City Orders Detailed Golf Course Study

A long-awaited public golf course is a step closer to reality after the City Council, working in conjunction with the Conejo Recreation and Park District, voted to begin a detailed planning phase for the project, which would be built in Hill Canyon.

Wednesday’s unanimous vote came after course designers, city officials and private consultants briefed city officials on a preliminary plan for the course and recreation area.

Developers will now refine that plan to include actual course design, how it will be built and how to finance the estimated $20-million project. They expect to have a detailed proposal ready by September, and a final vote could come by December.

The course would be designed by Michael Hurdzan, who has built more than 260 golf courses and is considered by many to be a leader in designing courses with an environmental conscience. In the past 25 years, he has designed scores of award-winning courses, including the Devil’s Pulpit Golf Club in Canada and the Ironhorse Golf Club in Kansas.

“It’s an incredible site and has been an enormous professional challenge putting this all together,” Hurdzan said of the Hill Canyon project. “But I can tell you that the canyon is what makes this area special and it will be an awesome experience playing there.”

As envisioned, the Hill Canyon project will be built on the west edge of the Conejo Valley near the end of Rancho Conejo Boulevard and sweep north through the canyon toward Santa Rosa Road.

A necklace of greens and fairways would thread along the Arroyo Santa Rosa and extend up the narrow canyon into the Santa Rosa Valley, where designers will build a small lake and marsh area interspersed with groves of existing live oak.

In addition to the 18-hole course, the 277 acres will include a wetlands preservation area, a nature center and miles of hiking, biking and equestrian trails connected by six trail heads, webbing through the canyon and neighboring open-space preserves.

City Council members have said repeatedly that a new golf course is badly needed in the affluent city of 114,000, and they hope to cash in on the sport’s popularity.

The city’s only municipal course, Los Robles Greens, is considered one of Southern California’s busiest, with more than 800,000 golfers teeing off in the past eight years.

According to Hurdzan, it has been the city’s intention to incorporate as much of the canyon’s natural surroundings into the course as possible.

However, according to preliminary plans, as many as 50 mature live oaks will have to be removed and part of the land running from the arroyo to the canyon walls will have to be graded.

Hurdzan said the grading might not have to be as extensive as originally planned. Some fairways and greens will have to be heightened to keep them above flood stage. The exact amount of grading will be determined as designers begin the new phase of the project.

“Even though it’s hard to say right now how much we’re going to have to do, it’s not as much as we’d originally thought,” Hurdzan said. “Much of the area is high enough already and we can do some other things, like planting, to protect the course from flooding.”

In addition to developing a final design, a means of financing the project will also have to be developed.

According to Ed Johnduff, special projects and program manager for the city, the city and the Conejo Recreational and Park District have already committed $2 million to the project’s design. The other $18 million, Johnduff said, will most likely be generated through a bond that would be paid back through a portion of the golf course’s revenue.

Developers hope to begin construction on the course by February and expect to have it completed by spring 1999.