A design created by several Northwestern State University students was selected for the City of Leesville’s miniature 18-hole golf course, which will be constructed at the Leesville Municipal Golf Course. According to officials, the course was designed to be challenging, aesthetically pleasing and incorporates themes that reflect the history and culture of the city of Leesville and Vernon Parish. The course is reconfigurable and was designed to withstand the rigors of high traffic.
The plans were announced during a press conference Wednesday, April 27 at the site of the proposed miniature golf course at the Leesville Country Club.
Dr. Mohammed Benalla, a professor in NSU’s Department of Engineering Technology, worked with Mirla Enriquez, a professor in the Department of Fine and Graphic Art, on the interdisciplinary project to produce a proposal for the design, along with graphic illustrations highlighting various themes. Involved with this project are engineering technology students Ethan Perkins of Leesville and Mitchell Landry of Doyline and art students Ashton Sanford of Calvin, Jessica Cross of Natchitoches and Katherine Benson of Leesville.
“The department worked with the Leesville mayor’s office and produced a detailed engineering drawing based on the proposed dimensions of the mini-golf course,” Benalla said. “Further discussions with the mayor’s office identified the need to incorporate different design themes that reflect the history of the city of Leesville, which include No Man’s Land, the railroad, the timber boom and Fort Polk. This project manifests interdisciplinary collaboration between the engineering technology and the art departments. This project allowed students to work together in order to generate solutions conveying architectural engineering design with layout design illustrations.”
“We are absolutely thrilled with what these students have created,” said Leesville Mayor Rick Allen. “Not only do we now have a detailed, scaled design for a new mini golf course, we’ve also got a design that is very unique and reflects the culture and history of the town we all love. We are so grateful that these professors and these students saw the value of working on this project. It helps them to become better at what they do, and it helps us to become a better City.”
