By the hand of man go thee...

[John Kavanaugh]

Where do golf courses rank in the world of aesthetic and functionality of design.  I just spent a plesent day golfing in two states and driving in three to come to the conclusion that while golf courses are nice, the highway and perfectly placed overpass is the most beautiful structure ever created by man.  A moonlit open road cut though hills and winding through valleys takes my breath away.  Where do you rank golf courses in the world of man made structures thrust upon the land?  Me...

1. Roads
approx 4. Golf courses.

[John Kavanaugh]

The Dam is huge...#2  

[Tim Bert]

A well-laid hiking trail does it for me.  I posted a thread here some time ago about "routing" a hiking trail and similarities to a good routing of a golf course.  I'm definitely a minimalist when it comes to hiking trails.

I must admit I don't get the same thrill from roads and overpasses that you seem to enjoy.  

Most of my time in a car is spent looking off to the left and the right of the road imagining what type of golf course would look good on the land.

If Mike Hendren is out there - I've almost got the plans in my head finished for the out and back alongside Mack Hatcher.  The land is tight and long, so it is going to have to be a strip with some double fairways and double greens.  Sort of a St. Andrews in middle Tennessee if you will.  Golfers will be able to get out of their cars during traffic and pay by the hole if they wish.  

[Phil_the_Author]

John, being stuck in the middle of the Holland Tunnel during rush hour without any traffic moving at all is what takes my breath away, which really sucks considering that it is just at that moment that I need it to shout #@(*^$%^*%^$(&_)&U*%%#...

[wsmorrison]

There is nothing so beautiful by the hand of man, as a garden.  Philadelphia is blessed with some of the nation's greatest gardens and arboretums, including the incomparable Longwood Gardens, Fairmount Park, Morris Arboretum, Winterthur, Chanticleer, Scott Arboretum, Bartram's Gardens and the Tyler Arboretum.  

We are also blessed with other landscape constructions; some of the most beautiful and testing inland golf courses in America as well.  The combination of function and aesthetic in golf courses can rise to the highest levels of all endeavors.

Many in the know speak of bridges as being the ultimate expression of engineering and art.  There is something about seeing the Verrazano Narrows Bridge or Golden Gate Bridge for the first time.  Driving over a bridge is scary and thrilling at the same time.  Being in a car over the old bridge out of Charleston, SC can be very scary...especially late on a St. Patrick's Day evening with a designated driver, of course.

I agree, John.  Dams are wonderful structures.  And of course there is building architecture...The Chrysler Building, Frank Furness's work, Horace Trumbauer, Duhring, Okie & Ziegler, etc.

A highway and overpass?  Not in my top 100 (if I ever came up with such a list).

[Dan Herrmann]

Roads have a lot of fans.  Check out www.aaroads.com and you'll see what I mean.

[Greg Cameron]

JK,I too have felt highways are a amazing blend of art and engineering and would use the stretch of I-70 between Glenwood Springs,Colorado,and Denver,especially along the Colorado river as just plain beautiful.The new bridge/bypass network at Hoover Damn too will be stunning.
    However,I stop short of ranking structures/golf as my childrens movies always point out,we're all beautiful,aren't we?  .....GC

[Kyle Harris]

You know John, I wrote about the beauty of highways, overpasses and the sheer engineering feat that some of them are several years ago in an old blog.

I was laughed at a lot.

Thanks everyone for validating my eye.

As for my rankings:
1. Railroads
2. Golf Courses
3. Dwellings
4. Highways/Bridges
5. Military Fortifications

[Adam Clayman]

This reminds me of the ranchers round here. They love the smell of cow shit. To them, it's the smell of money. To me, it's like a well placed overpass...shit! A pox upon the planet, making the infidel righteous.

[Chris Cupit]

For me, you just can't beat a well paved parking lot--fresh stripes and all

OK, OK, as a classics major umptean years ago, I would say that the Roman arches (lots of aplications--roads, aquaducts, entries to homes) had to be pretty cool.  Good looking and functional.

[Dan Herrmann]

as a kid, i used to love railroads - the tracks and the trains themselves.

[Kirk Gill]

There's a line in the old movie True Stories to the effect of "Overpasses are the cathedrals of the modern world."

There's a particularly amazing one near me - at the intersection of I-25 and C-470. I think about that line every time I drive through there......

I love when a natural setting works with the hand of man, reminding me that we ARE part of nature, and any separation there is just in our minds............

[Mark Pearce]

Buildings.  St Paul's Cathedral?  The Chrysler building?  Versaille?

[Don_Mahaffey]

Being the sports nut that I am...I love to see a beautiful  stadium or sports venue. The two new parks in Houston are outstanding. If there's a better pro stadium to watch an NFL game than Reliant...I haven't seen it.
On the college front...watching a football game on a cool overcast day at the University of Oregon's stadium is tough to beat.
On the flip side...my old school Univ of AZ has to have the worst football stadium of any BCS school.
Fenway park...Yankee stadium...Dodger stadium...all works of art to me.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Don Mahaffey,

Then, I would encourage you to collect as many pictures of Yankee Stadium as you can.  It won't be here much longer.

Yankee Stadium will soon join The Polo Grounds and Ebbets Field as NLE

[Mike Hendren]

Barney, this photograph of the Natchez Trace bridge over Hwy 96 near Franklin is for you:



Nice to know an asphalt man can appreciate good concrete.

