From golf course to gravestones, Sydney’s Wallacia Panthers Golf Club to shut next year.

1 Sep 2017

According to Sydney’s Daily Telegraph newspaper, public golf in the west of the city is now under attack with the Wallacia Panthers Golf & Country Club to be converted into a cemetery following the expiration of its lease next February.

The club was founded in 1932, and the following year apparently became the first in Australia to allow women associates to join. The golf course sits on land owned by the Catholic Church, and the Catholic Metropolitan Cemeteries Trust has now obtained NSW Government consent to acquire the golf land and replace the current holes with 60,000 burial spaces.

At $20 a round, the Wallacia Panthers course obviously provided value for the green fee golfer in Western Sydney and will surely be missed by many in the area. The club have made no comment yet on the situation, except to confirm that their lease expires on February 28, 2018 and subsequent to that date the members will need to play elsewhere.

From the Daily Telegraph article:

THE land on which the Wallacia Panthers Golf and Country Club sits has been flagged for use as a cemetery, Catholic Cemeteries and Crematoria confirmed.

“Catholic Metropolitan Cemeteries Trust has obtained NSW Government consent for the acquisition of 44ha of land at Wallacia, currently operating as the Wallacia golf course, with plans to create 60,000 burial spaces over the next 50 years,” a spokesman for Catholic Cemeteries and Crematoria said.

It comes as Penrith councillors voted unanimously for the council to amend planning regulations to stop developers from building cemeteries or crematoriums on Mulgoa Valley or Wallacia land.

Rookwood General Cemeteries Reserve Trust is also forging ahead with plans to turn the historic Fernhill estate in the nearby suburb of Mulgoa into a general cemetery. Both plans have sparked a community outcry — Mulgoa over the destruction of heritage, and Wallacia over the loss of a community meeting place.

But the buyers of the golf club and course site at 13-15 Park Rd maintain a cemetery would help meet demand for burial spaces in coming years.

Its spokesman pointed to research by town planning group Urbis which predicts “burial sites in western Sydney would be exhausted within 28 years, with burials continuing to comprise 30 per cent of internments in NSW”. A Penrith Council spokesman last year said the 107-year-old Penrith Cemetery would not reach capacity for “at least 40 more years”.

Rookwood’s trust spokeswoman said a Deloitte Economic Study showed “a quarter of billion dollars will flow into the Penrith community in the initial 15 years after commencement (of a Mulgoa cemetery) from visitation to the site alone”.

Catholic Cemeteries and Crematoria chief executive Peter O’Meara: “We will be providing to all communities much needed burial space at affordable prices in a landscaped setting, mitigating the exhaustion of existing burial sites at our Liverpool and Kemps Creek cemeteries over the next five years.

“Working with the NSW Government we are committed to ensuring the interment practices and beliefs of all religious and cultural groups are respected.”

Silverdale resident Kathrine Grover said the land the golf club sits on is “just beautiful”.

“Those of us who chose to live in rural villages do so for the sense of community and our sense of identity,” Dr Grover said of “The Club” which is how she and other locals fondly refer to the small friendly club, which boasts an 18-hole championship golf course.

Panthers said they did not own the land and declined to comment on what the sale would mean for its golfing members. “Panthers has a lease until February 28, 2018, with no option to renew,” a Panthers Group spokeswoman said.

Rookwood General Cemeteries Reserve Trust’s plan is for a “predominantly lawn-style” cemetery on 40 per cent of the total 384ha Fernhill site, developed over three stages.

The estate would be opened to the public but the historical buildings — including the 1830s heritage-listed homestead — would not be used for funeral ceremonies, the trust’s head, George Simpson, had previously said.

“People attending memorial services at the new site will use local businesses such as retailers, cafes, petrol stations and more, and this is expected to bring a host of benefits to the local area,” Mr Simpson said.