gotme interested in design and I
got into landscape architecture,fell in love with the design.
Design is a process, by the way, maybe we can touch on that at
some point.
Then learned the design process.
(04:34):
I'm not great.
I am not great graphically, Idon't draw well, but design
process is basically problemsolving and that was a skill set
that I found out that I had.
So you know, I got intolandscape architecture.
I had a landscape company butit was mostly geared toward the
residential landscape andsmaller scale design work and I
(04:56):
really wanted to do large scaleplanning and at the time this
would have been in the early.
This would have been in theearly, this would have been in
the uh, the uh, early 80s, late70s, early 80s and the large the
.
The growth of golf coursecommunities was robust and it
was really in that area wherelarge, there, where there was a
(05:16):
lot of opportunity inlarge-scale planning.
So yeah, you know it's thelittle guy with the hammer hit
me in the back of the head andsaid you know golf course
architecture, you've got youmarried.
The little guy with the hammerhit me in the back of the head
and said you know golf coursearchitecture, You've got the
experience.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
You married the two experiences.
But did you grow up somewherewhere year-round golf was an
option, Eric?
Speaker 2 (05:34):
I was fortunate.
I grew up in a little town inIowa, newton Iowa.
The Maytag family was in myhometown and had built the
Maytag washer and dryer plants.
My father was an executive withthe Maytag company and we were
able to join the local countryclub, and so that's where I
started working as a kid andplaying the nine hole golf
(05:55):
course, as there are many ofthose in the Midwest,
particularly Iowa.
And so, yes, I was exposed togolf and it was a you know, it
was.
Get up in the morning, go tothe golf course, work, play golf
, go swimming in the afternoonand play baseball and eat.
Get up, you know, and thenrepeat.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
And sounds ideal, but there were months you couldn't
play in Iowa, so it's not likeFlorida or any of our Sunbelt
states.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
Yeah, we could play golf, but we sure did a lot of
sledding on the golf course.
So yeah, so you know, I got adegree in landscape architecture
, I started the business andthen I called.
I eventually said it came uponme golf course architecture.
I got actually kind of thrilledwatching the tournament players
(06:39):
championship right here acrossthe street from me.
I'm in Ponte Vedra Beach,florida, for the first time in
the stadium course that acolleague and mentor rest in
peace.
Pete Dye designed and rememberI was on the couch in Iowa and
said wait a minute, what am Ilooking at?
You can do that sort of thing,that art.
You know those dramatic, youknow those dramatic slopes and
(07:06):
targets on the golf course inthose vast bunkering.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
I said I'm in, I'm going, I'm in you were
fascinated Is it possible, inyour opinion, to be a golf
course designer without havingthat knowledge of landscape and
plant material?
Speaker 2 (07:27):
The answer is yes, you can.
You don't need to knowlandscape and plant material.
There's always somebody thatcan tell you what trees to plant
, and it's primarily trees.
It's not a landscape likeshrubbery and bushes and stuff.
Those are really too smallscale.
You're going to do more of massplanting of trees.
But yes, you can which you can'tbe a golf course architect.
(07:48):
You cannot be a golf coursearchitect and not have the
understanding of engineering,particularly drainage and grade
work, and then the, the artistrythat goes on top of that, both
these, the strategy of play andthe beauty, overall beauty, of a
golf course.
But those are all secondary tosafety, which we, which is going
(08:13):
to be very relevant to this, tothis audience, and how a golf
course relates to and isadjacent to communities.
You know an hoa property safetyis first.
Safety is always first and it'sparamount and the work we do is
we lay on the very front end ofit.
As we lay out a golf course,then, with the function of it,
(08:34):
the drainage, irrigation,feature, construction, that's
all underground.
People don't really evenunderstand that or need to, but
those two have to be in placebefore you get to the call it
the icing on the cake of thereal beauty, the strategy bunker
placement, shapes of greens,those sorts of things that bring
out the real playability andfun in the golf course.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
Sure, Well, let's talk about designing golf
courses that are part of aresidential community homeowners
association.
I think I just mentioned thatI've lived in a golf course
community for years.
The golf course is not part ofthe HOA common areas, it's a
separate country club.
But many of our neighbors dosupport the club and our members
, whether it's social or tennisor golf.
(09:18):
I live on the fourth hole.
I will tell you, Eric, thatover time I've seen more and
more errant golf balls.
I mean, if there's a golf ballon my patio, I know somebody is
not a great golfer.
If it's in my front, on myfront doorstep, it's even worse.
So how do you go aboutapproaching design of golf
courses that are ringed or thatare located inside a community
(09:42):
association?
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Well, first.
Well, as I said, it's safetyfirst and there are industry
standards for setbacks, for thedistance from the center line of
the golf hole to the back ofthe property line, and they're
not regulated.
It's not law, but there areindustry standards which you
would understand.
So and that is typically fromcenter line and we work from
(10:08):
like on a par four, threedifferent spots, which would
have a spot for a T, a spot forthe angle turn or landing area
in the middle of the fairway anda spot in the middle of the
green and you connect the lineto those three spots and then
going laterally from there atthe T angle turning green it's
(10:29):
150 feet, basically 175 feet ifyou can get it each direction.
So a corridor width ofbasically 350 feet wide is the
corridor within the area for thegolf course.
The T's fairways and greensthemselves are much smaller than
that.
They fit inside that.
So there's a buffer area forsafety outside that.
(10:50):
And then the setback of thebuildings out within the
property is something we don'thave any bearing on.
We don't have any say in that.
The developer, the owners, willdetermine that amount.
So we have to create a safetysetback that the back of the
property line is safe.
Now let me say that you can'tmake them 100% safe.
(11:13):
It's not possible.
You can put somewhere.
There's going to be a guy or agirl that's strong and can hit a
ball a long ways, and itdoesn't take a rocket scientist
to know that.
The longer a ball goes offline,the farther it's going to go
offline.
That may mean your backyard oryour front step or your rooftop
(11:36):
or whatever.
Speaker 1 (11:37):
And you know when that typically happens is when
you've got somebody playing on agolf course for the first time.
I remember being out inCordillera and my husband had a
caddy and he wasn't listening.
It was the first time he playedthe course and he, as the ball
was flying, said no, he hit itway too hard and way too hard.
So do you agree that sometimesit's just people who don't know
(12:00):
the course also?
Speaker 2 (12:02):
Yeah, there's no question that that would have
bearing on errant shots, there'sno doubt about that or just
trying to do early in the round.
You know, on the fourth holethey may not be warmed up yet.
Typically, gray shots are tothe right.
Most people hit the ball leftto right.
So we're more cognizant ofsafety factors to be put in
(12:24):
place to the right of the golfhole, particularly the right,
immediately right of the teeshot, to keep homes and property
safe.
But, donna, it's the keyquestion for residential, for
HOA, condominium, whatever unitit is that is adjacent to or
runs parallel to the golf course.
That that's first and it comesvery early on in the planning
(12:47):
and it's the gospel you makethose lines.
There is another teammatethat's always involved the civil
engineer who's in charge ofgetting it approved, that he
basically plats those lots andthey become legal documents.
So that's an item that anyqualified golf course architect
and I encourage anybody that'slistening if they're going to
(13:10):
hire one, go to the ASTCA, theAmerican Society of Golf Course
Architects.
Everybody in our society hasmet a stringent set of
qualifications for the work wecan do and have done and that's
how we're allowed.
So it gives you a comfort.
You know confidence and acomfort level of any hire from
within the ASGCA.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
Have you ever said put on a course, eric, where you
said, oh no, this is not safe,this was not set up with the
correct setbacks?
Speaker 2 (13:38):
Yeah, you can, I can tell it immediately and it would
usually, you know, be almostalways done by a
non-professional and even I'dsay that carefully, because
there are professional golfersthat have laid out golf courses
but they are not professionalarchitects and they at times
could, without knowledge andexperience, could create unsafe
(13:59):
situations is it fair to saythat it's sometimes going to
sacrifice playability for safety?
It's very fair to say you do itoften.
You also sacrifice beauty, andI will tell you that.
What is the age of your, what'sthe age of your community?
Donna?
Speaker 1 (14:16):
It was.
Let's see my golf coursecommunity early 80s.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
Yeah, so you're of the vintage.
That was the very typical inthat you have probably have.
Do you look across your fairwayand there's homes on the other
side?
Speaker 1 (14:29):
No, actually.
So I was going to talk to youabout my community because my
community, the golf course, wasredesigned, eric, by the Florida
, by DOT for water drainage, soI had a different view before
that redesign.
Yes, I had a different viewbefore that redesign.
Yes, I looked across Afterwards.
It was completely differentwhere there's coverage with
trees and it was much prettierafter the redesign.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Well, that's good, great, good work, good work.
What I was getting at is thatin that vintage of 70s, 80s, 90s
, even into just the early 2000s, even into just the early 2000s
, the land plan model ofpreference was to what we call a
double load, or load thefairways with houses along both
(15:12):
sides of the fairways so thatyou could maximize the frontage
for the real estate, becausethere's a premium for being on
the golf course versus not onthat amenity.
Water tends to get more of apremium, but golf always had
provided a premium fordevelopers, so they maximized
the amount of homes on golf.
(15:34):
What that did was, if you flyyou mentioned Cordillera well,
keep going west and fly overPalm Springs or Arizona and look
down and you see it in SouthFlorida and a lot of larger
communities in Florida as well.
If you look down, you see thesegreen sausages that are linked
together.
Those are golf holes and thenthe house, house, house, house
(15:56):
along each side is so successful.
It actually fueled the boom ingolf course communities through
the, like you say, 80s and 90s,and golf would not be where it
is without that type ofdevelopment.
But that type of developmentbecame redundant.
They tend to look alike and youhave to work within the
(16:17):
corridors an architect and anartist to come up with different
look and feel.
Well, you only have that, somuch space to do that, and
particularly in Florida, whereit's flat, it's, you know, it's
a challenge to try to createanything of real, unique beauty.
Speaker 1 (16:31):
No for sure.
Well, I wanted to talk to youabout aesthetics, because when
you're dealing with golf coursesinside homeowners associations,
it must be very difficult tokeep everyone happy.
The players want to have acourse that challenges them.
The people living in the homeswant a beautiful view.
Those two things don't alwaysgo hand in hand.
Speaker 2 (16:51):
Well, they can, though, and you?
Those two things don't alwaysgo hand in hand.
Well they can, though, andyou're right, they don't.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
But they certainly can, and that's what you strive
for.
My view on the fourth hole wasmuch improved after DOT came in
and redesigned it.
We had more water Becausebefore it was a narrow canal
then they opened it up and itwas almost a lake and beautiful
trees and some hills and somesand in the distance.
I mean, it really was night andday, eric, in terms of the
(17:18):
design, but I imagine sometimesit's the reverse you may
actually go from having abeautiful view to one that's
less so.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
Yeah, they got compromised.
Yeah, In fact, yours would bekind of unique.
Actually that doesn't usuallyhappen by the DOT and I hope
they're not listening but theimportance of a view to the
layman, particularly to the 75%of you all that don't play golf
but live on the golf course.
It does not have anything to dowith design, to tell you the
(17:49):
truth.
It does not have anything to dowith design, to tell you the
truth.
It does have everything to dowith beauty, which comes from
primarily the condition of thegolf course.
If the grass is healthy anduniform and green and bright and
vibrant and you havewell-manicured bunkers that are
clean and white, with nice edgesand create that nice contrast,
(18:10):
that's the beauty and mostpeople don't pass that.
They still have the big view,they have the vista.
But if the vista is unsightlybecause the golf course is not
in good shape, that's going tobe an issue.
It could be unsightly and be asgood a golf course as Augusta
National, but if it's not wellkept, most people will not like
(18:34):
that.
And look, I'm the architect,I'm the designer, saying the
design is what's all important.
It actually is not.
It's the condition of the golfcourse that not only brings
people the average person to thegolf course.
It's what provides the value tothe real estate and HOA
communities around the outsideof it.
(18:54):
So the importance ofmaintenance cannot be overlooked
for communities, for HOAs thatown the golf course, whoever
does, or in their relationshipwith the clubs that do own it.
Speaker 1 (19:04):
That's a great point.
I mean our golf course.
I will tell you it's pristine.
Sometimes I'm up super early,eric and I see them out there at
4.35 in the morning with themachinery they're grooming the
fairway.
It's amazing.
But for those of us who livealong there, should we be
concerned about all thepesticides spraying and
(19:25):
everything else that goes intomaintenance?
Speaker 2 (19:27):
I don't think you need to be overly concerned.
No, and I've been in thisbusiness for 40 years now I mean
60, if you count when I startedwhen I was seven.
If there is overspray, it's allspecific, it's site-specific,
Donna, and it's also specific tothe applicator, the
superintendents these days.