Mike

[John_Cullum]

I rather enjoy tall buildings. I like the Chrysler best. It could be the Cypress Point of sky scrapers

[Geoffrey Childs]

There is a long list for me and no one is more important then the other

Special buildings with architectural value
Cathedrals built at a time when it was an amazing feat
Paintings
Books
An X-ray machine or MRI
New drugs to cure disease

What they and many others I don't mention do is to elicit emotions and make one realize that the peaceful use of the human mind is a truly wondrous thing.

[John Kavanaugh]

Barney, this photograph of the Natchez Trace bridge over Hwy 96 near Franklin is for you:



Nice to know an asphalt man can appreciate good concrete.

Mike

That bridge doesn't set well with me.  I do prefer a suspension bridge even though they may have protected the skyline views with that method.  One thing that does look interesting is the mowed area underneath.  I have had some of my best times of youth under bridges less spectacular than that.

I like alot of the ideas so far as I posted this last night while driving under a full Missouri moon and just got off the road.  I do like the ideas of a university quad and sports stadiums and particularly enjoy when both are done well together.  Nothing beats being a high school kid with the privilage of competing in a unversity stadium for a state title.  I don't doubt that at one time the drive to Assembly Hall at the University of Illinois was the most beautiful thing a 16 year old had ever seen. The building remains a great example of 1960's architecture:  http://www.uofiassemblyhall.com/default.asp?lnopt=6&sn1opt=1&sn2opt=1&sn3opt=1&month=7&year=2007&newsID=0

Updated list:

1. Roads
2. Dams
3. Universities
4. Golf Courses

I did hit and run the Warren Course last week for a twilight rate and got a nice view of the sun setting off the Golden Dome.  Nice combo.

[Tony_Muldoon]

I've always been a city dweller and I love the London skyline when returning to it from whatever direction.

But the things that make my pulse quicken are built out into the sea.
A harbour - small like Portstewart or North Berwick or large and stuffed with pleasure craft like La Rochelle.

Bridges - as mentioned above the Golden Gate (best name of all-time for a man made object?), the miles long bridges in Louisiana or the one at Nantes or near Le Harve - all associated with special trips.

Piers - just man made fingers out to sea.  There’s a terrific short one at Ryde, and one in Tuscany (where I ran to the mid point with my surf board and cruised to shore over and over again) or today’s in Brighton. One tacky and bustling the other a wreck being reclaimed by the elements.

And as you stand on the shore you gaze wistfully at mans most impressive invention.  Boats.

[Mark Bourgeois]

Did you just connect "sun" with South Bend? John, that's a clear indication you weren't really there!

And c'mon you gotta put bridges in there, maybe combine it with aqueducts. Why do you rank dams second? In a way, they're like over-engineered bridges, with none of the gossamer qualities that make bridges so enchanting.

Man, I have spent many an evening staring at the 59th Street Bridge. Only thing better is driving the upper level from Queens into Manhattan at night.

What about Calatrava's bridges?  The style is getting to be overexposed, but what a style! Or what about Brunel's Maidenhead Railway bridge? Or the Pont Neuf? Great stuff!

And with bridges, you can do exactly what golf nuts do: come up with a list and travel the world checking it off. "Drive and run" as it were....

One last point: as to what belongs at the absolute bottom of the list, I say airports.  Nearly every one out there, be it old or brand new, looks horrible!

[Mark Bourgeois]

Tony, no mention of the wobbly bridge? And the bridge in Louisiana is the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway, 24 miles long.

I can tell you that the excitement of traveling the world's longest bridge wears off around mile 8.  After that, it's a 16-mile slog...

[Dan_Callahan]

Asphalt is one of man's most unappealing inventions. The first use of the crap occured in Paris in 1824, so we have the French to thank for that. Almost 2 million miles of streets in the United States are paved with asphalt, the first appearing in 1872 on NYC's 5th Ave. It is amazing that almost 200 years since it was introduced, no one has come up with a more effective, reliable and attractive alternative. It is even more amazing that a golf course developer might spend millions of dollars bringing a new layout to life and then mar its face with black scars of asphalt cart paths.

If I were to put together a list of man's most attractive accomplishments, roads and highways would be at or near the bottom, perhaps coming in slightly ahead of the raised ranch.

[Mark Buzminski]

One thing that sticks in my mind is a trip I took a few summers ago to Altoona, PA. to see a Willie Nelson/ Bob Dylan concert.  It was staged in the minor league ballpark there, and it was really a wonderful spot.  It was cool because we had general admission tickets (the stage was in center field) and you got to walk down, onto the infield and look up at the thousands of people sitting in the two tiers of seats.  There's something sort of mystical about a ballpark you can't really explain - the author of "Shoeless Joe", W.P. Kinsella once called it "the thrill of the grass". There is actually a roller coaster and amusement park behind the right field fence, which adds to its charm.  I've pretty much loved almost every minor league ballpark I've ever been in.  The sights, the hot dogs, beer and popcorn, the sounds - a really great vibe on a warm summer evening as the sun goes down and the lights come on.

Speaking of mystical experiences, however, nothing has ever impacted me as much as my first trip to the linksland of the Scottish east coast.  It's pretty much perfection.

[Phil_the_Author]

John, you opined that, "I rather enjoy tall buildings. I like the Chrysler best. It could be the Cypress Point of sky scrapers..."

You evidently have never been in the Woolworth Building...