City maps out $1.5M upgrades to Fairview Golf Course after clearing hurdles
Cameron Montemayor
ST. JOSEPH, Mo. (News-Press NOW) — St. Joseph Parks and Recreation is setting the stage for long-awaited improvements to Fairview Golf Course after years of obstacles for one of the earliest scheduled parks tax projects.
Contractors with TranSystems are currently mapping out a 3D model of the 102-year-old golf course in preparation for $1.5 million in improvements planned through the 2021 parks sales tax.
The project will see as many as three ponds dredged, along with renovations to pedestrian/cart bridges and upgrades to its sprinkler system to support long-term functionality, aesthetics and efficient water management.
“They’re shooting from a lot of elevations, so we can get a good, detailed map of the system through here. Part of that also is they’re doing a hydraulic study of not only what’s on the course but including the watershed that runs through here,” said Jeff Atkins, director of St. Joseph Parks and Recreation.
A watershed is a large geographic area where all surface and groundwater drains to a common outlet.
Located on more than 200 acres, Fairview Golf Course is one of the oldest in Northwest Missouri and the only city-owned course in town. It’s also dealt with ongoing challenges with heavily silted ponds and irrigation due to stormwater runoff that enters the course from the north.
“You can imagine during a storm event how much dirt, silt gets flushed through the system. And it’s running pretty good until it gets here to the golf course,” Atkins said.
The city had planned to spend about $1.25 million to address the situation in 2022 before new flood maps were released by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, delaying the project.
Delays were further compounded when an outflow structure for one pond began to fail, impacting its ability to retain water properly and necessitating repairs in accordance with the U.S. Corps of Engineers, a multi-year process.
“With the repairs to our outflow structure. We’ve been able to reinforce that these were truly ponds and not wetland areas,” Atkins said. “We have now returned to the pond setting, so it’s just been a long, drawn-out process that we’re going through here.”
The course was initially one of the first in line for renovation after voters approved the parks sales tax in 2021.
Now, Kansas City-based company TranSystems has been contracted by the city to carry out an array of design services in advance of dredging and bridge work, including 3D modeling, a hydraulic analysis and assisting with environmental permitting with the Corps.
“That will let us know what levels of water we could expect to be coming through the course on a normal day… if we have a quarter inch of rain or one inch rain… that will help us determine how to properly size our ponds,” he said.
He said the ultimate goal is to design the ponds so they can retain water that can be used for the course’s irrigation system, reducing its dependence on city water.
“One of the ponds up at the north end of the course will be designed as kind of a silt collection pond. Hopefully most of that debris and silt will be caught where it’s easy for us to come in once or maybe twice a year and clean it out instead of having to possibly affect the entire pond system,” he said.
Until the official size of the ponds and depth of dredging is determined during the design process, the department will have to wait to confirm the scope of bridge renovations.
A completion date for the project has yet to be determined.
“We’re anxious to get through the planning stage and actually start seeing boots on the ground out here and start moving some dirt and get these ponds taken care of,” he said. “I know the golfers. They’ve been extremely patient with us over the last two or three years.”