And if you're living on apristine golf course, you've got
(19:49):
a good guy, there's no question.
And not only is he good at whathe's applying, he's good at how
he applies it.
That's regulated, that'slicensed.
You can't just go out and spraystuff.
You have to have the approvalto do that and you have to have
the approval to buy certainchemicals.
The FDA is very conscious ofwhat goes on a golf course.
So that's one thing and thatwould come primarily for you
(20:13):
would run into problem basicallyjust from two ways.
One is going to get wind.
It's going to be windborneparticulates which, if you watch
the sprayers now, they're onlyabout a foot off the ground, so
they really there isn't anyspray, outward spray.
The other would be runoff,stormwater runoff.
It's very seldom thatstormwater runoff goes off the
(20:35):
golf course.
It has to be contained in thegolf course, go into a drainage,
major drainage system that tiesin with the major drainage
system of the community.
Speaker 1 (20:45):
Listen, if I see them out there spraying, I'm not
going to be sitting out readinga book while they're doing this.
So I tend to go inside, butI've always wondered is there
any potential negative impactsto the adjacent homes?
You know, with regard to thepesticides?
Certainly, you may not have anypests in your trees and bushes
(21:06):
in your yard either, but youknow, but if you leave your
animals outside, if you leaveyour pets outside, things like
that.
Speaker 2 (21:12):
You know.
I think it's also a factor ofhow you feel about that
personally.
It depends on your sensitivityto that issue.
Certainly, they're spraying yes, they're spraying, and they're
spraying pesticides andherbicides that are limited in
damage to animal life they justhave to be now.
(21:35):
But they're also extremelyskilled in how they apply stuff
and in my experience I haven'tseen any issues.
I have not seen an issue, asingle issue actually where
there's been a problem withoverspray or runoff from
chemical into a real estatepiece surrounding a golf course.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
That's great to know.
I did want to ask you, whenyou're designing your golf
courses, eric, what steps do youtake to make sure they're
environmentally friendly andsustainable, for instance, if
you're designing a course likein a drought prone area, or if
you're designing a course youknow located near saltwater?
I assume that there's differentfactors you take into account
for those differences ingeography.
Speaker 2 (22:15):
Yes, there are.
They both fall into the designprocess, though, and, which is
the first, you develop a programof what do you have, what does
the property offer, what do youneed, what do you want and how
do you get there.
And in the program developmentof what do you have as with you
know, what do you want and howdo you get there, and then the
program development of what doyou have as with you know, what
are the components of thisfacility going to be, how much
(22:38):
real estate do you need?
Is there a hotel?
Is there?
What are the natural water,what is the natural drainage
system and what are the nativeelements that are critical to
maintain, to avoid, to minimizeimpact and actually to enhance.
And those go into the hopper.
To start with.
Those go on the map, they getcircled in red.
(23:00):
They are either no touch or howdo we help make them better?
And you have.
Usually, there is there againthe civil engineer, and someone
within his, usually within hiscompany is going to give you
regulation on what you can andcannot do with the sensitive
entire environmental areas.
Speaker 1 (23:17):
Is the goal to work around, Eric, what you have, for
instance, if you have oldgrowth trees- yeah, donna, it's
actually regulated.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
It depends on what the feature is.
If it's wetlands, you cannottouch it.
Like you mentioned, saltwater,you can't touch it, you can't
drain anything into it.
All water, everything has tomove away from that.
In fact you create a bufferusually 50 to 100 foot buffer of
vegetation along that edgethat's delineated by an
(23:45):
environmental specialist or acivil engineer and approved by,
say in your case, south FloridaWater Management.
They stamp everything andthat's a no-touch zone.
Now, in some cases they'reunsightly and you just play
around them.
In some cases they're beautifuland you want them to be a part
of the golf course as a featurefor strategy and beauty and you
(24:06):
can play close to them and overthem and it really creates, as I
said earlier, the nativeelement, creates the character
of your golf course.
So you want to use those.
The desert situation, droughtareas are different.
They're generally not regulated.
(24:27):
What is regulated is the amountof water you can use.
So you try to create kind ofwhat we call an out-of-play area
or big areas where there reallyaren't going to be many golf
shots, say behind tees, you know, along the sides of tees and
back behind tees, and you takethem out of turf.
They're not in irrigated turf,they would be in a.
(24:49):
You know, here we use coquina,a lot or concrete screenings,
and out west you're going to usenative desert basically or
caliche they call it and createthese big areas that are there's
no vegetation.
But the main issue is you don'tirrigate it so that you're
paying attention to the amountof water use.
Speaker 1 (25:11):
Are there any areas where you just you have to say
no, we cannot put a golf coursehere, no matter how badly you
want it, we can't make it happengeographically.
Speaker 2 (25:20):
There are, and it's.
That would be.
Yes, you mentioned saltwater.
That would be.
There's some fantastic.
You know, I'm up here inJacksonville.
There's some beautiful dunesnorth of the St John's river.
Just be like, oh my gosh, butyou can't.
You know it's, it's a, it's afederal preserve and it's on the
ocean and it's you can't.
(25:41):
You can't go there, you can'tdo that.
You can't build on cliffs inareas for safety, for one but
for their unstable condition offalling off or sloughing off.
Speaker 1 (25:56):
Yeah, you don't want that to happen, no matter how
good a golfer?
Speaker 2 (25:58):
you are no, but you do want to.
As an architect, you do look atthese sites just with well you
know, with desire to, to be ableto lay some golf holes out
there when you know it reallyisn't going to impact anything,
particularly in our minds.
Any environmentalist wouldargue differently.
So you just respect that andmove on.
(26:20):
It's different.
It used to be double loadingfairways with homes to maximize
real estate.
The golf boom was primarilyunderwritten by the real estate
piece.
There's a boom going on rightnow, unlike anything I've ever
seen.
It's down there, close to you,out from Hope Sound and other
places in Florida, where they'rebuilding terrific golf courses,
(26:42):
but they're building them aswhat we would call four golf
courses, where you have a blockof golf or you have a block of
golf picture a frying pan on anoven and the golf course is the
frying pan and all the realestate or residential is around
the outside of it.
You're not lining the fairwayswith homes and what that does is
create a better opportunity formaking really cool golf course.
(27:07):
Golf course, you don't have toworry about views from
homeowners or or runoff andstuff, and can move dirt up, and
they can.
You can lift dirt, so you sothat you're creating uphill
shots when you're not blockingviews from homes, because you
struggle, as I mentioned, youstruggle to create the third
dimension here in florida, andso it lets you take the
components of your development,of your community and kind of
(27:30):
place them where they reallykind of want to be, rather than
mesh them all together in a in areal uniform model of land plan
.
that was done before so that youcreate the value of the, of the
address of the of the community, rather than the individual
address of each home along thefairway.
So the whole place goes up invalue as the golf course is
(27:53):
better, your recreationalamenities are better, you've
created neighborhoods moreneighborhood-like, rather than
long runs of homes and stuffalong roads, and that has gained
traction as a favorable modelfor design and land planning.
Speaker 1 (28:13):
Well, and it sounds like you're spreading out the
enhanced real property valueamongst all the homes, not just
the ones sitting on the golfcourse.
Speaker 2 (28:20):
That's exactly right.
Yeah, well said.
Speaker 1 (28:23):
And it also sounds like you have as a golf course
designer in that type of concept, you have more freedom when it
comes to designing the course.
Speaker 2 (28:31):
That's exactly correct.
Speaker 1 (28:33):
I assume you like this trend, Eric.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
The trend is good is because it makes the quality of
each component better and moreunique.
It makes each development itsown character and I believe I
think that's very important justfor the golf course itself.
There are a lot of designersthat do a certain style and it's
been very successful for them,and there are our group.
(28:58):
When I was with Arnold, withPalmer, we didn't have a certain
style.
We did a lot of different typesof things, and you know.
So there's just there's adifferent way to go about that.
I believe that the golf courseshould have the character.
Go about that.
I believe that the golf courseshould have the character it
shouldn't be of the character ofthe architect, so that it is a
reflection of the community ofwhich the golf course resides.
(29:20):
That applies also to the entireamenity package Is there green
space, you have walking trails,pickleball is a huge new thing
growing flash pools, et cetera.
As those things come togetherby the portfolio of what those
items are, along with where youplace them and how you interact
in that community, gives theplace its character.
(29:42):
And that's, I mean, let's faceit, golf is just, at its basis,
a social gathering, form ofrecreation.
That's what it's about.
It happens to be wellunderwritten with infrastructure
of maintaining golf courses andan entire you know a handicap
system in the PGA where you canhave events and drive action
together, interaction events, etcetera, all creating this
(30:06):
terrific venue and veryimportant venue for communities,
as it turns out, and it's evenbeing exposed even more as being
a very valuable amenity andrecreational activity for humans
.
Speaker 1 (30:21):
In this new venue concept Eric, what would be the
driving factor for the characterof the community?
Would it be the golf course oris it all?
Would it be the homes?
Would it be the otherrecreational amenities, or do
you believe the golf course isstill the driving factor in
terms of establishing thecharacter for that community?
Speaker 2 (30:42):
This is a really good question and I hope there's
some.
I wish there would be adeveloper that could call in and
echo what I'm about to say inthat in the past it used to be
the golf course.
Golf was king and it was thecharacter driver oh, I'm at, you
know wherever.
Oh, yeah, the golf course isgreat and that's still important
(31:03):
.
Golf is still important, but itis only important now as a
piece of the amenity package,which must include
family-oriented activity besidesgolf, where you can go in.
Again, it's all about socialinteraction, and that
interaction now has transcendedfrom just golf to the other
(31:24):
forms of recreation and activityor even business centers within
the clubhouse sort of thing.
Golf is all I mean.
You see it in golf itself.
If I let me get let me not getover my skis here and stick with
my own, my own skillset Golfitself has changed in that, like
you were saying, you like toplay the par three, par three
(31:47):
holes.
Well, a lot of people so much sothat it's the number one added
activity to.
I call it real golf.
There's off-course golf andthere's on-course golf now, with
off-course golf, the phenomenonthat top golf has created is
actually the fastest-growingsport.
It's the fastest-growing sportand it's a much faster growing
(32:12):
segment of golf than on-coursegolf.
The fastest growing segment ofon-course golf is this I call it
fun golf, small golf, and itmay just a space for um for, for
(32:34):
, for less than regulation,whole golf in close to the
clubhouse, close to food andbeverage, and there's probably
an entertainment piece to it.
You've got a, you know, a alittle food court or or, or a
banner or an extension of theclubhouse that services that
(32:55):
area where you're playing golf.
You're out there by the amountof time you have.
You can go out there for 15minutes, you can go out there
for two hours, whatever amountof time you had, which, which is
a very important thing, issuein golf is the amount of time it
takes.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
I was going to ask you that what's driving this
trend?
Because I'm listening to youlay this out and I'm thinking
two things.
One, I'm thinking our shorteneddetention span.
So I assume it's much shortergame of golf when you call the
fun golf as opposed to the 18holes.
But secondly, the familyoriented activity.
Is that a reflection, Eric, ofthe fact that some golf courses
(33:33):
in communities have had to closeover the years because there've
been fewer golfers and thismaybe brings out this new trend,
brings out the whole family.
So grandma and grandpa aredoing one thing, Parents are
doing another thing.
You know teen kids are doingsomething else.
Is that what we're seeing?
Speaker 2 (33:51):
Yeah, there's two or three things in what you said
and I'll go to the time issuefirst.
It was shown that pre-COVIDgolf was suffering in its
participation and the primaryfactor was the amount of time it
took.
So certainly this small golf isa solution to that.
You can go play by the amountof time you have, rather than
(34:12):
you can hit, stand on the firsttee and four hours later, plus,
you're going to finish on 18 andyou have to, or two if you only
play nine.
So it's a solution to that.
One.
Two is it's very hard for abeginner.
We've discovered it as youalluded to it at the top of the
call.
Golf's a hard game and it'shard for a person who doesn't
(34:32):
play the game to go stand on thefirst tee and play a regulation
golf course.
It's hard.
Two or three holes into it,they're going holy cow.
I've got 15 more holes of this,so it can be.
You know, it's the moral.
Speaker 1 (34:49):
Eric, I have news for you.
I have friends and partnerswho've been playing the same
course for 15 years and by thesecond hole they're already
saying I've got.
Speaker 2 (34:57):
X number of holes.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
It's hard for them too.
Speaker 2 (35:00):
Yeah, they're saying uncle, uncle.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
Yeah, I get it.
Speaker 2 (35:04):
Well, so the small golf, fun golf, is an interim
step between not playing andplaying regulation golf.
You can go out there andpractice.
You can get good instructionnow that's another key part to
this via simulators or just proson the ground helping you with
your, with your short game, sothat you learned how to make get
(35:25):
the ball in the hole and youdon't have to, you know, take
full swings and hit the ball andchase it down out of your
backyard, you know.
