A highly creative design feature(s) or just totally devoid of thought.

[Steve_ Shaffer]

I prefer the "Moat Hole" as opposed to the "Island Green"




Galen Hall GC, near Reading, PA

Hole #15

Par 3           

Yardage: Back 193, Middle 148, and Forward 95.

Commonly known as the Moat Hole, the fifteenth is among the oldest island greens still in circulation.  Built in 1917 by renowned architect A. W. Tillinghast, the Moat Hole is sometimes compared to the seventeenth at TPC Sawgrass.  The hole is not nearly as visually intimidating as the seventeenth at Sawgrass. However, from the championship tees it is much harder to hit the green.  The green is surrounded by a 15-foot wide moat with ten-foot high banks.  Three bridges are used to access the green.  You can safely lay up short of this hole, unlike the seventeenth at Sawgrass.  Many a match has changed dramatically through our amen corner, the fourteenth and fifteenth.  If you are in a match and make two pars on these holes and lose ground, tell that guy to go out on the PGA Tour where they belong!

Historical Note: In the 1990’s, the moat hole was featured in the Philadelphia Inquirer. No less than renowned architect Pete Dye was interviewed for the article, drawing comparisons to his 17th at TPC Sawgrass. During the interview, Mr. Dye seemed unaware of the moat hole but intrigued by the A.W. Tillinghast designed hole.

[Melvyn Morrow]

Scott

The depths of bunkers are down to personal preferences. However, I like the 2ft and deep bunkers, subject to location. The fundamental point being that they are hazards or deterrents to be place by architects in the most appropriate positions to persuade the golfer to consider alternative approach shots or accept the risk. Shallow, say 6 to 12 inch bunkers even with lips, still allow a fair exit shot.

 We are getting soft, penal is not regards as being in favour, but the easy way, the give the golfer all the help one can seem to be the modern way. However, I don’t see the point in even setting foot on a course, which offers hole-to-hole room service with carts, distance aids and now hazards that seem to fail to be hazards. Sums up the modern game as golf, ‘come try our game it is easy, you don’t have to think, let alone break sweat’  For drinks to be served please press the blue button on the carts adjacent the GPS screen for the Automatic Room Service Beverage Dispenser (ARSBD). 

I feel bunkers should be deep and well placed otherwise just an expensive extra serving very little purpose.

Melvyn


Jim
I don't despise them I just see no reason for them. Completely different. How do you know if I have played out of a deep, shallow or any form of bunker, you just don't know. You may think you do but you don't.  "Apparently you fail to see that a shot from either one of them is similar". I would not jump to any conclusions until I saw the course and the actual position of the bunkers in association with the hole.

Paul

So you have played both, been in both traps and have come to that conclusion, then fine that is your opinion from actual experience. I for one believe that playing the courses (and out of these two traps) is where the real comparison should be made. The proof is in the playing of them, plus the quality of the golfers concerned, until then, I feel its just mind games.

[Michael Huber]

Michael

I was under the impression that bunkers and hazards were there as deterrents or challenges for a golfer. If they are just to be an aesthetics feature, why waste the money on them or their upkeep. As for TOC, I have seen many balls in the Swilken Burn in my time, so it seems to work as a hazard. As for the Valley of Sin and levelling out the contours of all courses is just going slightly off this thread by a few light years.

 

Mel,

The valley of sin and the shallow bunkers discussed in this thread generate similar kinds of challenges and penalties.  You aruged that the average golfer would not have much of a problem navigating out of/around shallow bunkers in your first post.  I'd argue that the average golfer could navigate the valley of sin just as effectively.  I'm sure you've see lots of balls in the Swilken Burn.  If we watched close enough, I'm sure we could see plenty of good and bad players alike shank balls out of shallow bunkers.  No one wants to hit into the valley of sin and no one wants to hit into a shallow bunker, even if they are relatively easy to escape.  

[Tom MacWood]

Melvyn
I prefer the shallow bunker to the cop bunker at West Herts.

[Jim_Kennedy]

Melyvn,
This is what happens when you go all dogmatic, you end up contradicting yourself.

At best, you have only been in or around one of the bunkers in the photos, yet you dislike the other one.

So, if I were to allow that your judgment about the bunker-you've-never-been-in is coming from first hand experiences with similar elements, then you must allow that my prior golfing experiences are the reason behind my judgement that these two shallow sandy areas would play the same.

There is only one reasonable way out of the corner that you have painted yourself into. 

[Kalen Braley]

 We are getting soft, penal is not regards as being in favour, but the easy way, the give the golfer all the help one can seem to be the modern way. However, I don’t see the point in even setting foot on a course, which offers hole-to-hole room service with carts, distance aids and now hazards that seem to fail to be hazards. Sums up the modern game as golf, ‘come try our game it is easy, you don’t have to think, let alone break sweat’  For drinks to be served please press the blue button on the carts adjacent the GPS screen for the Automatic Room Service Beverage Dispenser (ARSBD). 

