Golf Course Architecture - Issue 62: October 2020

49 development, but we can take many of the principles and apply it to modern day developments.” Golf architects naturally tend to the view that the balance between course and housing has been out of kilter on many such projects. Certainly in the boom times, it was quite commonplace for a golf architect to be hired to design a course, and, on making his first visit to the site, to be presented with a site master plan, done by a land planner, that basically locked in the routing of the golf course. Naturally, this cannot possibly make for the best golf. One of the most fundamental aspects of golf design is that the site is key. Architect Jason Straka says this is, if anything, even more so with real estate projects. “Choose better sites. Just because you can build a golf course with homes surrounding it doesn’t mean you should,” he says. “For example, housing in flat farm fields is likely better developed with parks, ponds and interconnected walking trails in many circumstances. It takes a lot of mass grading and revegetation to otherwise build an interesting golf course, and few of those types of projects are truly financially sustainable. Additionally, golf development was traditionally pushed into the worst ground of a housing development site such as flood plains. Again, golf became expensive to build, maintain and manage.” One development, currently underway, where housing is part of the mix, but definitely not the main reason for it, is Cabot Links principal Ben Cowan-Dewar’s new project on the West Indian island of Saint Lucia, where the golf course is being designed by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw. They are not the first names that spring to mind for development projects, so we spoke to both Coore and Cowan-Dewar to find out a bit more about what makes the project tick – and whether their experiences hold lessons for others trying to do similar, if perhaps less dramatic, projects. “We have 370 acres of land, and the master plan includes 300 housing units, but quite a few of them are either townhouses or flats, which reduces the footprint of real estate,” says Cowan- Dewar. “But the golf course always came first. Part of the reason the master plan works so well is the nature of the property, which has a lot of big, broad slopes that we were never going to put golf on. So, the houses cascade up the hillside and everyone has a view. It reminds me of the Seychelles in that aspect. There’s a fair bit – over At Cabot Saint Lucia, the site (left) was ideal for dramatic golf holes to be routed alongside the water and housing on hillsides with views out to sea Image: Ron Krater Studio