So it's an interim step betweennot playing and being a, say, a
core golfer.
That's two and then three.
I mean I can go out there onthat putting green or on that
short course with my grandchild,with my buddies, you know, with
(35:49):
a beer, with a group of us, andplay as a social venue.
You know an after round thingor an event type thing.
Yeah, you can do all that.
It opens up a whole newopportunity as a revenue
producer as well as satisfactionfor members and community.
(36:11):
You know, people, residents inthe community.
It's a new, it's a, it's anincremental revenue source and
it's an incremental activitythat was never used, never
discovered.
You know it's what isincremental, it's it's found and
it's consistent.
Well, that's happening withthis, this small golf component.
I'm I'm thrilled about it.
It's a it's a blast.
(36:32):
If you've never done it, youcan go to a big putting green in
Puttergrain, go to a short gamearea and just goof around for a
while with your friends.
It's a lot of fun.
Speaker 1 (36:43):
Yeah, I'm going to keep my eyes open.
Listen, I've been to Topgolf.
That's a lot of fun.
So what you're describing, I'mgoing to keep my eyes open in my
area to see if that's you know,something that's going to start
cropping up more and more often.
Speaker 2 (36:55):
And it's real golf too.
It's not hitting off a matnecessarily and into a net.
You're still out there in theopen space and real grass and
you have the real feeling ofconnection of hitting a golf
ball, you know.
So it's a real deal, it's fun,it's a lot of fun.
It's kind of has become thesnowboard, you know, the
(37:18):
snowboard of golfing.
Speaker 1 (37:19):
Okay, now you go too far, because I'm a seer.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
Well, you don't like snowboarders, Gotcha Okay.
No, all right you don't have asnowboarding resurrected scheme
right, that's true, snowboardingreally helped that.
The what it's keen rightSnowboarding really helped that.
I'm not sure I know whatindustry you'd call that, but
this is what this small golf isdoing for golf too.
Speaker 1 (37:41):
Well, you're right.
I mean, I think you're right, Ithink innovation is always
going to drive attention to theunderlying industry, right?
Or maybe it's become a littlestale over time, but I wanted to
go back to.
We were talking about designingthe course from scratch.
I imagine you've got a parcelof land.
You've got a lot of wildlifeliving on that land.
(38:01):
What do you do?
Do you even get involved as adesigner, Eric, in terms of what
you do with the wildlife,relocating it, the impact the
course will have on thatwildlife?
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Well, yes, we do.
We probably are not the primaryconsultant in that regard, but
we are initially into theproperty and the land plan.
So, as I said before earlier,you identify those areas.
If habitat is a key part,identify it and designate it and
(38:36):
stay away from it.
The terms are avoid, minimizeand enhance.
So you try to do those things.
I happen to love birds, I loveour Florida birds, particularly
the big birds, and AudubonSanctuary has a program that you
can apply for and they bringyou guidelines and regulation of
(38:57):
how that are tried and true forhow to protect wildlife
particularly, and the course canget that distinction and award
for that type of work.
There's a number of differentenvironmental awards.
You know that all go handtoto-hand with environmental and
wildlife.
They go together right.
So you identify those places,protect them If there's a lot of
(39:37):
.
You know if you've got stuffthat needs to be removed
tortoises, go for tortoises.
You know that's problematic andprobably is more costly.
They tend now to be, tends tobe too costly to remove and
mitigate those animals than itis to build the golf course and
sell real estate whatever it is.
So they get saved and thegovernment has done a good job
of protecting them in thatregard.
Speaker 1 (39:47):
I'm thinking about the pesky gopher in the movie.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
Caddyshack's a buried animal.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
He should not be on the golf course well, he was on
that golf course in that movieyes, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (40:01):
By the way, that's a classic in our office back when
there was 10 of us and 12 of usin the palmer office.
Just a funny story.
We somebody would start a linein that movie and and an hour
later it would finish and we hadall gone through different
parts.
Everybody knew every line inthat movie along the way.
Speaker 1 (40:20):
Hey, even in my law firm we all mostly know every
line in that movie.
But it's funny you talk.
I mean listen, when it comes towildlife you've got courses.
I'm sure where people arehitting near some dangerous
animals like alligators.
On my course we seem to beinundated with noisy Egyptian
geese.
(40:40):
They're everywhere and I don'tthink anybody imported these
animals.
I think they just found thegolf course and they like it.
Speaker 2 (40:49):
Yeah, they're problematic and they're
aggressive too.
Too, as you know, as youprobably know, they're
aggressive.
Don't, uh, don't get, don't gettoo close.
They can be controlled with adog.
It usually is kind of the bestway is to.
You know, border collies arereally good at that, and maybe
two where they're, so they don'tjust chase them from one end to
the other of the golf course.
(41:10):
Um, but that you know, ratherthan eliminating them.
That's than eliminating them.
That's a biological way tocontrol them.
But in the wildlife, with thehabitat and how to help protect
that, you want to save them andkeep the places intact, but try
to keep green corridorsconnecting them too, that go off
(41:32):
property so that they have acorridor in which to travel.
They live a whole different.
You know they live in adifferent place than we do.
Some of them tend to like thegolf course, as those geese do,
but the others are going to wantto stay.
They want to stay in theirnative habitat.
So, rather than isolating them,give them access at either end
of of their of their home sothat they can travel off
(41:55):
property and out into the nativeareas, if there are any around.
Speaker 1 (41:59):
That makes sense.
So I have to ask you you workedfor the Arnold Palmer Company
for so long.
Was Arnold Palmer reallyinvolved?
What was it like working withhim?
Speaker 2 (42:09):
Well, yes, I did.
I worked for him for 29 yearsand he was very involved.
He was not involved in designof bunker right, bunker left, or
what are you doing on this golfhole.
He was not.
He was completely involved inevery project we had.
Who was the client, where wasthe site?
What are they like?
(42:29):
He really wanted to know whatthe people were like more than
anything, and he gave usmandates for design.
They were general but they werefundamental and I've used them
still to this day.
A couple of them.
Well, very, very early on, itwas look, eric, you're spending
somebody else's money.
(42:49):
Do it with integrity, becareful, do it, do it right, do
it right and do it once.
Don't make you know, don't makemistakes, don't check and
double check.
He was very conscious of that.
He that we were working forother people and we were.
We were to satisfy that piecefirst.
Um, as far as the golf designit's and that was the way we
(43:14):
were with the company Everythingit was fair, do it fair, and
that's just typical of ArnoldPalmer.
Speaker 1 (43:19):
He was that.
Yeah, that's great advice forany industry.
Speaker 2 (43:22):
Yeah, exactly, and he lived it.
He was that.
Everything you hear aboutArnold is basically true.
He was of his goodness, hisgentleman-ness, his character.
He was that way every day.
Every gentleman-ness, hischaracter.
He was that way every day,every moment that I was around
him.
(43:44):
He was just a kind, very wise,very wise and practical guy that
came out in the golf coursedesign.
That, he would tell us, is thatlook, don't hide any features,
make it fun for everybody first.
Don't make these things hard.
Make it fun for everybody first.
Don't make these things hard,make them fun for everybody, but
set it up so that if they wantto have a tournament on Sunday,
(44:04):
there's some pins we can gettucked to make it challenging or
you've got a hazard in a place.
That can be a good strategy,that sort of thing.
But he was concerned primarilywith it being friendly first
before challenging.
And he and it was also makethem beautiful.
Make them beautiful, not just,not just, okay, make them
beautiful.
He said if, if people get donewith the golf course and they go
(44:25):
, they don't say much, you don'thave much.
But if they say, man, I hatethat golf course or I love that
golf course, which you're goingto get both, then you've
probably done something toprovoke emotion and you're going
to have fun with it.
But he was just a very commonsense guy.
He was a you know.
I could go on for a long timeof stories about him and just
(44:46):
the evidence, one day after theother, of his character is
caring for other people.
You didn't hear him say I hewas.
Speaker 1 (44:55):
It was golf did this for me, or you know well you
were with him for 29 years, sothat's quite a testament to the
partnership you created.
What, what would you say, aresome of the most memorable
courses you designed and andwhat made them so special?
Speaker 2 (45:11):
well, he never really looked at plans much and that's
all we did, really, unless wewere out in the dirt getting
them built.
We're working on plans and herehe comes I think it was a
yellow cardigan sweater that dayand he comes walking into the
office with this roll of plansunder his arm.
I'm going oh, this is going tobe good, I haven't seen this one
(45:33):
yet.
And he comes rolling back alittle grin.
What do you look?
You know, doesn't take him outfrom under his arm.
And everybody's just going ohman, I'm following around like a
puppy right now, going what it?
Just come on, quit teasing,roll the plans out.
Well, it's pebble beach.
And, um, he was on the boardand we got to basically touch up
every golf hole a little bit atPebble Beach Golf Links and
(45:57):
those changes are still outthere and they're still good.
It was primarily for all of youthat know that golf course,
certainly have seen it ontelevision.
He, which was a little bitunlike Arnold, which a little
atypical of Mr Palmer was.
He pinched the features fromnumber six on six through ten,
(46:17):
closer to the ocean, closer tothe cliff, to make the tee shots
more narrow, to make them alittle bit tougher, and it
really did create a little bitmore challenge in the golf
course.
That it was okay.
He wanted to do it a long timeand we did it, Moved some tees
back, but that was obviously abig deal.
Speaker 1 (46:39):
What about international?
What about one of your mostmemorable international courses?
Speaker 2 (46:43):
Well, my good friend and colleague at Palmer for many
years I was not projectarchitect but Harrison Minchu
was designed the K golf coursefor for Jefferson Smurfett and
they played a Ryder cup overthere and we all went over and
enjoyed that.
So that was, you know, featherin our cap and a feather in our
(47:05):
cap as well.
But you know, we there's 200,there's 250, some Palmer courses
to pick from Donna and we livedevery one of them.
We'd lived every golf hole, youknow, and did the best we could
on all of them.
I designed the golf course withanother colleague, thad Layton,
in Kazakhstan for PresidentNazarbayev at the time in his
(47:29):
yard, I think they played In hisyard.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
How many holes was that, golf course.
Speaker 2 (47:35):
His yard was basically Kazakhstan, I think.
So anyway, they played atournament.
They did play a tournamentthere, but I think on that day
there was probably the only timethere were more.
You know, there were probably140 players, whatever it was.
Speaker 1 (47:49):
That was an 18 hole course in his front yard.
Speaker 2 (47:52):
Ma'am, yes, it was, but he never nobody played it.
Speaker 1 (47:56):
I mean was he at least a good golfer?
What was his handicap?
Speaker 2 (47:59):
You know, honestly, I didn't meet him.
I'm not sure he even played it.
It was for diplomats anddignitaries.
You know it was.
That's a different.
You know I fell.
I fell off of that bus a longtime ago.
They're in a different, that'sa different category.
But I will tell you aboutKazakhstan, which was
interesting.
I went to lunch, we went up themountain.
(48:20):
We could see the mountainsthere and I went up to and we
were at 12,000 feet and it waslike being on the plains and I'm
looking and there's another14,000 feet above us of mountain
.
Mountains were 24,000 feet highcompared to the Rockies or 14.
(48:40):
It was just, it was likemind-boggling of how big those
tall, those mountains were.
Back then we did a golf coursein Jackson Hole, wyoming.
You'd think, oh my gosh, themountains.
It was right underneath HowlingWolf and the Grand Tetons.
It was the flattest golf courseI've ever worked on.
It was dead flat.
There was one foot of fall fromone end of the golf course to
(49:03):
the other.
It's because the Snake Riverhad.
It was in the Snake River, noteven the floodplain, more like
it's a wash.
Speaker 1 (49:13):
Have you played Eric on every course you designed?
Speaker 2 (49:16):
No, I haven't played, not while they were open, not
while they were open.
I played them all before theygot open and we'd call it dirt
golf.
Speaker 1 (49:26):
Why did you call?
It dirt golf.
Speaker 2 (49:28):
Because they hadn't been grassed yet.
Speaker 1 (49:29):
Oh, they hadn't.
Speaker 2 (49:31):
And they were dirt or sand or whatever.
But I have done that and Iplayed a lot of them that are
open and I'm a member of acouple of them that are that are
open and and really, reallyenjoy all that how's your golf
game these days?
Well, um, I'm okay, I'm a, I'ma two handicap I'm working at.
I'm trying to shoot my age I'm70, as I said, Did you say
(49:54):
you're a two.
Speaker 1 (49:54):
I was going to ask you if it was appropriate for me
to inquire about your handicap.
Did you say you're a twohandicap?
Speaker 2 (50:01):
Yes, I am, but I'm quite a pigeon at two, so any
other two handicappers are goingto be licking his chops when
I'm on the tee with them.
