The golf centre at Radlett has a fantastic location: just inside the M25 to the north of London, it is within reach and accessible to a huge number of people, yet it has a green and leafy setting.

Graham Atkinson has been a PGA professional for many years, the last of which have been spent providing an exceptional teaching and practice facility at Radlett. He has a long lease on the golf range and has been looking to develop it into something really special for some time. After a substantial period of time planning the strategy, Graham, in conjunction with London Rock, set about transforming his modest outfield into a beautiful landscape, which golfers can enjoy for many years to come.

In order to achieve this, the project needed expert planning and the full cooperation and help of the Environmental Agency. In years gone by, the site had had some unregulated tipping of various waste materials. These materials have had to be moved from the back of the range to a specially regulated area, which prevented any toxicity entering the water course; just under 40,000 m³ of material was then imported onto the range outfield between March 2015 and early August 2015.

The project was masterminded by specialist inert importers, London Rock Group, in conjunction with Contour Golf who ran the project on a day to day basis and provided all of the landscaping, sculpting and final finishes for the scheme. London Rock CEO, Jim Jeffries said:

 

"This was a relatively small scale project for our company, but being just a few miles from our head office it was a great opportunity for us to showcase our services close to our base. We worked very closely with Ingrid, from Contour Golf, and Graham Atkinson, the client. This strong working relationship ensured that the project went smoothly and of the golf operation was able to continue throughout the process. This was a major benefit to our client and to his customers, as good levels of service and revenue were maintained during the project. We are delighted with the way the finished product looks and performs."

 

Ingrid Eichler, founder of Contour Golf, provided all of the structure for the golf outfield and the detailed finishing to the putting green and target greens on the range. Once it is built it looks very simple, but before it can all look and perform so well there is a lot of detail to master and some serious shaping/drainage, together with creating the lasting foundations which ensure the outfield continues to perform well over the next few decades. Ingrid spoke to Golf Features:

 

"Jim Jeffries from London Rock and the client, Grahame Atkinson, all worked well on the whole project. We understood from the start that we only had a limited period of time to import material and only a limited amount of material to work with. London Rock carefully handled the relocation of previously tipped material on the site: this material was remediated on site and it was the clean, uncontaminated material from the original ground that was transferred to the north-west of the site. This was so we didn’t have to import material and place it where the sensitive Source Protection Zone is located. 

“As we were involved throughout, we were able to ensure that the imported material was immediately distributed and shaped to its best advantage as soon as it arrived on site. Often we are called in after the importation has started and we have to waste huge amounts of time (and clients' money) just moving and sorting soil, before we can create the desired golfing landscape. Working in this way ensures that the client pays far less and so fees from importation can be retained by them, rather than being spent getting us to retro-sort the imported materials. We are really impressed with how the finished range looks and – best of all – our client is delighted. "

 

Any golf operators considering an importation project should carefully check on how this relationship works before they sign any binding contracts – and the best advice possible is to speak to previous clients and ask for a 'warts and all' view of the completed project. The gains can be great, but the heartache and stress immense if you pick a poor team. 

Grahame Atkinson it is a highly experienced PGA professional, who turned professional in 1969 and has operated in many different environments throughout his career. The chance to transform the outfield and provide a really high quality golf range to his customers was too much to pass by. He explains:

 

"Looking back on the project, it was very straightforward, but prior to starting it was a much bigger deal. There was no guarantee that the project would finish up as well as it has and I didn't think we would be able to continue to trade as effectively as we have been able to throughout the process. What we have today is a truly outstanding outfield, with a natural golfing landscape that is a joy to hit into. Jim and Ingrid and their respective teams were very sensitive to our needs and I would recommend them both to any other operator without reservation. As an example of this, we had some complaints from our next door neighbour about large clanking noises during the tipping process. We relayed these to London Rock and they ensured that each driver tipped their load with precision and care, minimising the loud metallic thumps that normally accompany the tipping of a load of soil. Staying open throughout the process was a real game changer too, as we were able to retain most of our custom and our teaching service was largely unaffected. Without the close cooperation of the construction team, this would have been unworkable."

 

The centre will have an official opening in the summer and Golf Features will be back to cover that, but this is clearly a very well thought our project, providing improvements to the client's property and a working relationship throughout the build process. 

 

For more details, please contact: 

Ingrid Eichler; Ingrid@contour-golf.com, 07785 272935 www.contour-golf.com

Jim Jeffries; james@londonrock.co.uk, 0208 207 5566 www.londonrock.co.uk