Practice facility plans for the University of Connecticut Men’s Golf team have been relocated to the Depot Campus after opposition to the former proposal, according to a Sept. 9 scoping notice.
Plans for the golf facility are now underway on 6.5 acres on UConn’s Depot Campus which is accessible from Weaver Road about two miles from the main campus, according to the notice. Written comments on the proposal are due by Oct. 9 to Ian Dann, the senior project manager for University Planning, Design & Construction at UConn.
Four small buildings on the site currently are planned for demolition in a separate early 2027 project that would clear room for the proposal’s new building, a chipping and putting area, a single unlit driving range and a 24-car parking lot, according to the notice.
The former location of 986 Storrs Road was the previous site of the UConn Conifer Collection that served as a plant nursery for Sidney Waxman, a deceased UConn plant science professor known for his work innovating different dwarf evergreen trees at the site, according to the New York Times.
Memories of Waxman combined with local water quality and drainage concerns stoked an outcry from local Mansfield residents and students. Objectors to the facility addressed their concerns to UConn at board of trustees meetings, community meetings, protests and yard signs.
UConn filed an extension on July 7 to delay the decision on the facility’s next steps in the Connecticut Environmental Monitor. The website provides updates on developments from state agencies like UConn with possible environmental impacts to ensure compliance with the Connecticut Environmental Policy Act (CEPA).
The Sept. 9 scoping notice which relocated the proposed area for a golf facility said the decision was made “due to issues unrelated to the environmental review requirements of [CEPA] including, but not limited to, availability of an alternative site and enabling activities for its development.”
A presentation from the first public scoping meeting for the facility on Jan. 7 explained why UConn’s Depot Campus wasn’t the original choice.
“Depot Campus would require building removal, road crossing and/or disrupt and displace active agriculture, with significant utility infrastructure improvements needed to connect to campus,” the presentation said. “Depot Campus has higher potential opportunities for mixed use development and is mostly located within a Historic District of state significance.”
Some opponents to the original location on Storrs and East Road were happy to hear about the change of plans. Laura Tordenti, a Mansfield resident and 1983 graduate of UConn’s Neag School of Education, felt positively about the new proposal after almost nine months of organizing against the facility and researching its potential impacts.
“I walk by it now and it’s just a sigh of relief,” Tordenti said.
During a Monday phone interview Tordenti remembered walking around the UConn Conifer Collection with her daughter when it was well maintained in the early 2000’s.
“It’s a remarkable collection and [UConn] should care for it properly,” Tordenti said. “It could be grounds for learning.”
Tordenti said awareness spreading about the UConn Conifer Collection was one of the good things that came from a resistance effort with a petition that gained over 3,600 signatures.
University Spokesperson Stephanie Reitz said that no decisions have been made on potential other future uses of the Storrs Road site.
“While the Storrs/East Road site remains viable for future redevelopment, the building demolitions, combined with direct access to all UConn utilities and less clearing […], made the Depot Campus site a better candidate at this time,” Reitz said in an email Wednesday.
Skepticism of UConn’s plans remained, even among those in favor of the relocation.
Quin Harper, a local resident who presented to the board of trustees in opposition of the facility, said he was relieved but had some concerns about how UConn’s project information website was updated after the relocation.
“At the end of the day it wasn’t about golf, none of us are anti-golf,” Harper said in a Monday phone interview. “It was about the destruction of a historical tree preserve in an [environmentally sensitive area].”
One issue Harper had with the website regarded UConn’s explanation for the relocation.
“A significant amount of disinformation was circulated about the project’s proposed development on Storrs/East Road. That site is comparable […] however, it didn’t require demolition of buildings first,” the project’s website said.
Harper said he was very surprised reading that.
“They don’t call out anything in particular, but it seems pretty clear who they’re referring to,” Harper said about UConn’s perception of the facility’s critics.
Another obstacle Harper said was preventing a celebration about the cancelation was the insistence that 986 Storrs Road is available for future projects.
“I wish that [UConn] acknowledged that thousands of people signed the petition,” Harper said. “It signals very clearly that they don’t care about the concern.”