Golf Course Architecture - Issue 61, July 2020

53 Photo: credit one or two workers per house). During those two months, I had to drive two or three 1,200-kilometre round trips a month because there was no place to stay. On some of those trips, I had to spend the night in a sleeping bag inside my car. Great stories to live in your twenties and incredible to re-live when you are almost in your sixties! During my site visits, I had time to walk through the first nine holes, which opened a few months ago, and I realised what a great place Altaona Golf will be to live. And most importantly, how well it combines the housing and golf. Altaona could be a real model for new and future residential development. We have planned a golf community with safety corridors of 110 to 120 metres between the course and the properties. Along the golf course, we decided to include a jogging path, as well as allowing people to cycle or even skate. Sometimes, you find a couple of British or Swedish residents walking with a dog. What a great place to be during the restricted times of Covid-19. In some large areas between holes, we have created workout areas for joggers to stop and do some push ups or stretching. The golf course is 100 per cent safe with the housing totally away from golf balls and, at the same time, we have opened the golf areas to more than just golfers. Let the public get closer to golf, while walking through a beautiful, manicured landscape. My firm has designed more than 30 courses, and 28 of them combine golf with residential – maybe an average of 1,200 housing units per 18 holes. In all the designs, we first consider the complete safety of residents.. That is the only rule for a good golf course with residences around and on both sides. Our next step is to open golf courses to more users, to create the perfect place to be, walk, exercise, and even to isolate during these difficult times. GCA Marco Martin is a principal architect at Stirling & Martin Golf Course Architects Marco Martin has incorporated trails and workout areas into the design for Altaona Golf in Murcia, Spain