Golfers on road to ruin
Fears that highway plans would spell the end for club
TASMANIA’S high performance golf base may be forced to relocate if a proposal for a new Tasman Highway roundabout at Cambridge goes ahead.
Men’s state team coach and Tasmania Golf Club professional and pro shop owner Nick White said one of the options being considered would cut through a third of the driving range, which was imperative for top-level coaching.
The Tasmania Golf Club has previously said it fears it may need to close if the option to build the roundabout on its land was chosen.
“I love this golf course and that’s why I’m the golf professional here,” Mr White said.
“But the main asset I have got is the driving range and if it wasn’t here I wouldn’t be able to stay as the head professional.
“You need to be able to see ball flight at a proper driving range, you cannot coach at say an indoor facility.”
Mr White said to remain as a premier golf course and attract international players the club needed to have 18 holes so downsizing to nine holes to free up space was not an option.
“We just don’t have the land to have an 18-hole golf course if this proposal went ahead.”
The other option would see the highway and roundabout built on private property opposite the golf course, which would affect native bushland believed to contain two of Tasmania’s critically endangered native orchids.
Tasmania Golf Club committee member Andrew Todd said neither was the right option.
Mr Todd said he believed the consultant planners had gone back to the project officers and put up another option as a result of the feedback.
“I think the roundabouts are complete overkill for three little accesses with not much traffic and underpasses could do the same thing in a much smaller footprint,” he said.
A spokesman said yesterday the State Government did not have a preferred option.
He said the plan was to duplicate the Tasman Hwy between the airport roundabout and Midway Point causeway and provide safe access to Pittwater Rd, the golf course and Barilla Bay Oysters.