A few golfers were driving away Monday morning at the new 68-bay, double-decker, heated, illuminated driving range at the historic Cobbs Creek Golf Course.<\/p>\n
But full restoration of the golf course won\u2019t be complete until at least next spring or summer. <\/p>\n
As that work progresses, Mayor Cherelle L. Parker<\/a> and other officials announced that the city will contribute $9 million into restoring three miles of Cobbs and Indian Creeks, which flow through the golf course and contribute to persistent flooding. <\/p>\n Cobbs Creek Golf Course opened in 1916. The course, which spans 350 acres in a densely populated part of West Philadelphia<\/a>, was notable for welcoming players of all ethnicities decades before other courses desegregated. <\/p>\n The restoration includes creation of a 25-acre plain and planting 49,000 native trees and plants.<\/p>\n \u201cThis effort is about much more than golf,\u201d Parker said of the flood control and overall boost the new golf course \u2014 as well as a recently opened school <\/a>\u2014 will bring to the community.<\/p>\n Why stream restoration is needed<\/p>\n Persistent flooding \u2014 and a fire \u2014 ultimately led to the closure of the 350-acre course in 2020<\/a>. <\/p>\n The next year, it was announced that the nonprofit Cobbs Creek Foundation would spearhead the course\u2019s transformation into a \u201cworld class\u201d golf facility and raise $180 million for the project. Once the course is complete, the foundation will lease it back from the city for $1. <\/p>\n The foundation is spending $30 million in improvements to the creek in addition to the city\u2019s $9 million. <\/p>\n The creek restoration work, which began in 2023, is roughly 50% complete, officials said. Parts of the waterways have been excavated and flow rerouted to mitigate downstream flooding. <\/p>\n Work will continue over spring and summer, including construction of a retaining wall, creation of the new wetlands<\/a>, and the plantings.<\/p>\n Robert Baldwin, a project manager for Resource Environmental Solutions (RES), the company that has been contracted for the creek bed restoration, said hundreds of years of sediment has run off into the waterways.<\/p>\n \u201cThat built up beside the stream channel, made it unstable, made the banks vertical, and prone to erosion,\u201d Baldwin said. \u201cUltimately the stream channel over-widened. It\u2019s not a stable system.\u201d<\/p>\n Baldwin said crews are removing sediment and lowering the elevation. He said some banks were 10 feet high. They\u2019ll be lowered to one foot. <\/p>\n He expects the bulk of the work to be complete by the end of the year, including the plant of the trees and shrubs.<\/p>\n The felling of hundreds of mature trees in 2022 as part of the course renovation and wetlands rehabilitation outraged some neighbors, who had long used the woods for recreation. <\/p>\n Eventually, the city granted the Cobbs Creek Foundation an <\/a>exemption<\/a> from some environmental rules<\/a> so it could restore the creek and wetlands and complete some parts of the course. <\/p>\n How\u2019s the golf course renovation progressing?<\/p>\n