GOLF LA ROCA

Golf La Roca is a commercial course located 45 km north of Barcelona city, 1,5 km from Ap-7 Highway that connects central Europe, through France and Barcelona, to the south of Spain.

In 1999 a Barcelona-based Spanish development group started a mixed-use residential project, with lots, Hotel and an 18 hole commercial golf course, selecting our team for designing the golf course.

The urban zoning plan set a strict limitation for the golf development, as the zoning layout was carried out by an unexperienced team, being the terrain also crossed by the Cardedeu-La Roca provincial road, imposing a connectivity issue on the project.

The project and permitting process was carried out in the 2002-2004 period, and construction works started in 2004, the course being opened in 2006.

The site was a formerly a cereal field, with Vallforners creek crossing the land almost in the middle. A tunnel under the road had to be built in order to connect the club house and driving range area with the golf course, and the creek crossing was solved with only one small bridge as we arrange hole loops in a way we could save other crossings.

The 71 par and 5.997 meter course plays nicely and is very well considered by all golfers, as being rather flat it can be easily walked when playing golf.
The golf course is irrigated with re-used water coming from La Roca waste water depuration plant. The water permitting process made it compulsory to guarantee 100% of summer water consumption in lakes, so we had to create 4 hectares of new reservoirs, using the resulting cut to mound rough areas and create golf features, and therefore balancing cut and fill.

The strategic design we selected requires only a limited number of bunkers to give the course a nice character and becoming a nice playing challenge. Greens were set to medium size and very soft shaping.