best courses in bad settings

[PThomas]

Kyle's thread on Settings makes me wonder:  what are some of the best courses in bad settings.

For example, which,  (there must be some!?) courses that have housing close to the holes are so well-designed that the impacts of the housing on one's visuals is overcome by the quality of the course?

Southern Dunes in Florida might fit this bill.

a different example of a bad setting might also be Carnoustie, from what I've read (haven't been there yet)

[Tom Huckaby]

This has been explored in here before... but no hassles Paul - it remains an interesting topic and what on here hasn't?  

I wouldn't call Carnoustie a "bad" setting... it's just not as dramatic or cool or charming as other famous UK courses.

Isn't there one great UK course that backs up to a nuclear power facility?  It's been shown in here before... that one would have to take the cake.

Here in the US... hmm... that Southern Dunes example makes sense to me... close-in housing is rarely a good visual.

But I'd posit this - and I don't mean to be a hardass... wouldn't that disqualify SD from being "great"?

I wonder... to me it would.  Obviously to Patrick it wouldn't matter at all.  But man a course better be a freakin' marvel of strategic design and other interest to overcome poor setting and still qualify as "great."  I really can't think of any that meet the standard.

TH

[Tommy Williamsen]

I'm not sure it qualifies as a "bad" setting, but I am always dissapointed by the number of houses at Muirfield Village.  Wouldn't it be grand if it were not in a housing development?

[Adam Clayman]

SD is great compared to other housing lined courses. It's a solid design that compells the golfer to pay close attention to the what's within the field of play.

Doesn't Oakmont span an major highway? Is that where the rubber meets the road?

[PThomas]

sorry if this one's been explored a lot in the past Huck... if others agree this will drift off to the Land of Short-Lived Threads

I would call Southern Dunes a "great course', but it is definitely a course worth playing

and I can't recall the course with the nuclear towers...is it Royal St. George?

[PThomas]

I'm not sure it qualifies as a "bad" setting, but I am always dissapointed by the number of houses at Muirfield Village.  Wouldn't it be grand if it were not in a housing development?

I thought the houses at MV were more invasive than those at S Dunes

[Tom Huckaby]

Paul - hell, as I say, rare is the topic that hasn't been covered already in here.  I just said that hoping that someone would recall the UK course with the nuclear towers in the distance... it wasn't RSG I don't think... not one of the Open sites.

In any case I still posit that absent great setting it is VERY VERY tough to achieve greatness....

Houses alone don't ruin things, though.  Pasatiempo is surrounded by such, and I find it's setting to be pretty neat.

TH

[Phil McDade]

Huck:

Seascale, regarded as a solid links on the northwestern coast of England, literally sits in the shadows of a nuke plant. You can also see nuke plant cooling towers from both Prince's and Royal St. George's on the southeastern coast of England.

[Tom Huckaby]

Phil - Seascale must be the one I'm thinking of... someone posted pics in here way back when...

Thanks!

[Gary Slatter]

Housing fits on St. George's in Toronto, many of the homes are as old and dignified as the great course.
Doral has a few bad courses surrounded by equally bad housing.  I think the house on Troon fits the property, and the hotel on TOC is part of the course.  I remember playing a good course built next to a pig farm, and that was difficult.

[Geoffrey Childs]

Seascale is routed on some pretty good land for golf. I would not call it a bad setting unless you are spooked by a little radioactive waste.  The good side is that they will soon be featuring night golf to the green glow of the radiation.  It might have been me that posted some photos a while back but most of my round there was in sideways rain.

It starts out going up a steep hill and there are some fairly interesting dunes to work around the property.  It is eerie playing up to the razor covered fence of the nuke plant.

[Phil McDade]

Geoffery:

My reference to Seascale was not on the course itself, or the land, but its setting, as Paul's original post wondered. I personally think houses can be a visual detriment to a course, although some very fine courses -- notably WF West and Merion East -- are situated on land where you can airmail a 5-iron into somebody's front lawn/bedroom window.

Would Brora/Dunaverty/Portnoo count since they double as cow pastures? Pennard too?

[JSlonis]

Geoffery:

My reference to Seascale was not on the course itself, or the land, but its setting, as Paul's original post wondered. I personally think houses can be a visual detriment to a course, although some very fine courses -- notably WF West and Merion East -- are situated on land where you can airmail a 5-iron into somebody's front lawn/bedroom window.

Would Brora/Dunaverty/Portnoo count since they double as cow pastures? Pennard too?

WF West doesn't have any homes that encroach upon the golf course.  I don't recall any hole on the course where there is any risk of a stray golf ball. I believe the closest home sits well back behind the 3rd green.  The only hole at Merion where the homes are anywhere close is the 7th hole/ 8th tee shot.  

[Scott Coan]

Wannamoisett would certainly fit this bill, crammed into a hundred or so acres of East Providence and completely surrounded by fairly low-income housing.  Still some of the best golf you can play anywhere.

[Jay Flemma]

two of my favorites...Bethpage and Sawgrass...

[Jeff_Mingay]

Rod Whitman's original course at Wolf Creek in Ponoka, Alberta isn't in the best setting.

The course lies adjacent to Highway #2 - the main route between Edmonton and Calgary. In fact, one of my favourite holes - the par 5 sixth - plays immediately adjacent to that busy thoroughfare.

Yet, Wolf Creek is a Canadian favourite.

[Jeff_Mingay]

Gary Slatter: the houses surrounding certain holes on the front nine, at St. George's-Toronto, fit your description. A few of the homes along the left side of the 12th and 14th holes, for example, are less attractive.

