Three years ago, Interstate 73 steamrolled plans for a golf course in the Roanoke County community of Mount Pleasant. Now that the road's proposed route has changed, another developer wants to turn the old Saul Farm into a golf course.

George Golf Design has plans to use about 250 acres of the farm on Pitzer Road for a golf course. The balance, about 100 acres, will eventually hold houses. The company plans to host a community meeting about the proposal at the Mount Pleasant fire station at 7 p.m. Thursday.

"It's one of the most fascinating pieces of land I've ever seen," said company president Lester George. "It's like a sculptor finding the perfect piece of stone, I guess."

Nathaniel Haile proposed a similar development on the site near the Blue Ridge Parkway in 2001. Haile's course would have covered about 200 acres. The rest would have held 40 to 50 homes with price tags beginning about $300,000.

Upscale housing often turns golf courses into profitable golf communities, but Haile said the houses weren't his main interest.

"My thing is the golf course aspect," he said.

How the rest of the land is treated depends a lot on the developer his company chooses, George said.

Haile's plans fell apart soon after the Commonwealth Transportation Board said I-73 would run through the farm. That route was abandoned in March.

Less than a week later, George had an option on the property.

George's preliminary design puts nine holes on each side of Pitzer Road, creating what he calls a highland links-style course. But he doesn't know yet whether the course, called FountainHead, will be a daily-fee course, a country club or a private golf community.

Lester George founded what would become George Golf Design in the 1980s. The company has worked on about 90 projects, including Roanoke Country Club, Hunting Hills Country Club, Salem's country club, the Country Club of Virginia, which is in Richmond, and The Greenbrier, in White Sulfur Springs, W.Va.

The Colonial, a Williamsburg course that opened in 1996, was the company's first from-scratch project. Golf Magazine called it one of the top 10 public golf courses in America.

George called Kinloch, near Richmond, the company's showcase course. Golf Week magazine rates it the ninth-best modern course in the United States.

According to county zoning ordinances, a golf course is an allowable use of the farmland, but it requires a special-use permit. That requires approval by the board of supervisors.

The planning commission is scheduled to have a public hearing on the issue Aug. 3. A public hearing before the supervisors is planned for Aug. 24.