Renovating Your Club is Fun and Easy! Part Two – Put on the Hard Hat
by Jim Petersen, CCM, General Manager, Sunset Ridge CC, Northfield, Ill. (editor@clubandresortbusiness.com)
January 2008
You’ve hired an award-winning architect and have a quality general contractor on board, so they will know what needs to be done, right? Wrong! Don’t assume too much, as they will not be using the building when it is completed—–you will. And only you will know what you’ll need in the building to make it function properly and efficiently. Certainly a great architect and builder will help with many of the items required to make the building function, but not all of them.
There are countless items to think about and it may seem overwhelming at times. Tackle it in bits and pieces by studying, say, electrical first. Look at outlet locations, light dimmer and sound system controls, etc. Then move on to plumbing plans. Are there hose bibs outside to water the landscaping, accessible cleanouts in the bathrooms, etc? My last bit of advice is to keep copious notes and a good paper trail to ensure items brought to the architect for correction make it onto the construction documents.
What follows is a list of items to consider when planning a renovation or building project. This list was started by John Jordan, MCM, and has been added to by club managers that have experienced some of these issues. While it isn’t all-encompassing, it is a good starting point of things to consider.
• Always provide floor drains in toilet areas to accommodate toilet overflows and in wet areas to facilitate cleaning.
• Hose bibs need to be provided in wet areas to accommodate “hose downs” and pressure spray cleaners.
• Accessible clean-out traps need to be provided in toilet and wet areas to facilitate unclogging stopped up drain lines.
• Water lines to pool, pump, and filter systems need to be separate from water lines to pool houses.
• Hire a sound engineer early in the design process. Most architects do not include speaker and sound system volume control boxes in their electrical plans and conduit needs to be run for microphone jacks and speaker control boxes. Conduit chases also need to be provided through walls for speaker wiring.
• When designing ballrooms make sure the electrical plan has a sufficient outlets/power for bands and lighting. Consider having a 220V electrical outlet installed at points where bands may be placed in the room. Cheap to do during construction, expensive to do after. If using 120V duplex outlets, make sure there is a sufficient number all on separate breakers for bands and lighting.
• Consider providing floor outlets in meeting spaces for AV equipment. Most architects will not provide them in their initial plans.
• Get your coffee provider to supply specs for brewing equipment when planning kitchen electrical needs. More power generally means faster recovery and the ability to brew more coffee faster. The fastest coffee brewers require three-phase electrical power.
• In cold climates, if your fire protection system is a “wet” sprinkler, make sure sprinkler pipes are all located in insulated/heated areas. It is amazing how much water comes out when a sprinkler pipe freezes and breaks.
• Get the local sanitarian/health inspector involved in the kitchen design process. Their input will be beneficial and help to avoid costly retrofits. Being forced to install additional hand washing stations AFTER the kitchen is built is a problem you’ll want to avoid.
• In-house laundry rooms require a tremendous amount of ventilation. Make sure they are designed near an exterior wall at a point where the vent pipes will not be unsightly from the exterior of the building.
• Kitchen door sizes should be 48” and have right hand swings.
• Sufficient slope needs to be provided so water drains away from any building.
• Exterior hose bibs need to be provided to accommodate hosing down walks and drives.
• It is best to provide restroom facilities near the turn stand. This is particularly true for ladies. A ladies restroom should have no less than four commodes to accommodate ladies foursome on the turn.
• It is critical to use the best mechanical, electrical, plumbing, kitchen and structural consultants available. Their mistakes besmirch the architectural firm’s reputation and can cause lasting operational problems and difficulties for the owner.
• To ensure maximum success, once a month during the decision phase have an Executive Summary Meeting with Chairman of Building Committee, Owner’s Rep, and Architect to discuss design issues, team relationships, communication, and other design related issues.
• Make sure there is a clear understanding among all involved of where interior design begins and architecture ends and vice versa.
• The architect’s contract should include the interior design firm as a subcontract to ensure coordination and timely interior design.
• Particular attention should be paid to designing for maximum efficiency and for proper utilization of payroll dollars. For example, having coat check room adjacent to front desk permits the coat check function to be accomplished by the receptionist thus saving the cost of a coat check person.
• Design walk-in boxes so you enter a freezer through a pre-chilled walk-in cooler. Doing so saves operating costs.
• Provide for adequate storage space!
• Table storage areas must be large enough to accommodate all tables and chairs from not only banquet rooms but regular member areas as well. This allows maximum use of space for any number of set-ups for weddings and cocktail parties.
• Ample out-of-sight employee parking needs to be provided near employee entrance.
• Restroom areas need a strong ventilation system to provide plenty of fresh air.
• Golf Shop and cart staging area need to be on same level.
• Ladies Locker Room needs to be farther from Golf Shop than the Men’s Locker Room happens to be.
• Pay attention to sight lines from hallways to restrooms and locker rooms.
• Make sure shower heads are of Country Club quality.
• Understand 2” concrete is apt to crack under the slightest stress.
• Showers should not be located near exterior windows.
• Make sure massage rooms have sinks and that the flooring stands up to the weight of massage table.
