Plans move ahead for construction of MoCo Parks’ first public disc golf course

Project to be built near National Capital Trolley Museum

January 24, 2025 9:51 a.m. | Updated: January 24, 2025 11:50 a.m.

Plans are moving forward to construct an 18-hole public disc golf course in Montgomery County’s Northwest Branch Recreational Park in Aspen Hill with Thursday’s Planning Board approval of a forest conservation plan.

The public course would be the first of its kind for Montgomery Parks, the county’s parks department that proposed the project.

The planned disc golf course will be adjacent to the National Capital Trolley Museum and incorporate trolley themes within the course design, such as trolley tracks to create “synergy” with the museum, county planners said during Thursday’s meeting at the board’s Wheaton headquarters.

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Disc golf is a sport played like golf, with players walking around a course, trying to toss flying discs into elevated metal baskets.

The only other public disc golf course in the county is a 27-hole course at Seneca Creek State Park in Germantown, according to the parks department.

Montgomery Parks is “excited to be moving forward” with the course project, project manager Evan Dintaman said Thursday in a statement emailed to Bethesda Today.

“The planned course will … feature two 9-hole loops, which together create a full 18-hole course,” he wrote. “This will be Montgomery Parks’ first disc golf course and we look forward to welcoming new, intermediate, and professional players alike to this new facility.”

In addition to the disc golf course, the project calls for the construction of a plaza/gathering area. Within the plaza, planners propose a covered picnic shelter, picnic tables, a water fountain and benches.

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Excitement from the community

Montgomery Parks officials are hoping construction of the course will begin in early summer and it will open this fall, Dintaman said during Thursday’s meeting.

“We’re getting emails weekly. … The community is really excited about it,” Dintaman said.

Planning for the disc golf course began in spring 2023 after players in the county had requested a course “for years,” Montgomery Parks said on its website.

Montgomery Parks planner Chuck Kines said during Thursday’s board meeting that while he worked as a project manager for the Wheaton Regional Park Master Plan, the local disc golf community asked whether a course could be built in that park.

“To make a long story short, the answer was ‘No,’ for a variety of reasons I won’t get into but then the disc golf community said, ‘Well, where else nearby might it work?’ And we identified a couple of parks and eventually landed at Northwest Branch Recreational Park,” Kines explained.

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While planning the course, Kines said the trolley museum “saw the synergy” of bringing the sport to the area and was excited about the potential of increased traffic to the museum.

According to planners, the course was designed with “very minimal” disturbance and tree removal in the park. In addition, the design will include a buffer to ensure that flying discs do not disturb trolley tracks or nearby homes.

According to planning documents, the course will be constructed on about 115 acres of existing forest, with about 9 acres of forest to be removed. However, the majority of the forest to be cleared is “due to the proposed mowing and maintenance associated with the disc golf course.” A large native tree, a Black Willow, will be removed, documents said.

“This is beautiful,” board Commissioner Mitra Pedoeem said, referring to the course plans during the meeting. “It’s a minor impact and allows people to get into nature. … I’m all for it.”

Harris echoed Pedoeem’s sentiment, saying the course was a “fantastic project” that would be co-located with the trolley museum and add more amenities to the Montgomery Parks system.

“You always talk about recreation, physical activity, social connection, and [with] this [project] being in nature, this hits … all three,” Harris said to Montgomery Parks planners.

Following Thursday’s forest conservation plan approval, the next steps for the project involve creating a final design and applying for permits for erosion and sediment control, according to Montgomery Parks media relations manager Melissa Chotiner.

Construction will occur in two phases, with the first creating the course and the second involving the installation of the plaza and gathering area, Chotiner said. The timing of the construction and the course’s opening are dependent on the permit approvals as well as weather conditions.

Renderings of the disc golf course are not yet available, Chotiner said. Images will be made public on the project’s webpage as soon as they are available, she said.

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