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Calgary Herald on Golfing the Kootenay Rockies

August 25, 2008

Pros to design new courses in B.C.
Joanne Blain, Calgary Herald
Published: Friday, August 22, 2008

Nick Faldo doesn’t usually use the side of a mountain as a driving range. But the British golf icon couldn’t resist taking a few practice shots during his recent visit to Revelstoke Mountain Resort, where he’s designing an 18-hole golf course that will play a key role in turning the property into a year-round destination. 

Faldo, three-time winner of both the Masters and the British Open, isn’t the only professional golfer lending his or her name and design skills to courses in B.C.’s Kootenay Rockies area. Golf legend Gary Player is designing two courses in Cranbrook, Fred Couples is teed up for 18 holes in Sparwood and LPGA pro Annika Sorenstam’s name is attached to a project in Rossland.

It’s all part of a long-term plan to turn the region, which stretches from the Alberta border to the Okanagan, into a destination resort area aimed at golfers in Alberta, B.C. and beyond.

“If you want to do a summer trip that takes you from one spectacular golf course to another in this region, you can,” says Ashley Tait, director of sales and marketing for Revelstoke Mountain Resort, about 400 kilometres west of Calgary. 

“We’ve got about 30 golf courses in the area. Many of them are high-level community courses that are open to the public, but really what sets us apart is the number of pure resort courses that are built for the visiting golfer,” says Chris Dadson, president of Kootenay Rockies Tourism. There are 10 resort-style courses in the area now, he says, including Trickle Creek and Bootleg Gap near Kimberley, Greywolf and Copper Point near Invermere and the 40-year-old Kokanee Springs course on Kootenay Lake.

Three more are set to open in 2009. The first of the two Player courses at Wildstone near Cranbrook will open next spring, with the second scheduled for a 2010 unveiling.

Whiskey Jack in Sparwood, designed by Couples, will also open next year, as will Shadow Mountain near Cranbrook.

There’s no opening date yet for the Sorenstam-designed course near Rossland, which has run into opposition from area residents and might have to change sites to avoid concerns over its impact on the watershed.

The most recent project to be unveiled is the Faldo-designed course in Revelstoke, which is still in the design phase. It will break ground next year and is slated to open in the summer of 2011.

Faldo, captain of this year’s European Ryder Cup golf team, came to Revelstoke to meet with potential investors and the media, as well as to walk the bulldozed trails that will eventually become fairways. The course will hug both shores of Williamson Lake just below the ski slopes at the year-old resort, which boasts a spectacular view of the Columbia River valley and the Monashee mountains.  The British golfer was clearly impressed by the site, which he says is an essential ingredient in creating a course geared to tourists rather than to top-level golfers. “This is a resort golf course - it’s really about the wow factor rather than the degree of difficulty,” Faldo says. “When you’ve got vistas like this, you really want to create something that’s a really enjoyable experience.”

Another key factor in drawing club-toting tourists to the area is accessibility, which is about to improve significantly. In December, Delta will begin non-stop regional jet service three times a week between its Salt Lake City hub and Cranbrook, giving U.S. tourists easier access to the area. The same month, Hawkair will start flying four times a week between Calgary and Revelstoke, in partnership with Revelstoke Mountain Resort. Regular service between Vancouver and Revelstoke “is something we are actively looking into,” says Tait.

Dadson says that’s a testament to the growth in tourism the area has seen in recent years, spurred on by strong provincial economies in both B.C. and Alberta. And as tourists continue to flock to the area, so do investors, he says. The Revelstoke Mountain Resort development alone, which includes two luxury hotels and 5,500 units of housing, is budgeted at $1 billion over 15 years, including $8 to $10 million for the golf course.

Several developments - including Revelstoke Mountain, Trickle Creek and Graywolf - are banking on the appeal of the four-season resort, which will allow tourists to golf in the summer and ski in the winter. And as winter gives way to spring, Tait says, ambitious visitors will be able to do both. “Later in the ski season, you’ll be able to ski in the morning and golf in the afternoon,” she says.

The four-season resort is a model that makes economic sense, says Dadson. “Combining lifts with golf means they are going to be using the clubhouse and condominium accommodation year-round.”

While the Kootenay Rockies area is already known as a world-class destination for skiing and heliskiing, the big challenge for resort developers and tourism officials is to get would-be visitors from outside B.C. and Alberta to start thinking of it as a golfing destination as well. That’s why Dadson is working with his counterparts in the Okanagan and Vancouver Island to promote B.C. as a great place to golf. 
“We are not yet at that level, but we believe for destination vacation golf, we will ultimately surpass Jasper and Banff in terms of awareness,” he says. “It won’t be long.”

© For the Calgary Herald