Speaker 1 (50:11):
I know some people are going to be very jealous
hearing your handicap.
So, eric, we've been talkingabout golf courses when
everything goes right.
Can we take a moment to talkabout golf courses where things
start going wrong and the coursemay be failing due to aging
members, lack of new members,climbing expenses, whatever it
(50:31):
may be In your opinion, climbingexpenses, whatever it may be in
your opinion, what is the bestcase scenario to pull a failing
golf course out of that path,that downward spiral, and what's
the worst case scenario thatmight occur?
Speaker 2 (50:44):
yeah, donna, this is a terrific question because in
the last decade or so up untiljust recently, when golf has
turned back around, kind of justright around, started covid
through.
Now, as we've talked about,it's gotten to be robust.
Before that it was not in factthe entire golf development,
let's say our new golf coursebusiness, renovation business,
(51:08):
was in a spiral, downward spiral, for many reasons.
One you know, one is, as wetalked, it just takes a lot of
time to play golf, it'sexpensive, et cetera.
So there there were a lot ofthose cases.
We closed more golf coursesthan we opened by five, seven
times for 10, 15 years in a row.
And it was a real issue.
(51:31):
They closed for a number ofreasons, but primarily clubs are
in the dues, private clubs arein the dues business and public
municipal facilities are in thegreens feed business.
So you need players, you need,you need to get people there and
all the clubs are complete,competing with the same, with
the same basket of new players.
(51:53):
So how do you?
How players?
So how do you grab them?
How do you capture them If theclub has not escrowed money for
capital improvements to continueto improve their place and keep
it up in competitioncompetitively with conditionings
, or it's going to struggle andit's going to continue to
decline.
They go into the spiral andeventually may close.
(52:15):
That would be worst casescenario and past that then a
large developer who was able tocarry the burden of holding that
land until he can get itpermitted for development very
likely may convert the wholething into a real estate piece,
and there's a tough one becauseof all the homeowners that
(52:35):
bought in the community havelost that opportunity.
Speaker 1 (52:38):
Do you think some of it is oversaturation in the
market, Eric?
So you may have some areaswhere you just have way too many
golf courses, both private andmunicipal.
Speaker 2 (52:48):
Yeah, I think that's the case.
I think that certainlycontributed to the issue.
We built so many.
Look, golf was driven throughthe early 2010 by the real
estate component and it was kindof build it and they will come,
and by housing.
Well, that did not prove to betrue.
(53:10):
So what do we do with thesefacilities that are struggling
like this?
How do we help them?
How do we resurrect them?
And I've got a lot of experiencein a model that's not not well
known and it can be.
It can be completely arejuvenation of the place and
I've done it a couple times thatI can share.
(53:32):
But it's an infill model ofreal estate, basically, where
you look carefully at the layoutof the golf course and you'll
find that there are empty spaces, and not everywhere.
And this doesn't fit everywhere.
In fact, it only fits in a fewplaces, and not everywhere.
And this doesn't fit everywhere.
In fact it only fits in a fewplaces.
But if a golf course is of sizeenough that it has empty spaces
(53:55):
between golf holes, there aremethods.
There are land planning methods, golf course routing methods
where you can move golf holescloser together and kind of push
all the extra space into onebundle or two bundles, provided
access, and then develop it umas as a uh.
(54:17):
Generally typically they workas single family home
neighborhoods within the golfcourse.
Now you can't um change the usebehind any of the existing
homes because you'll getpushback from those homeowners.
But developers, who would be theones that bring the capital to
the table, and let's talk aboutwhat this provides is that a
(54:42):
developer would come, you do aland plan, you free up some
space that is a developable typepod, let's say, within the
facility.
Developer likes that becausethere is infrastructure in place
, generally there's alreadyutilities brought to the
facility, there's critical massand that it's already an area
(55:04):
where there are home.
You know there is aneighborhood or community or
town and there is a vibrancy.
There's a pent up vibrancy inthe, in the club or in the
community.
So he'll bring capital by theland here Club, sell me this
land.
I like your plan.
I may tweak it a little bit,but but we'll, we'll work on
that.
Here is capital for your planand what for the land.
(55:27):
And what I'm going to do thenis I will mandate membership on
the new homes, on the newresidences, not with the buyer
but with the residents, so thatif the buyer, the homeowner,
moves out, the membershipresides in that property.
So the next buyer is a memberas well.
So you generate capital fromthe land sale and incremental,
(55:49):
which is found in recurringrevenue through dues for the
sale of that property.
Speaker 1 (55:56):
So that's what I wanted to.
I wanted to jump in and saythat because it can't just be a
band-aid.
You'll certainly get the influxof cash when you develop the
property, like you're saying.
By the way, my own golf course,where I live in my home
community, the equity memberswere contemplating this infill
model before.
Ultimately, they sold to twoindividuals who took over the
(56:17):
course and they've done a greatjob.
But this was on the plate, thiswas on the table, this exact
model which there was propertythat they could carve out from
the golf course.
They were going to develop aseries of townhomes.
Of course, in our community itwould have required a completely
different road to get into thatcommunity and we're an existing
HOA.
There were issues with havingthose heavy trucks come down the
(56:39):
main road.
All of that could have beenovercome, but this was the exact
model they were consideringbefore they took a different
path.
There are some interestingchallenges when it comes to
mandating memberships,particularly something as
significant as golf membership.
Right, we're not talking aboutjust a social membership where
you have to go eat some you knowfood at the club once a month
(57:01):
or once a quarter.
Golf membership is a little bitmore of an investment of time
and money.
So you know, you have to lookat the documents.
You have to see whether or notthe golf course is part of
common area for that HOA or it'sseparate.
It was a private club, but itis an interesting model and it
is certainly available.
Having the new community set upfrom inception with membership
(57:25):
being mandatory is muchdifferent than a community
trying to force mandatorymembership later on.
It's a change of developmentscheme.
Speaker 2 (57:33):
Yeah, no question about it.
Change is hard to accept and atyour place, where the white
knights came in and bought itand kept it in place and build
it up, there's your ultimate,you know best, scenario.
But if the white knight doesnot show up, this is a method
that can be done.
Where I've done it the mostsuccessful was here in Atlantic
(57:55):
Beach, florida.
Up here it's a beach communityof Jacksonville.
We had a 180-acre golf course.
It was in the death spiral formemberships and shareholders and
we reconfigured the golf courseand freed up 175 single-family
high-end residential lots rightin the middle of the golf course
(58:16):
.
And another point to theneighborhood is they all wind up
with golf frontage as well, soa developer buys the land and
helps subsidize the fix-up of anew clubhouse.
And then the mandate ofmembership was social only.
They did not mandate full golfmembership.
It was a minimal mandate of asocial membership which
(58:39):
consequently they have.
90% of them have all upgradedto full golf membership.
Speaker 1 (58:46):
That's always the hope, isn't it?
But in our situation, therewasn't going to be enough
available space to build enoughhomes to really make a
difference in terms of runningthe club.
So that's another thing tothink about is how many members
are going to be carrying, howmany new members are going to be
carrying those expenses.
And I still think you need tolook at the underlying causes of
(59:08):
why the club started dying inthe first place, don't you think
?
Speaker 2 (59:11):
Oh yeah, absolutely.
And in this case at AtlanticBeach, it was because the
conditions had gotten so badbecause of a poor water quality
of irrigation.
It had to really redo theentire irrigation system and it
needed a large influx of cashfor capital to rebuild the place
.
So it was much larger scale,yes, than what you're talking
(59:32):
about.
Speaker 1 (59:33):
Now.
Speaker 2 (59:33):
I am doing another project here close by.
We're doing basically the samething, only it's much smaller
scale.
Took a golf hole.
That was not a good hole golfhole.
It had a sharp dog leg to theright, causing a liability issue
on the inside of the landingarea for the homeowner, causing
a liability issue on the insideof the landing area for the
homeowner.
Straightened that hole out andcreated just a little.
(59:58):
It's a seven-acre parcel thatSlough has decided okay, great,
you fixed a bad golf hole.
We have this in our pocket now.
Should we want to develop the15 lots that could come out of
this later, but it did provide,could come out of this later,
but it did provide minimally.
They've got a liability issue.
That went away.
But they now also have.
As, hopefully, prices escalate,land value goes up, they'll
(01:00:19):
have a little nest egg of aproperty piece they could sell
down the road for capitalimprovements.
It doesn't fit everywhere andthe scale of it they're all
different in scale and inconcept and in layout, but it is
an alternative to closure.
That should be, or it'ssomething that should be,
considered prior to closure andit should be considered prior to
(01:00:43):
a sale of the entire facility?
Speaker 1 (01:00:45):
Yeah, something for sure that should be investigated
.
I do want to add that in a lotof instances there may be a
restrictive covenant on the golfcourse property and if that
covenant is still effective,that covenant may prohibit any
sort of development on theproperty.
The land which requires thatreal property to remain open
(01:01:08):
space for recreational use suchas a golf course, doesn't mean
you can't overcome it, but Iagree with you, eric.
I think that when you've got afailing golf course you have to
investigate all possible avenuesto success.
Speaker 2 (01:01:23):
Yeah, and this is simply an option to pursue.
Speaker 1 (01:01:26):
Yeah, but you've been listen.
You've been so great with yourtime today.
This has been such aninteresting topic.
I'm excited to see the newtrends.
You talk about the fun golf orshort golf venue.
Where can people find you?
And please tell us what you'redoing these days in terms of
design.
Who's your target client?
Speaker 2 (01:01:47):
Well, my target client is anybody that's going
to build a golf course orrenovate their golf course, and
I can help with that.
I have a lot of experience in alot of different types and tend
to keep an eye more so on itfrom a business aspect,
particularly as a part of acommunity than as a standalone
type golf course.
(01:02:07):
I will say that with envy tothe others that have had this
opportunity.
I really haven't had theopportunity of a world-class
site where I can go do afantastic Sandhills or Band and
Dudes type facility and thoseare happening around here and I
would love to have thatopportunity.
My skill set tends to be morein the, you know, in the
(01:02:30):
satisfaction as the golf as partof a community.
Just to just our audience here,look, my phone number, if
anybody cares, is 904-631-7480,904-631-7480.
And you can email me and I willrespond equally and look
(01:02:52):
forward to hearing from anybody.
Eric is with a K-E-R-I-K atLarson L-A-R-S-E-N golf, like
the game of golf dot net Eric atLarsonGolfnet.
Donna, I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (01:03:06):
Thanks, eric.
Thank you for joining us today.
Don't forget to follow and rateus on your favorite podcast
platform, or visitTakeItToTheBoardcom for more
ways to connect.
Hi everyone, I'm attorney Donna DiMaggio-Berger
and this is Take it to the Board, where we speak condo and HOA.
Today, on the Take it to theBoard podcast, we're trading the
boardroom for the fairway.
Whether you're a scratch golferor the kind who scratches their
head wondering why that littlewhite ball won't cooperate.
Our conversation today withgolf course designer Eric Larson
(00:24):
should be illuminating.
Eric and I are going to betalking about a game that's been
driving people to both theheight of excitement and the
depths of frustration forcenturies.
Speaking of centuries, golf isconsidered to be over 500 years
old, with its origins datingback to Scotland during the 15th
century.
While similar games involving aball and a stick existed in
(00:44):
ancient times, it was inScotland where the game began to
take on its contemporary form,including the concept of 18
holes and specific rules.
The earliest recorded mentionof golf was in 1457, when King
James II of Scotland banned thegame because it was distracting
his soldiers from their archerypractice.
We're so drawn to the sport ofgolf today, which is why I am so
(01:06):
happy to be able to discuss thetopic with Eric Larson.
Eric is an accomplished andexperienced golf course
architect, having designed andoverseen construction of nearly
100 golf courses around theworld.
He designed 95 Arnold Palmersignature courses as the project
architect for the Arnold PalmerDesign Company from 1983 until
(01:27):
2011.
Eric became Vice President ofthe Arnold Palmer Design Company
in 2003.
Eric was also the President ofthe Acclaimed American Society
of Golf Course Architects.
Eric has overseen golf courseprojects in 26 US states and 14
countries.
He has designed courses thatare used in tournament play,
such as the US Open 14 countries.
He has designed courses thatare used in tournament play,
such as the US Open, the BobHope Classic, the Champions Tour
(01:49):
and more.
So we are really excited tohave him on the podcast today.
Eric, welcome to Take it to theBoard.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
Thank you so much, Donna.
Speaker 1 (01:56):
So let's dig into it.
First of all I want to sayright off the bat I'm not a
golfer.
So I know the basics of thegame and I've lived on a golf
course for many years.
I even like to go to thedriving range from time to time,
but I never feel confidentenough to go out on my 18 hole
golf course.
I do okay on a par three, Iwill do that, but my dad was a
(02:17):
big golfer.
