DATE: Thursday, August 7, 1997              TAG: 9708070505

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B2   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: Briefs 

                                            LENGTH:   23 lines

HAMPTON ROADS [BRIEFS]

Groundbreaking ceremony to include head of PGA Tour

Golfing great Tim Finchum, now commissioner of the PGA Tour, will be on hand at a groundbreaking ceremony today at 10:30 a.m. for an $8 million Tournament Players Club course on the city-owned Lake Ridge property.

Last March, the PGA Tour signed a letter-of-intent to design and build a professional-caliber course on a 200-acre site along Princess Anne Road, south of Dam Neck Road.

Construction of the 18-hole course is expected to begin immediately. Completion of it, and a club house, is expected by the fall of 1998. It is to be designed by the PGA Tour's in-house agency, PGA Tour Design Services. The PGA is to lease the land for $300,000 a year, and will build and operate the course.

The project is part of an ongoing effort by the city to upgrade its tourism industry and expand its tourist season beyond the traditional summer months.

Send Suggestions or Comments to webmaster@scholar.lib.vt.edu