Enfield Council, the owner of Whitewebbs Park Golf Course, is offering the property along with substantial extra land (a total of 241 acres in all) on a 25 year lease through property advisers, Knight Frank and UK golf specialists, Smith Leisure.
Whitewebbs Park is located less than two miles from junction 25 of the M25 and Enfield town centre. It therefore has a strong demographic profile with almost 500,000 people living within a 15-minute drivetime and over 2.75 million people living within a 30-minute drivetime.
The J H Taylor designed 18-hole municipal course opened for play in 1932. For many years Enfield Council has operated the course in-house and has maintained the adjacent land – which includes extensive natural woodland, an attractive lake and grasslands. Operating municipal golf courses is, however, no longer a core activity for most local authorities, and the Council is inviting initial expressions of interest from developers and operators by Friday 27th September.
The Council is looking for proposals which will benefit the local community and enhance Whitewebbs Park as a whole – which has its own community group (‘Friends of Whitewebbs Park’), a local running club and is popular with cyclists and walkers.
The 241 acres on offer present considerable opportunities for diversifying and expanding recreational and leisure activities on site. Provided proposals respect town and country planning guidelines, the Council is actively encouraging diverse and forward-thinking schemes.
Bidders interested in using landscaping to fund any development proposals may be interested to know that the Council previously commissioned an independent report which suggested that the golf course alone could accommodate around 150,000 to 200,000 m3 of imported inert material.
The property offers development and operational flexibility with two current clubhouse locations on site (one on the northern side and one on the southern side – both with parking and vehicular access). Suitable future leisure-based uses could include: a leisure centre, an outdoor gym, a children’s play area, a café/restaurant, bike hire and bike tracks. The Council will also carefully consider proposals that may fundamentally change the current golf format, such as reducing from 18 to 9 holes with golf academy, adventure golf, footgolf etc.
The Council is willing to divide the property letting into smaller lots, and it is also willing to consider consortium bids. Interested parties wanting further information can contact Mark Smith at Smith Leisure on 07951 587303 or mark@smithleisure.com or Kathryn Brown at Knight Frank on 01279 213 350 or kathryn.brown@knightfrank.com
Whitewebbs Park https://new.enfield.gov.uk/whitewebbsgolf/