There are plans to turn Pineridge Golf Course into a new subdivision.

Owner Dave Yard tells NL News that the ownership group has just applied to rezone the property, from agricultural to multi-family residential.

Yard says their current plan calls for 390 units of housing, of single-family and multi-family units, as well as open park space.

And he expects the build out would take about 10 years, and be done over three phases.

But construction won’t start overnight.

“We’re not anxious to give up Pineridge Golf Course. We love Pineridge Golf Course,” Yard says. “We are going to be here as a golf course next year, for sure. After that, not too sure.

“I’m saying that thinking that we probably will still be golfing there in 2022. Things are kind of in flux. We’ve just put the signs out for development and the zoning change.”

Yard says business has not been where it should be, as he says current members and regulars are getting older and playing less often, and that young people aren’t taking up golf as often as they used to.

“The bottom line is very skinny, I’ll be quite frank with you. And that’s sort of been happening over the past several years… Golfing in general, in North America, is not as brisk a business as it used to be. One of the main reasons is we’re losing our older members and we’re not gaining younger members.”

He adds that the owners aren’t reinventing the wheel with their development plans, pointing out there is new multi-family housing west of them, at Orchards Walk, and new development just east of the course on Dallas Drive, near the Petro-Canada gas station.

“It just makes sense, it’s the best use of this property right now.”

Pineridge has operated since 1990 and the current owners have had it for 12 years.