A good walk spoiled

16 Aug 2010, 14:47 Add Comment

Mark Twain said a lot of witty things, but his comment on golf is one I would take issue with.

I have toyed with golf - or vice versa - for most of my adult life, both as a player, as a spectator and as an author of a couple of advisory tomes in my former life as a Sports Council Planning Officer.

I will pass quickly over my golfing abilities, other than to say I have moved from a handicap of 28 (the maximum for men) to 26 in around 40 years and should therefore play off scratch (or zero), when I am 520, although I may have to use a buggy by then.

My (TV) spectating abilities are far better than my playing: I can watch golf for several hours at a stretch, with no thought of fatigue, although with frequent threats to life and limb from daughter number two, who wants to watch Glee again. The recent Open at St Andrews was a joy to behold, particularly on the second afternoon, when even the world's best were reduced to humble hackers by the Scottish wind and rain.

As a land use which uses a lot of land (as it were), golf tends to have a good deal of contact with the planning system. I suspect there are no other land uses which involve the use of the word 'manicured' on such a frequent and pejorative way ("the greens would be excessively manicured"). As a Sports Council planner in the 1980s, I spent quite some time convincing farmers that golf was a good way to diversify. As a planning consultant in the 21^st century, I am now seeing quite a few bland 1980s courses being upgraded by the importation of vast quantities of inert waste, to the playing advantage of golfers and to the financial advantage of the course owners.

Given that waste has to go somewhere and preferably not into landfill, the re-profiling of existing courses seems to be a Win-Win situation, at least in the long term, after any temporary inconveniences with large wagons is over and done with.

Perhaps the highest profile golf proposal in recent years has been the amusingly named (to juveniles like me at least) Trump International Golf Links in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. If nothing else, the proposal has led to an outpouring of sub-editorial headline making rarely seen before - "Effort to bunker Trump thrown out" and "Permission teed up for success" being two of the most common attention grabbers.

To say that the Trump proposals have divided local opinion would be a massive under-statement. The local planners and the national elected members had to balance the economic benefits to the area against the impacts on the local ecology and the local communities.

Whilst I have no knowledge of the Trump scheme, I have seen similar issues at a smaller scale around the North West in recent years. Many local residents may welcome a new or improved golf course, but others see only problems with change and this is understandable. In the end, a balanced judgement needs to be made, as in all planning applications and appeals.

On a personal level, I would much prefer to see a well designed and properly integrated golf course on a few tens of hectares, rather than some form of mono-crop as far as the eye can see. But that's just me!

I should also mention that the inaugural RTPI North West Golf Day (sponsored by Steven Abbott Associates LLP) recently took place at Mottram Hall Golf Club. No records were broken (with the possible exception of the number of mumbled swear words in one minute, which I can claim) but great fun was had by all. Certainly, all that took part enjoyed a good walk and it wasn't spoiled for any of them.

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