I have friends and law partnerswho have a love hate
relationship with the game, so Iam semi-fluent in golf.
Speaker 2 (02:26):
Well, you cut across a broad spectrum right now, then
, actually, of all theinhabitants of golf course
communities, really only 25 to30% do play golf.
The others do not.
And you also mentioned that youlike a par three tournament.
Maybe we'll get into this atsome point, or a par three
tournament.
Maybe we'll get into this atsome point, or some par three
(02:46):
golf, and maybe we can get intothat.
But that is a it's not evenreally an emerging trend anymore
.
It is, it's now almost anecessity in a golf course
community, and particularly ifthere's renovation and
improvements being made.
Speaker 1 (03:01):
Well, that's.
That's a great statistic toknow, eric, that many of my
neighbors are probably like me,that they like the openness and
the beauty of living on a golfcourse, but they're not
necessarily golfers.
So we will talk about that.
But I first wanted to ask youwhat inspired you to pursue a
career in golf design.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
Well, it's actually a long story, I guess.
To start is I have worked ongolf courses and played golf
since I was seven, eight yearsold, in fact, my first job, you
know, I got thinking about it.
I've been working on golfcourses since I was nine.
I'm 70.
So do the math, do the math onthat, we'll just, we'll just get
(03:39):
my age out there, wait, wait,wait.
Speaker 1 (03:40):
Nine years old, there's child labor laws, eric.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
Well, wait, wait, wait, nine years old, there's
child labor laws, eric.
Well, I did it willingly, I'lltell you.
I don't even remember what Iwas making, but it wasn't more
than it was.
Not more than three or fourdollars an hour, I can tell you
that.
And but it was.
I was hooked from the start tobe out on the green grass and
the big open spaces and thisbeautiful playing field.
You know dynamic, because itchanges, and so I stayed in
basically agronomy, golf coursemaintenance through college,
even took turf grass andagronomy in college and got a
(04:12):
little.
I wanted to play, but I was notreally patient enough to make a
good player and my father gotme interested in design and I
got into landscape architecture,fell in love with the design.
Design is a process, by the way, maybe we can touch on that at
some point.
Then learned the design process.
(04:34):
I'm not great.
I am not great graphically, Idon't draw well, but design
process is basically problemsolving and that was a skill set
that I found out that I had.
So you know, I got intolandscape architecture.
I had a landscape company butit was mostly geared toward the
residential landscape andsmaller scale design work and I
(04:56):
really wanted to do large scaleplanning and at the time this
would have been in the early.
This would have been in theearly, this would have been in
the uh, the uh, early 80s, late70s, early 80s and the large the
.
The growth of golf coursecommunities was robust and it
was really in that area wherelarge, there, where there was a
(05:16):
lot of opportunity inlarge-scale planning.
So yeah, you know it's thelittle guy with the hammer hit
me in the back of the head andsaid you know golf course
architecture, you've got youmarried.
The little guy with the hammerhit me in the back of the head
and said you know golf coursearchitecture, You've got the
experience.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
You married the two experiences.
But did you grow up somewherewhere year-round golf was an
option, Eric?
Speaker 2 (05:34):
I was fortunate.
I grew up in a little town inIowa, newton Iowa.
The Maytag family was in myhometown and had built the
Maytag washer and dryer plants.
My father was an executive withthe Maytag company and we were
able to join the local countryclub, and so that's where I
started working as a kid andplaying the nine hole golf
(05:55):
course, as there are many ofthose in the Midwest,
particularly Iowa.
And so, yes, I was exposed togolf and it was a you know, it
was.
Get up in the morning, go tothe golf course, work, play golf
, go swimming in the afternoonand play baseball and eat.
Get up, you know, and thenrepeat.
Speaker 1 (06:11):
And sounds ideal, but there were months you couldn't
play in Iowa, so it's not likeFlorida or any of our Sunbelt
states.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
Yeah, we could play golf, but we sure did a lot of
sledding on the golf course.
So yeah, so you know, I got adegree in landscape architecture
, I started the business andthen I called.
I eventually said it came uponme golf course architecture.
I got actually kind of thrilledwatching the tournament players
(06:39):
championship right here acrossthe street from me.
I'm in Ponte Vedra Beach,florida, for the first time in
the stadium course that acolleague and mentor rest in
peace.
Pete Dye designed and rememberI was on the couch in Iowa and
said wait a minute, what am Ilooking at?
You can do that sort of thing,that art.
You know those dramatic, youknow those dramatic slopes and
(07:06):
targets on the golf course inthose vast bunkering.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
I said I'm in, I'm going, I'm in you were
fascinated Is it possible, inyour opinion, to be a golf
course designer without havingthat knowledge of landscape and
plant material?
Speaker 2 (07:27):
The answer is yes, you can.
You don't need to knowlandscape and plant material.
There's always somebody thatcan tell you what trees to plant
, and it's primarily trees.
It's not a landscape likeshrubbery and bushes and stuff.
Those are really too smallscale.
You're going to do more of massplanting of trees.
But yes, you can which you can'tbe a golf course architect.
(07:48):
You cannot be a golf coursearchitect and not have the
understanding of engineering,particularly drainage and grade
work, and then the, the artistrythat goes on top of that, both
these, the strategy of play andthe beauty, overall beauty, of a
golf course.
But those are all secondary tosafety, which we, which is going
(08:13):
to be very relevant to this, tothis audience, and how a golf
course relates to and isadjacent to communities.
You know an hoa property safetyis first.
Safety is always first and it'sparamount and the work we do is
we lay on the very front end ofit.
As we lay out a golf course,then, with the function of it,
(08:34):
the drainage, irrigation,feature, construction, that's
all underground.
People don't really evenunderstand that or need to, but
those two have to be in placebefore you get to the call it
the icing on the cake of thereal beauty, the strategy bunker
placement, shapes of greens,those sorts of things that bring
out the real playability andfun in the golf course.
Speaker 1 (08:56):
Sure, Well, let's talk about designing golf
courses that are part of aresidential community homeowners
association.
I think I just mentioned thatI've lived in a golf course
community for years.
The golf course is not part ofthe HOA common areas, it's a
separate country club.
But many of our neighbors dosupport the club and our members
, whether it's social or tennisor golf.
(09:18):
I live on the fourth hole.
I will tell you, Eric, thatover time I've seen more and
more errant golf balls.
I mean, if there's a golf ballon my patio, I know somebody is
not a great golfer.
If it's in my front, on myfront doorstep, it's even worse.
So how do you go aboutapproaching design of golf
courses that are ringed or thatare located inside a community
(09:42):
association?
Speaker 2 (09:44):
Well, first.
Well, as I said, it's safetyfirst and there are industry
standards for setbacks, for thedistance from the center line of
the golf hole to the back ofthe property line, and they're
not regulated.
It's not law, but there areindustry standards which you
would understand.
So and that is typically fromcenter line and we work from
(10:08):
like on a par four, threedifferent spots, which would
have a spot for a T, a spot forthe angle turn or landing area
in the middle of the fairway anda spot in the middle of the
green and you connect the lineto those three spots and then
going laterally from there atthe T angle turning green it's
(10:29):
150 feet, basically 175 feet ifyou can get it each direction.
So a corridor width ofbasically 350 feet wide is the
corridor within the area for thegolf course.
The T's fairways and greensthemselves are much smaller than
that.
They fit inside that.
So there's a buffer area forsafety outside that.
(10:50):
And then the setback of thebuildings out within the
property is something we don'thave any bearing on.
We don't have any say in that.
The developer, the owners, willdetermine that amount.
So we have to create a safetysetback that the back of the
property line is safe.
Now let me say that you can'tmake them 100% safe.
(11:13):
It's not possible.
You can put somewhere.
There's going to be a guy or agirl that's strong and can hit a
ball a long ways, and itdoesn't take a rocket scientist
to know that.
The longer a ball goes offline,the farther it's going to go
offline.
That may mean your backyard oryour front step or your rooftop
(11:36):
or whatever.
Speaker 1 (11:37):
And you know when that typically happens is when
you've got somebody playing on agolf course for the first time.
I remember being out inCordillera and my husband had a
caddy and he wasn't listening.
It was the first time he playedthe course and he, as the ball
was flying, said no, he hit itway too hard and way too hard.
So do you agree that sometimesit's just people who don't know
(12:00):
the course also?
Speaker 2 (12:02):
Yeah, there's no question that that would have
bearing on errant shots, there'sno doubt about that or just
trying to do early in the round.
You know, on the fourth holethey may not be warmed up yet.
Typically, gray shots are tothe right.
Most people hit the ball leftto right.
So we're more cognizant ofsafety factors to be put in
(12:24):
place to the right of the golfhole, particularly the right,
immediately right of the teeshot, to keep homes and property
safe.
But, donna, it's the keyquestion for residential, for
HOA, condominium, whatever unitit is that is adjacent to or
runs parallel to the golf course.
That that's first and it comesvery early on in the planning
(12:47):
and it's the gospel you makethose lines.
There is another teammatethat's always involved the civil
engineer who's in charge ofgetting it approved, that he
basically plats those lots andthey become legal documents.
So that's an item that anyqualified golf course architect
and I encourage anybody that'slistening if they're going to
(13:10):
hire one, go to the ASTCA, theAmerican Society of Golf Course
Architects.
Everybody in our society hasmet a stringent set of
qualifications for the work wecan do and have done and that's
how we're allowed.
So it gives you a comfort.
You know confidence and acomfort level of any hire from
within the ASGCA.
Speaker 1 (13:31):
Have you ever said put on a course, eric, where you
said, oh no, this is not safe,this was not set up with the
correct setbacks?
Speaker 2 (13:38):
Yeah, you can, I can tell it immediately and it would
usually, you know, be almostalways done by a
non-professional and even I'dsay that carefully, because
there are professional golfersthat have laid out golf courses
but they are not professionalarchitects and they at times
could, without knowledge andexperience, could create unsafe
(13:59):
situations is it fair to saythat it's sometimes going to
sacrifice playability for safety?
It's very fair to say you do itoften.
You also sacrifice beauty, andI will tell you that.
What is the age of your, what'sthe age of your community?
Donna?
Speaker 1 (14:16):
It was.
Let's see my golf coursecommunity early 80s.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
Yeah, so you're of the vintage.
That was the very typical inthat you have probably have.
Do you look across your fairwayand there's homes on the other
side?
Speaker 1 (14:29):
No, actually.
So I was going to talk to youabout my community because my
community, the golf course, wasredesigned, eric, by the Florida
, by DOT for water drainage, soI had a different view before
that redesign.
Yes, I had a different viewbefore that redesign.
Yes, I looked across Afterwards.
It was completely differentwhere there's coverage with
trees and it was much prettierafter the redesign.
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Well, that's good, great, good work, good work.
What I was getting at is thatin that vintage of 70s, 80s, 90s
, even into just the early 2000s, even into just the early 2000s
, the land plan model ofpreference was to what we call a
double load, or load thefairways with houses along both
(15:12):
sides of the fairways so thatyou could maximize the frontage
for the real estate, becausethere's a premium for being on
the golf course versus not onthat amenity.
Water tends to get more of apremium, but golf always had
provided a premium fordevelopers, so they maximized
the amount of homes on golf.
(15:34):
What that did was, if you flyyou mentioned Cordillera well,
keep going west and fly overPalm Springs or Arizona and look
down and you see it in SouthFlorida and a lot of larger
communities in Florida as well.
If you look down, you see thesegreen sausages that are linked
together.
Those are golf holes and thenthe house, house, house, house
(15:56):
along each side is so successful.
It actually fueled the boom ingolf course communities through
the, like you say, 80s and 90s,and golf would not be where it
is without that type ofdevelopment.
But that type of developmentbecame redundant.
They tend to look alike and youhave to work within the
(16:17):
corridors an architect and anartist to come up with different
look and feel.
Well, you only have that, somuch space to do that, and
particularly in Florida, whereit's flat, it's, you know, it's
a challenge to try to createanything of real, unique beauty.
Speaker 1 (16:31):
No for sure.
Well, I wanted to talk to youabout aesthetics, because when
you're dealing with golf coursesinside homeowners associations,
it must be very difficult tokeep everyone happy.
The players want to have acourse that challenges them.
The people living in the homeswant a beautiful view.
Those two things don't alwaysgo hand in hand.
Speaker 2 (16:51):
Well, they can, though, and you?
Those two things don't alwaysgo hand in hand.
Well they can, though, andyou're right, they don't.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
But they certainly can, and that's what you strive
for.
My view on the fourth hole wasmuch improved after DOT came in
and redesigned it.
We had more water Becausebefore it was a narrow canal
then they opened it up and itwas almost a lake and beautiful
trees and some hills and somesand in the distance.
