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By Design
T
hirty years ago, H. Gary Morse
began to develop The Villages, a
master-planned community in
Central Florida. Starting with one sub-
division and 9 holes of golf, the Morse
family has developed The Villages into
a 54,000+ home community with 630
holes of golf. The Villages is the eighth
largest city in Florida, larger than other
well-known snowbird destinations
like Clearwater. The entire community
encompasses 32 square miles in area
with over 115,000 residents, 70 percent
of whom are there full-time.
As the community has grown in size
and scope, the infrastructure required
has grown as well. Entire town centers
with thriving retail shops, recreation
centers and a wide range of sports
fields and amenities have been
developed for homeowners and their
guests. Separate roads for cars and golf
carts help move people around the
neighborhoods.
Golf at The Villages has developed
under the leadership of Ken Ezell,
ASGCA, George Clifton, ASGCA, and
the late ASGCA Fellow Lloyd Clifton,
ASGCA. In 1989, they designed their
first course for The Villages. Since that
time, almost 600 of the property’s 630
holes of golf have been designed and
built under their guidance. Today, the
Villages comprises 10 27-hole and
two 18-hole championship courses
and 36 nine-hole executive courses.
The courses have a surprising amount
of elevation change (over 115 feet
across the property) and plenty of
undulation in the playing surfaces to
create more strategy and challenges
for the golfer. Ezell describes the style
as “look hard and play easy, creating a
fair experience for the golfer.”
Clifton, Ezell and Clifton designed
the golf courses on larger-than-average
acreages as a focal point of each village
within the overall community. They
incorporated large lakes between
adjacent holes, providing extensive
water retention areas to capture and
retain storm water runoff. Golf holes
are strategically designed to handle
flood water, draining excess water from
residential and common areas. With
the golf courses located in floodplain
areas, homes are built on higher
ground with many course views. This
philosophy changed the way that
the property could be developed,
optimizing the number of homes that
can be built in a given location.
As the infrastructure of The Villages
increased in complexity, a highly
sophisticated water management
system has also evolved. An extensive
storm water management system
moves rainwater off hardscape
and common areas and into storm
retention ponds. Four on-site
wastewater treatment facilities have
been built to manage the wastewater
generated from the community. The
golf courses are integral parts of
the management system, handling
the disposal of both rainwater and
reclaimed wastewater.
Reclaimed wastewater from four on-
site water treatment facilities, plus one
local off-site facility, is used to irrigate
the golf courses. In season, almost eight
million gallons of reclaimed water is
generated each day by the five facilities.
An extensive network of pumps and
piping distributes the reclaimed
water to irrigation lakes around the
property utilizing a very elaborate
SCADA system with remote lake level
monitoring and automated fill valves.
Twenty pump stations then pump the
reclaimed water onto the golf courses
each night. One of the unique features
of The Villages’ irrigation systems is the
extent to which the reclaimed water
is managed. Golf areas are irrigated
primarily with reclaimed water. Rather
than just disposing of it, the reclaimed
water is considered as a valuable
resource to be used and managed as
efficiently as possible.
Rainfall can be feast or famine in
Florida. In some years, like 2006 with
28 inches of rainfall, there are drought
conditions and the reclaimed water
is managed carefully. In other years,
Water management at The Villages
|
Stuart Hackwell
Using
water wisely
CASE STUDY
Golf courses are much more than just an
amenity at The Villages community in Florida.
Stuart Hackwell of Rain Bird explains