[Noel Freeman]

two of my favorites...Bethpage and Sawgrass...

Jay-- I vehemently beg to differ on Bethpage being in a bad setting.. This was Tillie's tribute to Pine Valley.  Grand scale, sand based, almost perfect borrow and roll terrain.  In his writings he praised it as the public Pine Valley.  Even today's version with no housing it is an ideal setting.  That said, it is a terrifying taskmaster for a mid handicapper and eschews the ground game..

If Bethpage is an average setting, then what is Garden City's MO?

[Ian Andrew]

Are you guys crazy?
Most of the courses mentioned have great settings.

A Nuke plant in the distance - big deal - your by the ocean!

Houses on Muirfield village? So what!

Wolf Creek Jeff, your kidding right? That's a great setting for golf - one road, big deal - the rest is rolling open land with a great valley through the middle. I'll take that site every time.

Bethpage? Seriously?

Sawgrass was a tough site because it was flat, but the setting is still tree lined.

What's wrong with Carnoustie?


How about a landfill? or reclaimed strip mine? Or how about courses beside industrial complexes or theme parks, malls, or airports? That's much worse than all the examples given. Isn't it?

[Adam Clayman]

The Rawls course should win this debate easily.

The setting isn't so bad. The only real eyesore (thanks to that wonderful berm) is the hospital. Mortality and audit trails should loom large in one's appreciation of how fortunate they are to be golfing.

[Tom Huckaby]

Ian:

The nuclear plant I was thinking of was right on top of the course... off in the distance is one thing, right there next to you has to be a bit disconcerting, as Geoffrey explained.

Re courses on landfill, we have quite a few here in CA... and while the odor is rarely nice, the scenic views are sometimes not bad at all... there's a fave of some of us NorCals called Shoreline GL that is downright pretty in some parts, going right up against the Bay....

TH

[Kyle Harris]

Southern Dunes setting isn't all that bad. Certainly not the most intrusive housing and there is a great stretch of core golf on the back nine.

While not a great course (at least in its current state) Cobb's Creek is in some errr colorful parts of Philly.

Walnut Lane's setting is less than elegant.

Are we perhaps forgetting Bayonne?

[Phil_the_Author]

Bethpage was created by the purchase of several tracts of open land where nothing was built on or near it. The only portion that was the exception to this was the present day Green course, the site of the original Lenox Hills Golf Club and which served as the only course at bethpage from 1932 to the spring of 1935. Up until then it was operated as the Bethpage Golf Club.

The Lenox Hills Golf Club was part of the Lenox Hills housing division, conceived of and built by Railroad tycoon Benjamin F. Yoakum. It was an upscale community with one of the perks given to anyone purchasing a house there a membership to the Lenox Hills Golf Club.

When Mr. Yoakum died at the end of November in 1929, his family decided to rid itself of the burden of the golf course and adjoining property by selling it to New York State. The sale took until Jan. 1 of 1934 to accomplish and so the state leased the property until then. It is for the specific reason that the state did not own the land that the contract with A.W. Tillinghast to design the 3 new golf courses HAD to list him as a "Consultant" to the Long Island State Parks Commission, rather than the architect of a multi-course golf project.

When the property was leased to the state, the community became outraged yet there was nothing that they could do as the SOLE owner property had been Mr. Yoakum. The memberships did not contain any ownership rights for the members.

The ONLY houses that could be seen from any of the golf courses were on streets that are adjacent to what is today the 8th & 9th holes of the Green course. In addition, the old Quaker Meeting House building and the property adjacent had views of the clubhouse from it, but this was mainly because of the massive tree removal project begun at the start of the building program. Today neither can see the other.

Houses along peripheral streets that can see s few holes on the yellow course (built in the 1950's) came later as well as the glimpses of the 5th & 6th holes of the Blue course from the Seaford-Oyster Bay Expressway came much later on.

The park and courses are still what they were when conceived and created, a paradise of play invisible to the outside world.

If the state of California allowed garbage barges to be anchored continuously off the Monteray Peninsula would this mean that Pebble & Cypress, etc... were built in bad settings? Of course not.

Just because there are now a few houses and a road or two doesn't lessen the setting of Bethpage.

[Phil McDade]

Geoffery:

My reference to Seascale was not on the course itself, or the land, but its setting, as Paul's original post wondered. I personally think houses can be a visual detriment to a course, although some very fine courses -- notably WF West and Merion East -- are situated on land where you can airmail a 5-iron into somebody's front lawn/bedroom window.

Would Brora/Dunaverty/Portnoo count since they double as cow pastures? Pennard too?

WF West doesn't have any homes that encroach upon the golf course.  I don't recall any hole on the course where there is any risk of a stray golf ball. I believe the closest home sits well back behind the 3rd green.  The only hole at Merion where the homes are anywhere close is the 7th hole/ 8th tee shot.  

Perhaps my tongue-in-cheek reference to Hogan's reference to the 10th at WF needed to be more explicitly stated...Not that Hogan would airmail his 3-iron into the guy's bedroom, but I might.

[Mark Pearce]

Seaton Carew has a backdrop of chemical plants, broken only by the outline of the Ghost Ships - contaminated US vessels brought over here for demolition but the local council won't grant the relevant permits.

Downfield lies in the heart of a rotten council estate and has barbed wire fences to keep the locals out.  When we played there we assumed we had taken a wrong turn.