I mean, it really was night andday, eric, in terms of the
(17:18):
design, but I imagine sometimesit's the reverse you may
actually go from having abeautiful view to one that's
less so.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
Yeah, they got compromised.
Yeah, In fact, yours would bekind of unique.
Actually that doesn't usuallyhappen by the DOT and I hope
they're not listening but theimportance of a view to the
layman, particularly to the 75%of you all that don't play golf
but live on the golf course.
It does not have anything to dowith design, to tell you the
(17:49):
truth.
It does not have anything to dowith design, to tell you the
truth.
It does have everything to dowith beauty, which comes from
primarily the condition of thegolf course.
If the grass is healthy anduniform and green and bright and
vibrant and you havewell-manicured bunkers that are
clean and white, with nice edgesand create that nice contrast,
(18:10):
that's the beauty and mostpeople don't pass that.
They still have the big view,they have the vista.
But if the vista is unsightlybecause the golf course is not
in good shape, that's going tobe an issue.
It could be unsightly and be asgood a golf course as Augusta
National, but if it's not wellkept, most people will not like
(18:34):
that.
And look, I'm the architect,I'm the designer, saying the
design is what's all important.
It actually is not.
It's the condition of the golfcourse that not only brings
people the average person to thegolf course.
It's what provides the value tothe real estate and HOA
communities around the outsideof it.
(18:54):
So the importance ofmaintenance cannot be overlooked
for communities, for HOAs thatown the golf course, whoever
does, or in their relationshipwith the clubs that do own it.
Speaker 1 (19:04):
That's a great point.
I mean our golf course.
I will tell you it's pristine.
Sometimes I'm up super early,eric and I see them out there at
4.35 in the morning with themachinery they're grooming the
fairway.
It's amazing.
But for those of us who livealong there, should we be
concerned about all thepesticides spraying and
(19:25):
everything else that goes intomaintenance?
Speaker 2 (19:27):
I don't think you need to be overly concerned.
No, and I've been in thisbusiness for 40 years now I mean
60, if you count when I startedwhen I was seven.
If there is overspray, it's allspecific, it's site-specific,
Donna, and it's also specific tothe applicator, the
superintendents these days.
And if you're living on apristine golf course, you've got
(19:49):
a good guy, there's no question.
And not only is he good at whathe's applying, he's good at how
he applies it.
That's regulated, that'slicensed.
You can't just go out and spraystuff.
You have to have the approvalto do that and you have to have
the approval to buy certainchemicals.
The FDA is very conscious ofwhat goes on a golf course.
So that's one thing and thatwould come primarily for you
(20:13):
would run into problem basicallyjust from two ways.
One is going to get wind.
It's going to be windborneparticulates which, if you watch
the sprayers now, they're onlyabout a foot off the ground, so
they really there isn't anyspray, outward spray.
The other would be runoff,stormwater runoff.
It's very seldom thatstormwater runoff goes off the
(20:35):
golf course.
It has to be contained in thegolf course, go into a drainage,
major drainage system that tiesin with the major drainage
system of the community.
Speaker 1 (20:45):
Listen, if I see them out there spraying, I'm not
going to be sitting out readinga book while they're doing this.
So I tend to go inside, butI've always wondered is there
any potential negative impactsto the adjacent homes?
You know, with regard to thepesticides?
Certainly, you may not have anypests in your trees and bushes
(21:06):
in your yard either, but youknow, but if you leave your
animals outside, if you leaveyour pets outside, things like
that.
Speaker 2 (21:12):
You know.
I think it's also a factor ofhow you feel about that
personally.
It depends on your sensitivityto that issue.
Certainly, they're spraying yes, they're spraying, and they're
spraying pesticides andherbicides that are limited in
damage to animal life they justhave to be now.
(21:35):
But they're also extremelyskilled in how they apply stuff
and in my experience I haven'tseen any issues.
I have not seen an issue, asingle issue actually where
there's been a problem withoverspray or runoff from
chemical into a real estatepiece surrounding a golf course.
Speaker 1 (21:53):
That's great to know.
I did want to ask you, whenyou're designing your golf
courses, eric, what steps do youtake to make sure they're
environmentally friendly andsustainable, for instance, if
you're designing a course likein a drought prone area, or if
you're designing a course youknow located near saltwater?
I assume that there's differentfactors you take into account
for those differences ingeography.
Speaker 2 (22:15):
Yes, there are.
They both fall into the designprocess, though, and, which is
the first, you develop a programof what do you have, what does
the property offer, what do youneed, what do you want and how
do you get there.
And in the program developmentof what do you have as with you
know, what do you want and howdo you get there, and then the
program development of what doyou have as with you know, what
are the components of thisfacility going to be, how much
(22:38):
real estate do you need?
Is there a hotel?
Is there?
What are the natural water,what is the natural drainage
system and what are the nativeelements that are critical to
maintain, to avoid, to minimizeimpact and actually to enhance.
And those go into the hopper.
To start with.
Those go on the map, they getcircled in red.
(23:00):
They are either no touch or howdo we help make them better?
And you have.
Usually, there is there againthe civil engineer, and someone
within his, usually within hiscompany is going to give you
regulation on what you can andcannot do with the sensitive
entire environmental areas.
Speaker 1 (23:17):
Is the goal to work around, Eric, what you have, for
instance, if you have oldgrowth trees- yeah, donna, it's
actually regulated.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
It depends on what the feature is.
If it's wetlands, you cannottouch it.
Like you mentioned, saltwater,you can't touch it, you can't
drain anything into it.
All water, everything has tomove away from that.
In fact you create a bufferusually 50 to 100 foot buffer of
vegetation along that edgethat's delineated by an
(23:45):
environmental specialist or acivil engineer and approved by,
say in your case, south FloridaWater Management.
They stamp everything andthat's a no-touch zone.
Now, in some cases they'reunsightly and you just play
around them.
In some cases they're beautifuland you want them to be a part
of the golf course as a featurefor strategy and beauty and you
(24:06):
can play close to them and overthem and it really creates, as I
said earlier, the nativeelement, creates the character
of your golf course.
So you want to use those.
The desert situation, droughtareas are different.
They're generally not regulated.
(24:27):
What is regulated is the amountof water you can use.
So you try to create kind ofwhat we call an out-of-play area
or big areas where there reallyaren't going to be many golf
shots, say behind tees, you know, along the sides of tees and
back behind tees, and you takethem out of turf.
They're not in irrigated turf,they would be in a.
(24:49):
You know, here we use coquina,a lot or concrete screenings,
and out west you're going to usenative desert basically or
caliche they call it and createthese big areas that are there's
no vegetation.
But the main issue is you don'tirrigate it so that you're
paying attention to the amountof water use.
Speaker 1 (25:11):
Are there any areas where you just you have to say
no, we cannot put a golf coursehere, no matter how badly you
want it, we can't make it happengeographically.
Speaker 2 (25:20):
There are, and it's.
That would be.
Yes, you mentioned saltwater.
That would be.
There's some fantastic.
You know, I'm up here inJacksonville.
There's some beautiful dunesnorth of the St John's river.
Just be like, oh my gosh, butyou can't.
You know it's, it's a, it's afederal preserve and it's on the
ocean and it's you can't.
(25:41):
You can't go there, you can'tdo that.
You can't build on cliffs inareas for safety, for one but
for their unstable condition offalling off or sloughing off.
Speaker 1 (25:56):
Yeah, you don't want that to happen, no matter how
good a golfer?
Speaker 2 (25:58):
you are no, but you do want to.
As an architect, you do look atthese sites just with well you
know, with desire to, to be ableto lay some golf holes out
there when you know it reallyisn't going to impact anything,
particularly in our minds.
Any environmentalist wouldargue differently.
So you just respect that andmove on.
(26:20):
It's different.
It used to be double loadingfairways with homes to maximize
real estate.
The golf boom was primarilyunderwritten by the real estate
piece.
There's a boom going on rightnow, unlike anything I've ever
seen.
It's down there, close to you,out from Hope Sound and other
places in Florida, where they'rebuilding terrific golf courses,
(26:42):
but they're building them aswhat we would call four golf
courses, where you have a blockof golf or you have a block of
golf picture a frying pan on anoven and the golf course is the
frying pan and all the realestate or residential is around
the outside of it.
You're not lining the fairwayswith homes and what that does is
create a better opportunity formaking really cool golf course.
(27:07):
Golf course, you don't have toworry about views from
homeowners or or runoff andstuff, and can move dirt up, and
they can.
You can lift dirt, so you sothat you're creating uphill
shots when you're not blockingviews from homes, because you
struggle, as I mentioned, youstruggle to create the third
dimension here in florida, andso it lets you take the
components of your development,of your community and kind of
(27:30):
place them where they reallykind of want to be, rather than
mesh them all together in a in areal uniform model of land plan
.
that was done before so that youcreate the value of the, of the
address of the of the community, rather than the individual
address of each home along thefairway.
So the whole place goes up invalue as the golf course is
(27:53):
better, your recreationalamenities are better, you've
created neighborhoods moreneighborhood-like, rather than
long runs of homes and stuffalong roads, and that has gained
traction as a favorable modelfor design and land planning.
Speaker 1 (28:13):
Well, and it sounds like you're spreading out the
enhanced real property valueamongst all the homes, not just
the ones sitting on the golfcourse.
Speaker 2 (28:20):
That's exactly right.
Yeah, well said.
Speaker 1 (28:23):
And it also sounds like you have as a golf course
designer in that type of concept, you have more freedom when it
comes to designing the course.
Speaker 2 (28:31):
That's exactly correct.
Speaker 1 (28:33):
I assume you like this trend, Eric.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
The trend is good is because it makes the quality of
each component better and moreunique.
It makes each development itsown character and I believe I
think that's very important justfor the golf course itself.
There are a lot of designersthat do a certain style and it's
been very successful for them,and there are our group.
(28:58):
When I was with Arnold, withPalmer, we didn't have a certain
style.
We did a lot of different typesof things, and you know.
So there's just there's adifferent way to go about that.
I believe that the golf courseshould have the character.
Go about that.
I believe that the golf courseshould have the character it
shouldn't be of the character ofthe architect, so that it is a
reflection of the community ofwhich the golf course resides.
(29:20):
That applies also to the entireamenity package Is there green
space, you have walking trails,pickleball is a huge new thing
growing flash pools, et cetera.
As those things come togetherby the portfolio of what those
items are, along with where youplace them and how you interact
in that community, gives theplace its character.
(29:42):
And that's, I mean, let's faceit, golf is just, at its basis,
a social gathering, form ofrecreation.
That's what it's about.
It happens to be wellunderwritten with infrastructure
of maintaining golf courses andan entire you know a handicap
system in the PGA where you canhave events and drive action
together, interaction events, etcetera, all creating this
(30:06):
terrific venue and veryimportant venue for communities,
as it turns out, and it's evenbeing exposed even more as being
a very valuable amenity andrecreational activity for humans
.
Speaker 1 (30:21):
In this new venue concept Eric, what would be the
driving factor for the characterof the community?
Would it be the golf course oris it all?
Would it be the homes?
Would it be the otherrecreational amenities, or do
you believe the golf course isstill the driving factor in
terms of establishing thecharacter for that community?
Speaker 2 (30:42):
This is a really good question and I hope there's
some.
I wish there would be adeveloper that could call in and
echo what I'm about to say inthat in the past it used to be
the golf course.
Golf was king and it was thecharacter driver oh, I'm at, you
know wherever.
Oh, yeah, the golf course isgreat and that's still important
(31:03):
.
Golf is still important, but itis only important now as a
piece of the amenity package,which must include
family-oriented activity besidesgolf, where you can go in.
Again, it's all about socialinteraction, and that
interaction now has transcendedfrom just golf to the other
(31:24):
forms of recreation and activityor even business centers within
the clubhouse sort of thing.
Golf is all I mean.
You see it in golf itself.
If I let me get let me not getover my skis here and stick with
my own, my own skillset Golfitself has changed in that, like
you were saying, you like toplay the par three, par three
(31:47):
holes.
Well, a lot of people so much sothat it's the number one added
activity to.
I call it real golf.
There's off-course golf andthere's on-course golf now, with
off-course golf, the phenomenonthat top golf has created is
actually the fastest-growingsport.
It's the fastest-growing sportand it's a much faster growing
(32:12):
segment of golf than on-coursegolf.
The fastest growing segment ofon-course golf is this I call it
fun golf, small golf, and itmay just a space for um for, for
(32:34):
, for less than regulation,whole golf in close to the
clubhouse, close to food andbeverage, and there's probably
an entertainment piece to it.
You've got a, you know, a alittle food court or or, or a
banner or an extension of theclubhouse that services that
(32:55):
area where you're playing golf.
You're out there by the amountof time you have.
You can go out there for 15minutes, you can go out there
for two hours, whatever amountof time you had, which, which is
a very important thing, issuein golf is the amount of time it
takes.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
I was going to ask you that what's driving this
trend?
