by Shane Sody
Since February 2025, a proposal to “re-develop” one or more of the three North Adelaide golf courses has been touted by the State Government as a claimed “upgrade” or “investment”.
Informed forecasts about the likely loss of hundreds, if not thousands of mature trees on the golf courses has prompted no response of any substance from Government ministers, other than to ridicule those who have expressed their concerns.
Significantly, neither the Premier, nor his Ministers refer to this area as a Park; let alone correctly identify it as Possum Park / Pirltawardli (Park 1); a biodiverse urban forest within the world-unique Adelaide Park Lands.
The target: all this land (almost 20 times the area of Adelaide Oval) taken over by the State Government, with one aim - to make money from a commercial golf business throughout the year. It’s not just about LIV golf.
By referring to this area solely as a golf course, or golf courses, the Government’s messaging indirectly downplays, if not actually denies the status of this area as Park Lands. As part of your Park Lands, this area is valuable not only for golf, but for so much more.
That’s why award-winning photographer, Yuri Poetzel has helped us compile this “Portrait of a Park under threat.”
The citizen science platform iNaturalist has reports of more than 100 species in this Park. The Atlas of Living Australia has even more. On the Government’s own figures, more than 9,000 trees are found within this Park.
International golf course designer Peter Dalkeith Scott has estimated that to widen and lengthen all fairways, as would be required for an elite-level golf course, more than half of these 9,000 trees would have to be removed.
Images: (left) State Government; (centre and right): Peter Dalkeith Scott. Compilation: Channel Ten News.
For detail, see: https://www.adelaide-parklands.asn.au/blog/2025/9/11/canopy-shredding
It’s not just about a 3-day golf festival
The LIV Golf circuit, sponsored by Saudi Arabia’s “Public Investment Fund” (PIF) is haemmoraghing red ink. LIV Golf’s operations outside the United States lost $US461.3 million ($AUD 702 million) in 2024, even more than the losses incurred in each of the previous two years.
The possibility that that the Saudi PIF might withdraw its financial support, leading to the collapse of the LIV Golf franchise, has not deterred Premier Peter Malinauskas from maintaining his push for a commercial golf takeover and “re-development” of your Park Lands.
On 10 October 2025, the Premier told the ABC:
“We are investing in the North Adelaide public golf course irrespective of the opportunity with LIV. LIV helps improve the economics of the proposition, but it's not dependent upon it.”
Alternative venue secured for 2027
The Premier has confirmed that after the next scheduled LIV Golf event at The Grange Golf Club in February 2026, the annual event will be transferred in 2027 to the Kooyonga Golf Club at Lockleys.
But despite the availability of this alternative venue, the Premier has doubled down on his determination to “re-develop” your Park Lands with built facilities, and with widened and lengthened fairways, which would necessitate massive tree losses.
His remarks are always couched in terms of promoting golf; never acknowledging the other benefits of this mature urban forest within your Park Lands.
Thar’s why a award-winning photographer, Yuri Poetzel, has captured these portraits of what seems to be (to the State Government at least) an INVISIBLE Park.
The author of this article, Shane Sody, is a former President of the Adelaide Park Lands Association (from 2017 to 2025) and remains the editor of the semi-monthly newsletter, "Open Green Public".
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