Appeals cause delays to construction of floating golf driving range in Helsinki

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The floating golf practice range planned for Helsinki’s Munkkiniemi district now looks as if it will materialise only next year at the earliest. The driving range idea thought up by singer and active golfer Timo Kojo was originally meant to open already in the spring or early summer.
      On Tuesday the City of Helsinki Real Estate Committee discussed complaints made against the committee’s earlier favourable decision to endorse the building of the floating driving range.
      The committee, however, ended up leaving the matter on the table, as the committee vice chairman Kai Kalima (Soc. Dem.) wanted to familiarise himself further with the Floating Range company’s plans on the spot in Munkkiniemi.
     
”In practice, the decision will be postponed until September, because during our late August meeting I will be in Beijing”, said committee chairman Kai Hagelberg (Nat. Coalition), whose idea it was to leave the issue on the table.
      According to Hagelberg, the Real Estate Committee’s favourable decision with regard to building the floating golf range is unlikely to change, because already in the spring the committee decided unanimously to rent part of the Munkkiniemi water area to the golf company. “The city officials have carefully looked into our decision and the filed complaints and they have found the complaints unfounded.”
     
The objectors to the floating driving range consider the Real Estate Committee’s decision to be in violation of good administrative practice. Furthermore, the obligation to hear all the interested parties is said to have been neglected.
      Päivi Väisänen, one of the leading figures of the opposing group, says that the group’s standpoint has not change since the spring. “The traffic problems related to the golf range remain unresolved.”
     
The opponents of the project consider flying golf balls are a hazard to canoeists and other users of the water area. Furthermore, it is feared that the planned restaurant building on the shore will cause disturbance and will inconvenience the area’s other users of recreational outdoor activities.
      “The city of Helsinki has 300 kilometres of shoreline. In other words, there’s enough of it for the residents as well. According to various accounts, Munkkiniemi is one of the best locations suitable for a golf practice range like this. There is a dire shortage of such places in Helsinki”, Kai Hagelberg says in justifying the plans.
      According to Hagelberg, a possible continuation of the appeal round may postpone the realization of the plan even further into the future.
     
In the Floating Range company’s golf practice concept, floating balls are hit from the teeing area on a pontoon bridge onto green islands covered with artificial grass and anchored to float at different distances in the water.
      Winches can be used to move the "islands" and vary the distance.
      Floating barriers will prevent balls from drifting outside the area.
      An equipment hire business and a restaurant will be situated on the shore.


Links:
  Floating Range Press Release (February 29, 2008)
  Floating Range Brochure (.pdf file)

Helsingin Sanomat