Because I'm listening to youlay this out and I'm thinking
two things.
One, I'm thinking our shorteneddetention span.
So I assume it's much shortergame of golf when you call the
fun golf as opposed to the 18holes.
But secondly, the familyoriented activity.
Is that a reflection, Eric, ofthe fact that some golf courses
(33:33):
in communities have had to closeover the years because there've
been fewer golfers and thismaybe brings out this new trend,
brings out the whole family.
So grandma and grandpa aredoing one thing, Parents are
doing another thing.
You know teen kids are doingsomething else.
Is that what we're seeing?
Speaker 2 (33:51):
Yeah, there's two or three things in what you said
and I'll go to the time issuefirst.
It was shown that pre-COVIDgolf was suffering in its
participation and the primaryfactor was the amount of time it
took.
So certainly this small golf isa solution to that.
You can go play by the amountof time you have, rather than
(34:12):
you can hit, stand on the firsttee and four hours later, plus,
you're going to finish on 18 andyou have to, or two if you only
play nine.
So it's a solution to that.
One.
Two is it's very hard for abeginner.
We've discovered it as youalluded to it at the top of the
call.
Golf's a hard game and it'shard for a person who doesn't
(34:32):
play the game to go stand on thefirst tee and play a regulation
golf course.
It's hard.
Two or three holes into it,they're going holy cow.
I've got 15 more holes of this,so it can be.
You know, it's the moral.
Speaker 1 (34:49):
Eric, I have news for you.
I have friends and partnerswho've been playing the same
course for 15 years and by thesecond hole they're already
saying I've got.
Speaker 2 (34:57):
X number of holes.
Speaker 1 (34:59):
It's hard for them too.
Speaker 2 (35:00):
Yeah, they're saying uncle, uncle.
Speaker 1 (35:02):
Yeah, I get it.
Speaker 2 (35:04):
Well, so the small golf, fun golf, is an interim
step between not playing andplaying regulation golf.
You can go out there andpractice.
You can get good instructionnow that's another key part to
this via simulators or just proson the ground helping you with
your, with your short game, sothat you learned how to make get
(35:25):
the ball in the hole and youdon't have to, you know, take
full swings and hit the ball andchase it down out of your
backyard, you know.
So it's an interim step betweennot playing and being a, say, a
core golfer.
That's two and then three.
I mean I can go out there onthat putting green or on that
short course with my grandchild,with my buddies, you know, with
(35:49):
a beer, with a group of us, andplay as a social venue.
You know an after round thingor an event type thing.
Yeah, you can do all that.
It opens up a whole newopportunity as a revenue
producer as well as satisfactionfor members and community.
(36:11):
You know, people, residents inthe community.
It's a new, it's a, it's anincremental revenue source and
it's an incremental activitythat was never used, never
discovered.
You know it's what isincremental, it's it's found and
it's consistent.
Well, that's happening withthis, this small golf component.
I'm I'm thrilled about it.
It's a it's a blast.
(36:32):
If you've never done it, youcan go to a big putting green in
Puttergrain, go to a short gamearea and just goof around for a
while with your friends.
It's a lot of fun.
Speaker 1 (36:43):
Yeah, I'm going to keep my eyes open.
Listen, I've been to Topgolf.
That's a lot of fun.
So what you're describing, I'mgoing to keep my eyes open in my
area to see if that's you know,something that's going to start
cropping up more and more often.
Speaker 2 (36:55):
And it's real golf too.
It's not hitting off a matnecessarily and into a net.
You're still out there in theopen space and real grass and
you have the real feeling ofconnection of hitting a golf
ball, you know.
So it's a real deal, it's fun,it's a lot of fun.
It's kind of has become thesnowboard, you know, the
(37:18):
snowboard of golfing.
Speaker 1 (37:19):
Okay, now you go too far, because I'm a seer.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
Well, you don't like snowboarders, Gotcha Okay.
No, all right you don't have asnowboarding resurrected scheme
right, that's true, snowboardingreally helped that.
The what it's keen rightSnowboarding really helped that.
I'm not sure I know whatindustry you'd call that, but
this is what this small golf isdoing for golf too.
Speaker 1 (37:41):
Well, you're right.
I mean, I think you're right, Ithink innovation is always
going to drive attention to theunderlying industry, right?
Or maybe it's become a littlestale over time, but I wanted to
go back to.
We were talking about designingthe course from scratch.
I imagine you've got a parcelof land.
You've got a lot of wildlifeliving on that land.
(38:01):
What do you do?
Do you even get involved as adesigner, Eric, in terms of what
you do with the wildlife,relocating it, the impact the
course will have on thatwildlife?
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Well, yes, we do.
We probably are not the primaryconsultant in that regard, but
we are initially into theproperty and the land plan.
So, as I said before earlier,you identify those areas.
If habitat is a key part,identify it and designate it and
(38:36):
stay away from it.
The terms are avoid, minimizeand enhance.
So you try to do those things.
I happen to love birds, I loveour Florida birds, particularly
the big birds, and AudubonSanctuary has a program that you
can apply for and they bringyou guidelines and regulation of
(38:57):
how that are tried and true forhow to protect wildlife
particularly, and the course canget that distinction and award
for that type of work.
There's a number of differentenvironmental awards.
You know that all go handtoto-hand with environmental and
wildlife.
They go together right.
So you identify those places,protect them If there's a lot of
(39:37):
.
You know if you've got stuffthat needs to be removed
tortoises, go for tortoises.
You know that's problematic andprobably is more costly.
They tend now to be, tends tobe too costly to remove and
mitigate those animals than itis to build the golf course and
sell real estate whatever it is.
So they get saved and thegovernment has done a good job
of protecting them in thatregard.
Speaker 1 (39:47):
I'm thinking about the pesky gopher in the movie.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
Caddyshack's a buried animal.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
He should not be on the golf course well, he was on
that golf course in that movieyes, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (40:01):
By the way, that's a classic in our office back when
there was 10 of us and 12 of usin the palmer office.
Just a funny story.
We somebody would start a linein that movie and and an hour
later it would finish and we hadall gone through different
parts.
Everybody knew every line inthat movie along the way.
Speaker 1 (40:20):
Hey, even in my law firm we all mostly know every
line in that movie.
But it's funny you talk.
I mean listen, when it comes towildlife you've got courses.
I'm sure where people arehitting near some dangerous
animals like alligators.
On my course we seem to beinundated with noisy Egyptian
geese.
(40:40):
They're everywhere and I don'tthink anybody imported these
animals.
I think they just found thegolf course and they like it.
Speaker 2 (40:49):
Yeah, they're problematic and they're
aggressive too.
Too, as you know, as youprobably know, they're
aggressive.
Don't, uh, don't get, don't gettoo close.
They can be controlled with adog.
It usually is kind of the bestway is to.
You know, border collies arereally good at that, and maybe
two where they're, so they don'tjust chase them from one end to
the other of the golf course.
(41:10):
Um, but that you know, ratherthan eliminating them.
That's than eliminating them.
That's a biological way tocontrol them.
But in the wildlife, with thehabitat and how to help protect
that, you want to save them andkeep the places intact, but try
to keep green corridorsconnecting them too, that go off
(41:32):
property so that they have acorridor in which to travel.
They live a whole different.
You know they live in adifferent place than we do.
Some of them tend to like thegolf course, as those geese do,
but the others are going to wantto stay.
They want to stay in theirnative habitat.
So, rather than isolating them,give them access at either end
of of their of their home sothat they can travel off
(41:55):
property and out into the nativeareas, if there are any around.
Speaker 1 (41:59):
That makes sense.
So I have to ask you you workedfor the Arnold Palmer Company
for so long.
Was Arnold Palmer reallyinvolved?
What was it like working withhim?
Speaker 2 (42:09):
Well, yes, I did.
I worked for him for 29 yearsand he was very involved.
He was not involved in designof bunker right, bunker left, or
what are you doing on this golfhole.
He was not.
He was completely involved inevery project we had.
Who was the client, where wasthe site?
What are they like?
(42:29):
He really wanted to know whatthe people were like more than
anything, and he gave usmandates for design.
They were general but they werefundamental and I've used them
still to this day.
A couple of them.
Well, very, very early on, itwas look, eric, you're spending
somebody else's money.
(42:49):
Do it with integrity, becareful, do it, do it right, do
it right and do it once.
Don't make you know, don't makemistakes, don't check and
double check.
He was very conscious of that.
He that we were working forother people and we were.
We were to satisfy that piecefirst.
Um, as far as the golf designit's and that was the way we
(43:14):
were with the company Everythingit was fair, do it fair, and
that's just typical of ArnoldPalmer.
Speaker 1 (43:19):
He was that.
Yeah, that's great advice forany industry.
Speaker 2 (43:22):
Yeah, exactly, and he lived it.
He was that.
Everything you hear aboutArnold is basically true.
He was of his goodness, hisgentleman-ness, his character.
He was that way every day.
Every gentleman-ness, hischaracter.
He was that way every day,every moment that I was around
him.
(43:44):
He was just a kind, very wise,very wise and practical guy that
came out in the golf coursedesign.
That, he would tell us, is thatlook, don't hide any features,
make it fun for everybody first.
Don't make these things hard.
Make it fun for everybody first.
Don't make these things hard,make them fun for everybody, but
set it up so that if they wantto have a tournament on Sunday,
(44:04):
there's some pins we can gettucked to make it challenging or
you've got a hazard in a place.
That can be a good strategy,that sort of thing.
But he was concerned primarilywith it being friendly first
before challenging.
And he and it was also makethem beautiful.
Make them beautiful, not just,not just, okay, make them
beautiful.
He said if, if people get donewith the golf course and they go
(44:25):
, they don't say much, you don'thave much.
But if they say, man, I hatethat golf course or I love that
golf course, which you're goingto get both, then you've
probably done something toprovoke emotion and you're going
to have fun with it.
But he was just a very commonsense guy.
He was a you know.
I could go on for a long timeof stories about him and just
(44:46):
the evidence, one day after theother, of his character is
caring for other people.
You didn't hear him say I hewas.
Speaker 1 (44:55):
It was golf did this for me, or you know well you
were with him for 29 years, sothat's quite a testament to the
partnership you created.
What, what would you say, aresome of the most memorable
courses you designed and andwhat made them so special?
Speaker 2 (45:11):
well, he never really looked at plans much and that's
all we did, really, unless wewere out in the dirt getting
them built.
We're working on plans and herehe comes I think it was a
yellow cardigan sweater that dayand he comes walking into the
office with this roll of plansunder his arm.
I'm going oh, this is going tobe good, I haven't seen this one
(45:33):
yet.
And he comes rolling back alittle grin.
What do you look?
You know, doesn't take him outfrom under his arm.
And everybody's just going ohman, I'm following around like a
puppy right now, going what it?
Just come on, quit teasing,roll the plans out.
Well, it's pebble beach.
And, um, he was on the boardand we got to basically touch up
every golf hole a little bit atPebble Beach Golf Links and
(45:57):
those changes are still outthere and they're still good.
It was primarily for all of youthat know that golf course,
certainly have seen it ontelevision.
He, which was a little bitunlike Arnold, which a little
atypical of Mr Palmer was.
He pinched the features fromnumber six on six through ten,
(46:17):
closer to the ocean, closer tothe cliff, to make the tee shots
more narrow, to make them alittle bit tougher, and it
really did create a little bitmore challenge in the golf
course.
That it was okay.
He wanted to do it a long timeand we did it, Moved some tees
back, but that was obviously abig deal.
Speaker 1 (46:39):
What about international?
What about one of your mostmemorable international courses?
Speaker 2 (46:43):
Well, my good friend and colleague at Palmer for many
years I was not projectarchitect but Harrison Minchu
was designed the K golf coursefor for Jefferson Smurfett and
they played a Ryder cup overthere and we all went over and
enjoyed that.
So that was, you know, featherin our cap and a feather in our
(47:05):
cap as well.
But you know, we there's 200,there's 250, some Palmer courses
to pick from Donna and we livedevery one of them.
We'd lived every golf hole, youknow, and did the best we could
on all of them.
I designed the golf course withanother colleague, thad Layton,
in Kazakhstan for PresidentNazarbayev at the time in his
(47:29):
yard, I think they played In hisyard.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
How many holes was that, golf course.
Speaker 2 (47:35):
His yard was basically Kazakhstan, I think.
So anyway, they played atournament.
They did play a tournamentthere, but I think on that day
there was probably the only timethere were more.
You know, there were probably140 players, whatever it was.
Speaker 1 (47:49):
That was an 18 hole course in his front yard.
Speaker 2 (47:52):
Ma'am, yes, it was, but he never nobody played it.
Speaker 1 (47:56):
I mean was he at least a good golfer?
