With hills rolling to the horizon like green waves frozen in place, it looks like a natural setting for a golf course, or a good site to build a house with a view.
If the plans of three Jonesboro men are realized, these 500 acres of "Sage Meadows" on Crowley's Ridge will become both.
Brothers Bob and Ed Troutt, assistant publishers of The Jonesboro Sun, and Kent Arnold, a Jonesboro real estate developer, plan to turn the rolling fields on the northeast edge of Jonesboro into a development called Sage Meadows, a residential village community that will be a "City within a city" and a semi-private 18-hole golf course with a "a country club feel for the everyday golfer."
"This will be the first major development in Northeast Jonesboro," said Bob Troutt. "Northeast Jonesboro is one of the prettiest areas in all of Jonesboro. It's just a few minutes to downtown and its proximity to the university is ideal. It's a wonderful, untapped location."
"This development will be something Jonesboro has never seen before," said Arnold, who has built over 500 homes in Jonesboro but does not plan to build homes in the new development.
The Troutts and Arnold will be asking the Jonesboro City Council to annex the site later this fall, located southeast of the Arkansas 351-Macedonia Road intersection. Their zoning requests have already been approved by the Metropolitan Area Planning Commission. Preliminary Plans for the development include recreational parks, open green space and a commercial park, in line with the MAPC's emphasis on planned neighborhood communities in the comprehensive land use plan approved Monday by the council.
"Kent and I have gone to numerous community developments all over the country, and we think Jonesboro is ready for this type of development," Ed Troutt said. "When you go into one of these communities, it's like a city within a city. The idea of a community development is to truly make it a planned area with one main entrance. Once you get in the development, you don't need to leave because everything is there for you."
Ultimately, the community could have a residency of over 2,000 people, Ed Troutt said, with readily available commerical outlets such as a grocery store, video rental store, cleaners, pharmacy, etc.
"One emphasis of a controlled community is that the entrances and exits are limited to one," added Ed Troutt, citing security as a factor. "Everything flows off one main boulevard or circle."
"About 80 percent of development currently in America is in master planned, gated or golf course communities," Arnold said. "It's a destination lifestyle. You buy into a lifestyle."
If it gains the official nod, and project developers say they have yet to hear any major complaints, Sage Meadows will become the third golf-residential development under construction in Jonesboro. House construction continues at RidgePointe, a Southwest Jonesboro country club/upscale residential development that recently expanded its course from nine to 18 holes. The Links, a planned nine-hole executive golf course and apartment complex off South Caraway Road, is also currently under construction.
The Troutts describe Sage Meadows as a five-year project, with the golf course being opened for play by May 1998, possibly earlier if construction conditions are ideal. All 18 holes will open at once, they said.
A team of local and out-of-state experts has been assembled to design and construct Sage Meadows. Kevin Tucker of Nashville, Tenn., will design the course. Tucker has designed over 40 golf courses across the South, including two courses at the Greystone golf community near Cabot owned by Jonesboro physician Glenn Dickson. Sajo Construction of Richmond, Texas, which has constructed nearly 50 courses, will build the course. Jim Maddox of Little & Maddox architectural firm of Jonesboro will be responsible for designing and formulating guidelines for landscaping and house construction to conform with community and neighborhood themes.
Tommy Bolt, the 1958 U.S. Open Champion currently living in Cherokee Villiage, will "signature" the course, providing some consultation on the design. "I'll give them a little input, add some little stuff, but the architects will be doing most of the work," Bolt said.
Sage Meadows will differ from other area developments in at least two ways: public access to the golf course and the variety of housing lots available.
While there will be some memberships, anyone will be able to play the 7,100-yard course for a fee. Bob Troutt said there will be five tees on each fairway, including a championship tee, a men's tournament tee, a men's tee, a seniors' tee and a woman's tee.
"We will have rules that parallel country clubs," Bob Troutt said. "This is not going to be a place where you can play with your shirt off or just drive up and start playing. There will be tee times and golf carts. We want to provide a country club feel for the everyday golfer."
Troutt said the course would actively seek outings by various companies and organizations, collegiate and high school events, and youth tournaments. He said a "Pub-Links" tournament, in which members of country clubs are not allowed to compete, would be played, and there has also been some interest expressed about a city golf championship involving Ridge-Pointe, Jonesboro Country Club, and Sage Meadows.
Over 800 homesites are planned for the development, with lot prices $28,000 and up. The Troutts expect homes built on the lots to cost $110,000 and up.
"Jonesboro is ready for a totally planned golf community with lot prices affordable to a wider range of people," Arnold said.
"What you'll have is a developed community environment with multiple housing types,"l Tucker said, "ranging from estate lots to townhouses, including manor lots which would be accorded less square footage (than estate lots) and garden homes."
There will also be a private swim and racquet club on the site, primarily for community residents.
Tucker and Sam Sakocious, president and owner of Sajo Construction, agreed that the site is ideal for golf course construction, the rolling terrain requiring minimal earth-moving.
"The golf course is already there," said Sakocious, who described it as "in the top 5 percent" of the sites his company has worked.
Elevation differs nearly 100 feet between the tallest hill crests and deepest drainage valleys on the site, which was purchased from Bill and Lavern Sloan who live nearby. The land is never steep, but never level; it is "gracefully rolling" in Maddox' words. Its western slopes overlook the Lost Creek valley, with the crests of the grassy hills providing a scenic view across a series of similar hills stretching miles eastward on Crowley's Ridge. It is mostly open pastureland interspersed with groves of trees, and there are scattered ponds which will be incorporated into the layout.
"I think it is absolutely gorgeous, perfect for a golf complex," Bolt said.
While Zoysia fairways, bent grass greens and Bermuda roughs will be the rule, Tucker said some of the native grasses, such as orchard grass, lespedeza and the namesake wild sage, would be incorporated into the roughs.
Neighborhoods within Sage Meadows will be built to conform to differing themes. That conformity and compatibility will require restrictions on private landowners. "We are going to have landscaping requirements, especially on the street sides of the building lots and the lots facing golf courses," Maddox said.
"You'll see some of the toughest deed restrictions there's ever been in the city of Jonesboro," Arnold added.
Sage Meadows may also spur development in a section of the city which has experienced very little in recent times. Ironically, the Arkansas 351 area, as part of the Old Greensboro Road, was the first area to be settled in Craighead County. The former community of Buck Snort and the accompanying "Buck Snort Hill," site of a post-Civil War skirmish between carpetbaggers and the Ku Klux Klan, are located just northwest of the Sage Meadows site.
"There's very little land left to develop in large tracts in the south part of town," said Arnold. "The Nettleton School District has been the biggest draw in South Jonesboro, and this is the largest single tract of land (in Northeast Jonesboro) that's in the Nettleton School District. It's the very last tract to the north in the Nettleton district where we can provide City Water & Light and sewer services."
"I expect that after we finish with the project, it will do wonders for Northeast Jonesboro," Bob Troutt said of what he described as a "multi-million dollar" venture. "It'll do wonders for the Jonesboro-Paragould area, period."
And it will extend both the housing boom and the golf boom in the Jonesboro area. Once all current and planned golf construction projects are completed, there will be 72 holes of golf in the city of Jonesboro and 99 in Craighead County. In 1990, there were 27 and 45, respectively.
"Jonesboro really needs a complex like this," Bolt said. "I think the Troutt brothers and Kent Arnold have great plans and intend to do a good job and will make it the showcase of Northeast Arkansas."
