Roadblock After Roadblock
Updated: 7 days ago
Three years to a permit!
When we started working on Vaca Valley Country Club in 2023, I knew the building would need a lot of work.
What I did not expect was how much of the project would happen before we ever really got to build it.
The space was originally about one-third office and two-thirds warehouse. It was never designed for a private golf club, so making the layout work around the existing restrooms, plumbing, and building conditions took a lot of revisions.
By late 2023, I had an interior designer working alongside my project designer, and the plans kept evolving.
Working With an Older Building
Once the previous tenant vacated, we discovered a major foundation issue.
A portion of the building had settled significantly, so piers had to be drilled around part of the structure and the building carefully jacked back into position.
Once that was addressed, accessibility became another major hurdle.
The building was constructed long before today’s ADA requirements were a major part of commercial design. We brought in a third-party consultant to help navigate the process, which led to changes to the parking lot, a new accessible ramp, restroom revisions, and additional layout changes.
Each change seemed to affect something else.
Changing the Use
Another major hurdle was changing the building from industrial use to assembly occupancy.
That meant working through parking, maximum occupancy, public notices to neighboring properties, and special conditions of approval from the city.
Once that was resolved, more plan revisions followed. The health department created another round of changes, including plumbing adjustments that we are still finishing today.
It became a cycle of solving one problem and finding the next one.
Roadblock After Roadblock
At many points, I thought we were finally there.
Then another roadblock would show up.
We had already started demolition and made it almost to our first inspection before additional design changes forced us to stop and go back through review.
At the same time, we were already committing to the finished club.
I placed our Trackman deposit in late 2023. The furniture was selected, ordered, delivered, and is still sitting in a warehouse waiting for the building to catch up.
That probably sums up the last few years pretty well.
The project never really stopped. We were always working through engineering, accessibility, plans, occupancy, parking, health department requirements, or another design revision.
We just were not always physically building.
The upside is that the extra time allowed the design to improve and gave me more time to think through how the club should actually function.
Finally Moving Forward
Today, the interior is demoed and the underground plumbing is substantially complete.
We have a little more underground work to finish because of the latest health department changes, and our next major milestone is the first inspection, planned for the end of August. From there, the building should finally start changing quickly.
I will be building VVCC as an owner-builder, and working in construction has given me great people and resources to lean on throughout the process.
I also know enough about construction to know there will still be problems.
There always are. But these will be construction problems.
After nearly three years of foundation work, design changes, accessibility requirements, occupancy changes, city reviews, health department revisions, and permits, that sounds pretty good to me.
We finally get to build it.
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