Port Royal's Old Planter's Row Course Is Getting Its First New Building, and It Isn't the Park

"Completely blindsided." That is how executive board members of the Port Royal Plantation Association of Landowners described the Town of Hilton Head Island's announcement in March 2013. Town Council had approved spending $5 million on 102 acres that included holes 2 through 16 of the Planter's Row Golf Course. The POA board had approved a different deal the previous September, with a private investor who wanted to develop the land.

Thirteen years later the Town still owns that ground, now called the Mid-Island Tract. The first permanent new building on it is about to go up, and it isn't a park pavilion, an ecology center, or a trailhead. It's a church campus, and the Hilton Head Island Airport is the reason it's being built there.

How a golf course became a waiting room

The 2013 purchase didn't come with a plan. Town officials said at the time that they had no plans yet for the land, and they leased it back to Heritage Golf Group, which kept it running as a golf course for at least two more years. By December 2018, then-Mayor John McCann said the Town had bought the property "to protect it from development." Council member David Ames said the old course was inactive and several holes were overgrown, and that year the property had been used to dump hurricane debris.

The ideas floated back then included a park, maintained natural space, or new grounds for the Concours d'Elegance & Motoring Festival, which the Island Packet noted takes place in Port Royal Plantation each year.

Here is how the land has been used since then:

• February 2021: The Town opened the tract to the public, with a 20-space parking lot at the Union Cemetery Road entrance.
• November 2022: Town Council approved a park master plan with five phases that can be built in any order.
• June 2024: Walkers and cyclists were using the old golf-cart paths. The Town had laid temporary gravel on a parking area, and park design and permitting were running behind schedule.

That June 2024 report is the most recent public confirmation of path access we found. If you use the cart paths, the Town is the place to check current conditions.

The runway that set the order of events

St. James Baptist Church was founded in August 1886. Its founders were former members of First African Baptist Church who wanted to keep worshipping in Mitchelville. Across Dillon Road, at 210 Dillon Road, stands Cherry Hill School, a one-room frame schoolhouse built around 1937. The National Register of Historic Places describes it as the first freestanding school built specifically for Black children on Hilton Head Island. The community raised money for the land, and the school district supplied materials and hired local builders. St. James bought the building in 1956.

Both buildings are older than the airport and its expansions. In 2018 the airport added 700 feet to its runway so larger commercial jets could use it. That extension put the church inside the airport's Runway Protection Zone. The Town's July 2026 announcement explains why that matters. FAA guidance treats places of public assembly, churches and schools included, as incompatible uses inside an RPZ, and it encourages airport sponsors to acquire and relocate them where practicable. The Post and Courier has also reported that a 1975 aircraft crash killed six people about 50 feet from the church.

Town Council agreed to help relocate the church and school in February 2019. That spring, then-pastor Charles E. Hamilton told the Island Packet the congregation had reluctantly agreed to move after years of resistance. Ahmad Ward, director of the Mitchelville Preservation Project, said the congregation wanted to stay close to its historic roots. The site that kept them close was already sitting idle a short distance away. In 2022, Island Packet coverage of the park planning showed the concept already included moving St. James near Union Cemetery.

The deal, closed in summer 2026

After seven years of negotiation, the pieces came together at Town Council meetings on June 9 and July 14, 2026. The structure is a chain of transactions, not a land swap:

1. The Town buys about 1.70 acres holding the current church and Cherry Hill School for $1.29 million, as part of the airport's runway mitigation program. A 2025 Beaufort County agreement identifies that acquisition as FAA-funded.
2. The congregation leases its current buildings back for $1 a year until the new campus is finished.
3. The Town sells about 4.67 acres on Union Cemetery Road to Beaufort County for $1.
4. The County manages construction and the move of Cherry Hill School, and it covers any cost overruns.
5. When the work is done, the County conveys the finished campus to St. James for $10.

The Town lists the funding sources this way:

The Town also lists its own $1.29 million purchase of the current church site as a separate line. The Island Packet, citing a staff report, put the cost of the construction project at $9.84 million.

The new campus will sit in the Grassland Historic Neighborhood next to Union Cemetery. It will have a church of about 11,975 square feet with a 250-seat sanctuary, a 120-seat fellowship hall, and Cherry Hill School, relocated. The school keeps its National Register listing through the approved relocation process. Stained-glass windows donated by generations of church members will be installed in the new sanctuary.

What's left on the calendar

On September 15, 2026, Town Council adopted first reading of an ordinance that amends the Port Royal PD-1 Master Plan. The change adds religious institutions as a permitted use on 4.667 acres of the Mid-Island Tract along Union Cemetery Road. The land is zoned under a master plan that carries Port Royal's name. Anyone who follows Port Royal land-use questions should know this change is happening through that document.

Council's next regular meeting is Tuesday, October 13, 2026, at 3 p.m. As of this writing, we have not seen a posted agenda confirming the zoning ordinance's second reading for that date. In July the Town said construction was expected to begin in fall 2026, pending final approvals, with a groundbreaking ceremony "later this year." The Island Packet reported an October start and a March 2028 finish. No date has been announced for the groundbreaking.

The old Dillon Road site gets a defined future too. After the move, the historic church building will be demolished. Any historic artifacts found there become Town property, with St. James as the designated curator, and a commemorative sign will tell the church's history. Ward 6 Council Member Melinda Tunner said the Town is buying the property so it stays "open space for perpetuity."

"It won't be behind a fence. It'll be accessible to all." Council Member Melinda Tunner, June 2026

Where that leaves the park

The 4.67-acre church site takes about 4.5 percent of the roughly 103-acre tract. The rest is still meant to become the park the Town adopted in 2022. The 2022 concept was large. Phase 1 had an entry and parking, trails, a playground, a "Great Lawn," and a dog park. Later phases added cultural gardens, an event lawn and open-air market, bocce courts, an interactive water feature, and an eco-park with a boardwalk, canopy walk, and eco-center. It even proposed a pedestrian bridge over William Hilton Parkway to the smaller Ashmore Tract. In 2022, the Island Packet reported an overall cost range of $48 million to $71 million. That is an early planning figure, not a current estimate.

The Town's FY2027 capital budget sets that scale against what is actually funded. It describes Phase 1 more modestly, as stormwater and lagoon work, pathways, landscaping, parking off Union Cemetery Road, and restrooms for a 102-acre passive park. The project had an approved amended budget of $957,744 in FY2026. For FY2027 it shows $0 in roll-forward, $0 in new funding, and no design, permitting, or construction milestones. It is listed as a priority for FY2028 through FY2031. The full document is on the Town's FY2027 budget page.

So for the next few years, the most visible activity on the old Planter's Row will be the church campus going up along Union Cemetery Road, with a target finish of March 2028. The park plan is still on the books, but its first phase has no money attached for this fiscal year.

Questions about how nearby land use affects a particular Port Royal address are part of the consultations Richard Kadesch handles at Go Gated Realty. If you're weighing a home near Union Cemetery Road or the north-end gates, request a free buyer consultation and we'll go through what's been approved and what's still pending.