What was his handicap?
Speaker 2 (47:59):
You know, honestly, I didn't meet him.
I'm not sure he even played it.
It was for diplomats anddignitaries.
You know it was.
That's a different.
You know I fell.
I fell off of that bus a longtime ago.
They're in a different, that'sa different category.
But I will tell you aboutKazakhstan, which was
interesting.
I went to lunch, we went up themountain.
(48:20):
We could see the mountainsthere and I went up to and we
were at 12,000 feet and it waslike being on the plains and I'm
looking and there's another14,000 feet above us of mountain
.
Mountains were 24,000 feet highcompared to the Rockies or 14.
(48:40):
It was just, it was likemind-boggling of how big those
tall, those mountains were.
Back then we did a golf coursein Jackson Hole, wyoming.
You'd think, oh my gosh, themountains.
It was right underneath HowlingWolf and the Grand Tetons.
It was the flattest golf courseI've ever worked on.
It was dead flat.
There was one foot of fall fromone end of the golf course to
(49:03):
the other.
It's because the Snake Riverhad.
It was in the Snake River, noteven the floodplain, more like
it's a wash.
Speaker 1 (49:13):
Have you played Eric on every course you designed?
Speaker 2 (49:16):
No, I haven't played, not while they were open, not
while they were open.
I played them all before theygot open and we'd call it dirt
golf.
Speaker 1 (49:26):
Why did you call?
It dirt golf.
Speaker 2 (49:28):
Because they hadn't been grassed yet.
Speaker 1 (49:29):
Oh, they hadn't.
Speaker 2 (49:31):
And they were dirt or sand or whatever.
But I have done that and Iplayed a lot of them that are
open and I'm a member of acouple of them that are that are
open and and really, reallyenjoy all that how's your golf
game these days?
Well, um, I'm okay, I'm a, I'ma two handicap I'm working at.
I'm trying to shoot my age I'm70, as I said, Did you say
(49:54):
you're a two.
Speaker 1 (49:54):
I was going to ask you if it was appropriate for me
to inquire about your handicap.
Did you say you're a twohandicap?
Speaker 2 (50:01):
Yes, I am, but I'm quite a pigeon at two, so any
other two handicappers are goingto be licking his chops when
I'm on the tee with them.
Speaker 1 (50:11):
I know some people are going to be very jealous
hearing your handicap.
So, eric, we've been talkingabout golf courses when
everything goes right.
Can we take a moment to talkabout golf courses where things
start going wrong and the coursemay be failing due to aging
members, lack of new members,climbing expenses, whatever it
(50:31):
may be In your opinion, climbingexpenses, whatever it may be in
your opinion, what is the bestcase scenario to pull a failing
golf course out of that path,that downward spiral, and what's
the worst case scenario thatmight occur?
Speaker 2 (50:44):
yeah, donna, this is a terrific question because in
the last decade or so up untiljust recently, when golf has
turned back around, kind of justright around, started covid
through.
Now, as we've talked about,it's gotten to be robust.
Before that it was not in factthe entire golf development,
let's say our new golf coursebusiness, renovation business,
(51:08):
was in a spiral, downward spiral, for many reasons.
One you know, one is, as wetalked, it just takes a lot of
time to play golf, it'sexpensive, et cetera.
So there there were a lot ofthose cases.
We closed more golf coursesthan we opened by five, seven
times for 10, 15 years in a row.
And it was a real issue.
(51:31):
They closed for a number ofreasons, but primarily clubs are
in the dues, private clubs arein the dues business and public
municipal facilities are in thegreens feed business.
So you need players, you need,you need to get people there and
all the clubs are complete,competing with the same, with
the same basket of new players.
(51:53):
So how do you?
How players?
So how do you grab them?
How do you capture them If theclub has not escrowed money for
capital improvements to continueto improve their place and keep
it up in competitioncompetitively with conditionings
, or it's going to struggle andit's going to continue to
decline.
They go into the spiral andeventually may close.
(52:15):
That would be worst casescenario and past that then a
large developer who was able tocarry the burden of holding that
land until he can get itpermitted for development very
likely may convert the wholething into a real estate piece,
and there's a tough one becauseof all the homeowners that
(52:35):
bought in the community havelost that opportunity.
Speaker 1 (52:38):
Do you think some of it is oversaturation in the
market, Eric?
So you may have some areaswhere you just have way too many
golf courses, both private andmunicipal.
Speaker 2 (52:48):
Yeah, I think that's the case.
I think that certainlycontributed to the issue.
We built so many.
Look, golf was driven throughthe early 2010 by the real
estate component and it was kindof build it and they will come,
and by housing.
Well, that did not prove to betrue.
(53:10):
So what do we do with thesefacilities that are struggling
like this?
How do we help them?
How do we resurrect them?
And I've got a lot of experiencein a model that's not not well
known and it can be.
It can be completely arejuvenation of the place and
I've done it a couple times thatI can share.
(53:32):
But it's an infill model ofreal estate, basically, where
you look carefully at the layoutof the golf course and you'll
find that there are empty spaces, and not everywhere.
And this doesn't fit everywhere.
In fact, it only fits in a fewplaces, and not everywhere.
And this doesn't fit everywhere.
In fact it only fits in a fewplaces.
But if a golf course is of sizeenough that it has empty spaces
(53:55):
between golf holes, there aremethods.
There are land planning methods, golf course routing methods
where you can move golf holescloser together and kind of push
all the extra space into onebundle or two bundles, provided
access, and then develop it umas as a uh.
(54:17):
Generally typically they workas single family home
neighborhoods within the golfcourse.
Now you can't um change the usebehind any of the existing
homes because you'll getpushback from those homeowners.
But developers, who would be theones that bring the capital to
the table, and let's talk aboutwhat this provides is that a
(54:42):
developer would come, you do aland plan, you free up some
space that is a developable typepod, let's say, within the
facility.
Developer likes that becausethere is infrastructure in place
, generally there's alreadyutilities brought to the
facility, there's critical massand that it's already an area
(55:04):
where there are home.
You know there is aneighborhood or community or
town and there is a vibrancy.
There's a pent up vibrancy inthe, in the club or in the
community.
So he'll bring capital by theland here Club, sell me this
land.
I like your plan.
I may tweak it a little bit,but but we'll, we'll work on
that.
Here is capital for your planand what for the land.
(55:27):
And what I'm going to do thenis I will mandate membership on
the new homes, on the newresidences, not with the buyer
but with the residents, so thatif the buyer, the homeowner,
moves out, the membershipresides in that property.
So the next buyer is a memberas well.
So you generate capital fromthe land sale and incremental,
(55:49):
which is found in recurringrevenue through dues for the
sale of that property.
Speaker 1 (55:56):
So that's what I wanted to.
I wanted to jump in and saythat because it can't just be a
band-aid.
You'll certainly get the influxof cash when you develop the
property, like you're saying.
By the way, my own golf course,where I live in my home
community, the equity memberswere contemplating this infill
model before.
Ultimately, they sold to twoindividuals who took over the
(56:17):
course and they've done a greatjob.
But this was on the plate, thiswas on the table, this exact
model which there was propertythat they could carve out from
the golf course.
They were going to develop aseries of townhomes.
Of course, in our community itwould have required a completely
different road to get into thatcommunity and we're an existing
HOA.
There were issues with havingthose heavy trucks come down the
(56:39):
main road.
All of that could have beenovercome, but this was the exact
model they were consideringbefore they took a different
path.
There are some interestingchallenges when it comes to
mandating memberships,particularly something as
significant as golf membership.
Right, we're not talking aboutjust a social membership where
you have to go eat some you knowfood at the club once a month
(57:01):
or once a quarter.
Golf membership is a little bitmore of an investment of time
and money.
So you know, you have to lookat the documents.
You have to see whether or notthe golf course is part of
common area for that HOA or it'sseparate.
It was a private club, but itis an interesting model and it
is certainly available.
Having the new community set upfrom inception with membership
(57:25):
being mandatory is muchdifferent than a community
trying to force mandatorymembership later on.
It's a change of developmentscheme.
Speaker 2 (57:33):
Yeah, no question about it.
Change is hard to accept and atyour place, where the white
knights came in and bought itand kept it in place and build
it up, there's your ultimate,you know best, scenario.
But if the white knight doesnot show up, this is a method
that can be done.
Where I've done it the mostsuccessful was here in Atlantic
(57:55):
Beach, florida.
Up here it's a beach communityof Jacksonville.
We had a 180-acre golf course.
It was in the death spiral formemberships and shareholders and
we reconfigured the golf courseand freed up 175 single-family
high-end residential lots rightin the middle of the golf course
(58:16):
.
And another point to theneighborhood is they all wind up
with golf frontage as well, soa developer buys the land and
helps subsidize the fix-up of anew clubhouse.
And then the mandate ofmembership was social only.
They did not mandate full golfmembership.
It was a minimal mandate of asocial membership which
(58:39):
consequently they have.
90% of them have all upgradedto full golf membership.
Speaker 1 (58:46):
That's always the hope, isn't it?
But in our situation, therewasn't going to be enough
available space to build enoughhomes to really make a
difference in terms of runningthe club.
So that's another thing tothink about is how many members
are going to be carrying, howmany new members are going to be
carrying those expenses.
And I still think you need tolook at the underlying causes of
(59:08):
why the club started dying inthe first place, don't you think
?
Speaker 2 (59:11):
Oh yeah, absolutely.
And in this case at AtlanticBeach, it was because the
conditions had gotten so badbecause of a poor water quality
of irrigation.
It had to really redo theentire irrigation system and it
needed a large influx of cashfor capital to rebuild the place
.
So it was much larger scale,yes, than what you're talking
(59:32):
about.
Speaker 1 (59:33):
Now.
Speaker 2 (59:33):
I am doing another project here close by.
We're doing basically the samething, only it's much smaller
scale.
Took a golf hole.
That was not a good hole golfhole.
It had a sharp dog leg to theright, causing a liability issue
on the inside of the landingarea for the homeowner, causing
a liability issue on the insideof the landing area for the
homeowner.
Straightened that hole out andcreated just a little.
(59:58):
It's a seven-acre parcel thatSlough has decided okay, great,
you fixed a bad golf hole.
We have this in our pocket now.
Should we want to develop the15 lots that could come out of
this later, but it did provide,could come out of this later,
but it did provide minimally.
They've got a liability issue.
That went away.
But they now also have.
As, hopefully, prices escalate,land value goes up, they'll
(01:00:19):
have a little nest egg of aproperty piece they could sell
down the road for capitalimprovements.
It doesn't fit everywhere andthe scale of it they're all
different in scale and inconcept and in layout, but it is
an alternative to closure.
That should be, or it'ssomething that should be,
considered prior to closure andit should be considered prior to
(01:00:43):
a sale of the entire facility?
Speaker 1 (01:00:45):
Yeah, something for sure that should be investigated
.
I do want to add that in a lotof instances there may be a
restrictive covenant on the golfcourse property and if that
covenant is still effective,that covenant may prohibit any
sort of development on theproperty.
The land which requires thatreal property to remain open
(01:01:08):
space for recreational use suchas a golf course, doesn't mean
you can't overcome it, but Iagree with you, eric.
I think that when you've got afailing golf course you have to
investigate all possible avenuesto success.
Speaker 2 (01:01:23):
Yeah, and this is simply an option to pursue.
Speaker 1 (01:01:26):
Yeah, but you've been listen.
You've been so great with yourtime today.
This has been such aninteresting topic.
I'm excited to see the newtrends.
You talk about the fun golf orshort golf venue.
Where can people find you?
And please tell us what you'redoing these days in terms of
design.
Who's your target client?
Speaker 2 (01:01:47):
Well, my target client is anybody that's going
to build a golf course orrenovate their golf course, and
I can help with that.
I have a lot of experience in alot of different types and tend
to keep an eye more so on itfrom a business aspect,
particularly as a part of acommunity than as a standalone
type golf course.
(01:02:07):
I will say that with envy tothe others that have had this
opportunity.
I really haven't had theopportunity of a world-class
site where I can go do afantastic Sandhills or Band and
Dudes type facility and thoseare happening around here and I
would love to have thatopportunity.
My skill set tends to be morein the, you know, in the
(01:02:30):
satisfaction as the golf as partof a community.
Just to just our audience here,look, my phone number, if
anybody cares, is 904-631-7480,904-631-7480.
And you can email me and I willrespond equally and look
(01:02:52):
forward to hearing from anybody.
Eric is with a K-E-R-I-K atLarson L-A-R-S-E-N golf, like
the game of golf dot net Eric atLarsonGolfnet.
Donna, I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (01:03:06):
Thanks, eric.
Thank you for joining us today.
Don't forget to follow and rateus on your favorite podcast
platform, or visitTakeItToTheBoardcom for more
ways to connect.
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