12 / 26
12
|
By Design
the plant on the far south end of the
entire property.
Ladenburg also made a crucial
determination—to go with links-style
fescue grasses that would emulate a
traditional seaside layout, and with
that, to abandon any paved cart paths
and to rely upon a walking-only policy
for play rather than one that catered
to modern preferences for riders.
Carts would have beaten fescue into
submission. A walking policy, with the
occasional concession to medically-
certified golfers incapable of walking,
would protect the notoriously
traffic-intolerant grasses needed for
a true links layout. KemperSports,
the management firm that had been
overseeing the all-fescue Bandon
Dunes Resort in Oregon since its
inception in the late-1990s, knew that
the virtual banning of carts would
have serious financial implications
for the Chambers Bay operation. But
Ladenburg was insistent, and instead
of being a liability, the emphasis upon
walking became a defining element of
the property.
An abundance of sand on site
meant that there was plenty of
available material for a fertile growing
medium. But first the land had to
be rough shaped into proper form.
That required an army of bulldozers
and pan scrapers—25 heavy pieces
of machinery, all of it part of a
construction contract awarded to
Heritage Links, with Jones’ own
shapers, Ed Tanno and Doug Ingram,
leading on the all-important final
massage work.
At times, the yearlong construction
process looked like a scene from a
post-apocalyptic sci-fi movie. The
grading operation required a kind of
‘melting down’ of the entire northern
rim by 10-25 feet, with the material
then screened in massive sorting bins
that were themselves holdovers from
the old gravel site. The sandy material
was tested for percolation rates and
moisture retention, then used as
capping for the areas to be grassed.
Jones, watching as the elevation levels
of the site evened out somewhat,
likened it to “an acceleration of
geological time.”
Rarely has a North American
construction site made quicker
progress from ugly to beautiful. An
entire ridge was pushed through to
make way for the 10th hole. Today,
it looks like the hole was fitted into
a natural box canyon, with just an
opening at the far end to give a glimpse
of Puget Sound behind the green.
In an effort to give the resulting
mounds and knobs some element
of rough, scruffy nature, track
hoes plodded up and down them
to imprint their tracks on the
dirt; this had the double effect of
creating a corduroy effect that would
hold emergent turfgrass down as
it germinated in the wind. The
furrowing also made it look as if age-
old erosion had already taken hold.
Once the fescue took hold and started
waving in the breeze, the entire site
took on the feel of a classic links, one
that had been there for decades.
Oh, those finicky fescues.
Notoriously hard to establish and
sustain, particularly in a cool-season,
rainy environment. Interestingly,
metro Tacoma, with 40 inches of
precipitation a year, is closer to
St Andrews (27 inches) than to
Bandon, Oregon (59 inches) in
the wet department. Specifications
were precise and based upon test
plots cultivated 20 miles to the east
in Puyallup, Washington. Greens,
fairways, tees and approaches were
seeded to a mix of colonial bentgrass
(6 percent), a three-way mix of
CHAMBERS BAY
Project Timeline
Pierce County acquires a
930-acre gravel and sand
pit along Puget Sound
The firm of Robert Trent
Jones II wins the golf
course design contract
Pierce County Council
authorizes construction bonds
for golf course
Construction begins
Mike Davis, th
senior director,
competitions,
to Chambers
1992
Pierce County executive John
Ladenburg initiates plans for a
golf course and park
2002
Mining ends but county
retains mining permit
2003
2004
2005
2005
2006