• Doors to bag room need to be wide enough to accommodate someone carrying a bag on each shoulder.
• All delivery areas need to be properly screened and hidden from view.
• The service yard needs to be surfaced with five or six inches of poured concrete to accommodate heavy garbage trucks and large delivery trucks. Such service yards need drains to permit areas to be hosed down for cleaning.
• Be aware of the need for vertical circulation.
• Porches and verandahs need to be below the level of main floor to accommodate the views of those in the building.
• Need wall space to intermix and balance with windows (you need places to rest your eyes).
• Design lighting so dimmers on tray and vaulted ceilings work independently of chandeliers and of the sconces located in the same areas.
• Be sensitive to acoustics and sound levels in dining areas to ensure noise levels are kept to a reasonable level. Plaster ceilings are beautiful to look at but don’t function well from a sound absorbing standpoint.
• Bar tops should be deep enough for patron to slide legs underneath comfortably.
• Floor structure needs to be sufficiently rigid in dining areas so floors won’t shake when walked upon.
• Use light colored tile under urinals. Make sure urinals have adequate bottom lips.
• Allow sufficient overhang of roof to keep windows clean and dry during “normal” rain storms. (Constant cleaning of window exteriors is expensive).
• Insulate all cold water drain lines so that the condensation doesn’t drip through the ceiling.
• Make sure kitchen doors are solid wood (as opposed to hollow core).
• Make sure small windows are located in kitchen doors to avoid collisions.
• Make sure trench drains are installed in front of ice machines to accommodate ice spillage.
• Make sure gutters are placed around all areas of building to avoid mud from splattering up onto and staining exterior surfaces.
• Make sure to provide suitable lighting between the cart staging area and cart barn.
• Place locks on men’s and ladies locker rooms to keep non-members from entering during after hour private parties.
• Ensure that soil stacks are located a sufficient distance from fresh air intakes (or cap them with one way vent caps).
• Understand that pavers are subject to battery acid spills and oil drips and plan accordingly.
• Make sure employee restrooms are strategically located near kitchens, dining rooms and other busy areas to assist staff in a quick return time.
• When constructing a Porte Cochere, allow adequate height and width to accommodate motor coaches and tour buses to drive underneath for boarding and un-boarding – especially in inclement weather.
• Ensure that patterned carpet is used in dining areas. This helps to hide food spills. Avoid ever using light colored carpet.
• Make sure chairs used in food service areas have a waterfall front edge. Use of ribbing will trap crumbs and create a constant maintenance problem. Enclosed seat backs will also collect crumbs.
• Wood chairs should have stringers to strengthen the legs.
• Be sure that chair arms will fit under table tops without scratching the chair arms or the table edges.
• Avoid plain wooden arms on chairs used in casual food areas. Body oils and sweat will accumulate in time and create a grimy appearance which in turn can be difficult to maintain without removing the finish on the arm itself. Consider covering arms of such chairs with leather or a top quality vinyl covering –both types of covering will lend themselves to easy maintenance.
• Never put a drop ceiling in an employee area because this provides “hiding places” to facilitate employee theft.
• Make sure floors are well-braced and that poured concrete slabs are thick enough so floors don’t shake as people walk upon them. It is particularly annoying to diners for the floor and their tables to rock to and fro as servers and other patrons walk between and by their tables.
• On doors to restroom stalls, use a door closer that allows the door to only close 75% to 80% of the way. This would accommodate a potential user to see which stall might be available.
• Make sure drinking fountains are readily available within the Men’s and Ladies Locker Rooms.
• Make sure dirty dish zone is not too small and ideally is located near the kitchen entrance so that the return of dirty dishes to be washed doesn’t require walking from one end of the kitchen to the other.
• Storage areas and coolers need to be close to the delivery entrance.
• Make sure to border the carpet in a manner that doesn’t distinguish the new portions of the carpet versus the old in relation to traffic patterns.
• Upon considering furnishings for Men’s Card Room or Grill, give very strong consideration for the sake of the older members to having chairs with casters to facilitate getting in and out of the chair.
• Upon purchasing dining room chairs, be sensitive that the seat backs of chairs are not so deep as to preclude ladies and/or shorter people from being able to sit with their backs against the back of the chair.
• If building a zero entry pool, make sure pool bottom is slip and skid proof for suntan lotion will make the bottom very slippery.
• For pool seating planning purposes, assume that about 15% of the total members of the club will visit the pool on a peak day, i.e. July 4, Memorial Day, Labor Day, etc. “Total Members” means all members and their direct family members. For instance, if a club has 1,000 members, statistically, there will be 3.75 (number of people in average American household – don’t ask about the .75 person) times 1,000 or 3,750 total members. Assume that 1/3 to 10% of the total members – in this example, 188 to 375 seats will be needed. Clearly, you wouldn’t want that many seats around the pool all the time, so there normally would be a fraction of these put out. Naturally, storage becomes a problem. Also, try to design approximately the total deck area to be three times the pool surface Area. Assume 2/3 of this will be paved and 1/3 will be grass that is flat enough for chairs on a peak day. The number of seats that will fit on a given deck area must be determined through design studies since the shape and size of decks vary for each pool.
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