THE CHICAGO PARK GOLF ALLIANCE PLANS TO RECONSTRUCT JACKSON PARK GOLF COURSE

A community meeting was recently held at La Rabida Children’s Hospital located on 6501 S. Promontory Dr. to discuss the reconstruction plans for the 27-hole golf course in Jackson Park. The Chicago Park Golf Alliance said they plan to replace the 27-hole golf course and create a single 18-hole golf course that will cater to the next generation of young golfers. Eugene Taylor has been golfing since 1973. Taylor says he can’t believe that he is still alive to witness the beginning stages of the Obama Presidential Center which is the planned presidential library of Barack Obama. The center will be located in Jackson Park in the same area as the newly renovated golf course. Photo Credit: Christopher Shuttlesworth
A community meeting was recently held at La Rabida Children’s Hospital located on 6501 S. Promontory Dr. to discuss the reconstruction plans for the 27-hole golf course in Jackson Park. The Chicago Park Golf Alliance said they plan to replace the 27-hole golf course and create a single 18-hole golf course that will cater to the next generation of young golfers. Eugene Taylor has been golfing since 1973. Taylor says he can’t believe that he is still alive to witness the beginning stages of the Obama Presidential Center which is the planned presidential library of Barack Obama. The center will be located in Jackson Park in the same area as the newly renovated golf course. Photo Credit: Christopher Shuttlesworth

THE CHICAGO PARK GOLF ALLIANCE PLANS TO RECONSTRUCT JACKSON PARK GOLF COURSE

By Christopher Shuttlesworth

The Obama Presidential Center (OPC) is set to be completed in Jackson Park by the year 2021. As part of the new installments, the Chicago Park Golf Alliance plans to reconstruct the 27-hole golf course in Jackson Park and create a single 18-hole golf course that will cater to the next generation of young golfers.

Chicago Alderman Leslie Hairston of the 5th Ward along with community leaders and architects, held a community meeting on June 27, 2017 at La Rabida Children’s Hospital, located on 6501 S. Promontory Dr., to

discuss further details of the reconstruction plans for the 27-hole golf course.

Gregg Calpino, who is the senior landscape architect at SmithGroup JJR, said the updated framework for the single 18-hole golf course will go through a series of holistic processes before it’s completed.

Calpino explained that during the Framework planning process, his architectural team would like to create an 18- hole golf course that features several recreational designs and caters to all age levels, especially the next generation.

“I think one of the neat things is the way this course will be designed. It will have a whole series to play a 5,500 yard course or to play a 7,000 course and pretend you’re Tiger [Woods],” he said. “If you want to be a kid that wants to learn the game and you want to have a 3,000 yard course, then that’s here as well.”

Calpino said Smith Group JJR is working with the city of Chicago to gather as much information as it can to understand what might work together to ultimately guide them to a detailed design on how the golf course will come together under one vision.

“We’re looking at how we can serve the wide range of users,” he said. “We need to start to think about how we can cater to the next generation of golfers through recreational purposes such as picnicking, walking trails, usages of the park and how it all can knit into the golf course.”

Calpino said Chicago has a great legacy of framework and holistic planning going back to the 1800s. He continued to say that Chicago has always been guided by some level of framework planning that looks holistically at the parks.

“We’re at the point where we are reflective of the history, but we’re looking at today and the future to make sure we have the right frame work plan to guide us,” Calpino said.

Dr. Carol Adams, who is a 48-year South Shore resident, said she will help keep the community involved during the golf course planning process.

Adams said a lot of longtime residents have felt neglected from past community projects, and really want to make sure this golf course project is respectful of the legacy of the neighborhood as it propels the community into the future.

“There needs to be some sense of a mutual vision of where we want to end up, where we would like to see our community and what we think our neighborhood deserves,” she said. “The community golfers have asked us to please incorporate ideas that would encourage young people

to get engaged and get involved in the game and grow the game.”

Adams highlighted that they have started golfing programs within the area high schools and an orientation for a caddy program at Jackson Park, which is subsidized by the Western Golf Association.

Calpino said the month of June was the discovering and listening phase of the 18-hole golf course, adding, that during the middle of the summer, his architectural team will begin to input ideas from the listening phase to generate the next generation of golfers. This process

will also serve as guide in terms of how it will be created.

Ultimately, he said, his team will look at the architectural drawings of the plan in September and draft the updated framework later in the fall.

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