It's official -- last Friday a plan was approved to build 750 housing units on the site of Beechtree Golf Course, only ten years after the course opened.
I happened to be traveling down the east coast today and stopped in and played the course (after a 2-inch rain last night). It was better work than I remembered, a lot of fun to play. I will be sorry to see it go, but I understand how the numbers work. The course was not entirely unsuccessful -- they had been playing around 18,000 rounds a year recently -- but it wasn't enough to make keeping it open more attractive than plowing it under.
A lot of the result just has to do with location, location, location -- there are a lot of places in America where golf courses are struggling right now, but there aren't a lot which can absorb a 750-unit development.
I would encourage everyone to play the course this summer or fall before it's gone, but it is a goner, and that's not going to change.