Melyvn,

In light of your previous comment, I can think of very few things which are more penal in golf than a island green.  So I woulda thought you would be a huge fan of them, not slagging on em.

Go figure!!      

P.S.  I've played that Island green on the left in your original post and I took a big number on it.  This is good right?  Penality in action!!

[Steve Lang]

  color my eyes cynical sandy brown, but Mike's "bunker" looks more a like a drainage wash area for upland runoff starting from that tree there, that wouldn't grow any grass (so why fight it) than a strategic design feature.. but i've never been there and have only limited topographic information, and certainly nutrient deficient or other stressed areas or natural outcroppings play as they may in any part of the world..

personally i'm no fan of gorse and find it most unnatural and as penal as a water hazard.. (its drawn my blood and ire at TOC and at Ganton trying to retrieve small white objects)

perhaps given some regional Scottish weather and sandy soils, it is not surprizing that lakes might be considered unnatural features at the home of GOLF:
 


Certainly stone embellished burns are unnatual.. but they are needed conveyances...

drain - Bouvier's Law Dictionary, Revised 6th Ed (1856) :

  DRAIN. Conveying the water from one place to another, for the purpose of
  drying the former
       2. The right of draining water through another map's land. This is an
  easement or servitude acquired by grant or prescription. Vide 3 Kent, Com.
  436 7 Mann. & Gr. 354; Jus aguaeductus; Rain water; Stillicidium.
  



I wonder what course Anthro played at in Cro-Magnon daze and would everything natural been acceptable?



 

[Carl Rogers]

The first island green was (and still is) incredible theatre for viewing the top golfers in the world.  The second island green is a bit ho-hum that again, the third is hopeless cliche.

Shallow bunker ... is the back right bunker at ANGC #11 a shallow bunker more for definition and aiming?

[Sean_A]

That shallow bunker is a waste of time to maintain.  If it was just hard pan it would be better because average golfers can't hit off that stuff either and its free - plus you can drive a cart over it.  The look of this bunker is so bad that it buries any possible (which is a stretch) strategic significance it may have.  I doubt there are more than a few wing nuts on this site who would enjoy taking credit for this gem.  I have no time for this sort of thing especially when it costs money to keep up.  Maybe George was right. People are so afraid to call a piece of crap, crap that its critical analysis has gone out the window. 


Ciao

[Paul_Turner]

A shallow bunker is just a different form of hazard from a deep bunker.....  And if it's roughly maintained like that photo, it doesn't have to cost much maintenance at all.  A vertical revetted face bunker costs a lot more to maintain.  It's a huge amount of work to rebuild one of those.

A shallow bunker is a cheap form of hazard and it is a hazard....plenty of flubbed shots from these. 

A variety of hazards makes golf more interesting: 

A deep pot bunker in the fairway may have approximately a half or three quarters of a shot penalty.  So what's wrong with having a shallow bunker with just a  quarter to half a shot penalty? 

[A.G._Crockett]

A shallow bunker is just a different form of hazard from a deep bunker.....  And if it's roughly maintained like that photo, it doesn't have to cost much maintenance at all.  A vertical revetted face bunker costs a lot more to maintain.  It's a huge amount of work to rebuild one of those.

A shallow bunker is a cheap form of hazard and it is a hazard....plenty of flubbed shots from these. 

A variety of hazards makes golf more interesting: 

A deep pot bunker in the fairway may have approximately a half or three quarters of a shot penalty.  So what's wrong with having a shallow bunker with just a  quarter to half a shot penalty? 

Careful, Paul.  You are being both positive and reasonable here.  That seems to be unacceptable. 

[Eric_Terhorst]

 "...I have a rather wider definition of hazards than is given by the rules of the golf committee.  As a minor kind of hazard, undulating ground, hummocks and hollows might be included...

Most golfers have the erroneous view of the real object of hazards.  The majority of them look upon a hazard as a means of punishing a bad shot, whereas their real object is to make the game more interesting....

...A hazard placed in the exact position where a player would naturally go is frequently the most interesting situation, as a special effort is then needed to get over it or to avoid it."

"Given a free hand, I would use an existing water hazard to the fullest possible extent, but I am very much opposed to creating artificial ones at a cost of thousands of dollars when the money cna be used to give much greater thrills in some other way."

-Alister Mackenzie,  The Spirit of St. Andrews

Mr. Morrow, on reviewing these statements, it seems our hero might have agreed with you on island greens, but not with your opinion of shallow bunkers.  Whether the hazard is 2 feet deep or 3 inches doesn't seem to matter.