COURSE & GROUNDS
PHOTO COURTESY COLUMBUS CC
‘The Heart of the Fleet’
From their role in renovation projects to everyday use, utility vehicles are the lifeblood of golf course maintenance efforts. By Betsy Gilliland, Contributing Editor
SUMMING IT UP
• Superintendents rely on
heavy-duty utility vehicles to haul materials, and lightduty UVs to move people and tools around the golf course.
• Letting turf and tree contractors use utility vehicles from a club’s fleet can help to minimize damage to the golf course and property. • Assigning a particular utility vehicle to crew members gives them ownership of the equipment and encourages them to take care of it.
Many factors drive the success of a golf course maintenance operation. From hiring dedicated personnel to relying on trusted equipment, golf course superintendents need to steer their departments in the right direction. And utility vehicles (UVs) have become some of the most critical pieces of equipment in superintendents’ arsenals. “They’re indispensable,” Kevin Pryseski, Golf Course Superintendent at Marin Country Club in Novato, Calif., says of utility vehicles. “Other than mowers, they’re the heart of the fleet. You couldn’t operate efficiently without them, and you need the proper number of vehicles to move people around.” Reliability for Renovations Utility vehicles get plenty of mileage in everyday use. However, the vehicles have also played an outsized role in the recent surge of golf course renovation projects, like the bunker renovations at Marin’s 18-hole golf course in 2017. Under the renovation, the golf course’s 72 bunkers, built in 2007, were reduced to 51 bunkers, dropping the sand coverage from 90,000 square feet to 70,000 square feet. Crews also replaced the fabric-lined sub-
surfaces of the hazards with Capillary Concrete to rapidly draw storm water through the sand without washouts or channeling. Several dual fairway bunkers were combined into one, eliminating some greenside bunkers that got little play and converting others into closely mown collection areas. While the project originally called only for the bunker renovations, the property also expanded and improved its short-game practice area and built new forward tees while the contractors were on site. Even though the renovation project changed, the need for utility vehicles to carry out the tasks remained the same throughout the effort. “There’s a difference in what we need for a reconstruction job. There’s a lot of hauling, and the vehicles are getting a lot more heavy-duty work,” says Pryseski. During the bunker renovation process, the heavy-duty utility vehicles were used to haul materials such as sod and sand and for soil removal. In addition, Pryseski reports, “The contractors borrowed them so they could get in tight spots. We do that with our tree contractors, too, so they can use them to remove logs. There is less damage to the golf course when they use our equipment.”
44 C&RB www.clubandresortbusiness.com MARCH 2019
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