Design/Build Flaws that Lead to Maintenance Issues

[JMEvensky]

It would be a petty boring world without flashed bunker faces, and they can be sustainable if constructed correctly.

 

This I don't understand. I'm certainly willing to concede they can be built correctly--but then what? Don't you end up with a decision based solely on aesthetics?

If one believes it's OK to have the occasional plugged lie in the face of a bunker,then I understand the point of flashing sand up the face. But don't most clubs spend a lot of maintenance time/money on tamping down the sand in the face to avoid a plugged lie? Further,if the object of the exercise is to have the ball release down off a bunker slope,why not just grass the faces to begin with?

Sand flashed bunkers look cool--but I don't see the argument in favor versus grass faced.

What am I missing?

The guy wrestling a fly mower.  "low maintenance" is a term coined by a non maintenance guy.

I never said low maintenance--nothing bunker related is low maintenance. But compared to 4 guys literally pounding sand every few days,wrestling a fly mower or string trimmer once a week seems like a pretty good alternative.

[Jeff_Brauer]

Don,

Well, of course publicly suggest I am not truthful, just as you suggested, based on a recent post that I create necessary work to bill more from my clients.  Talk of tall tales!  It seems you have a need to imply to the world something bad about me after every one of my well intended posts meant to clarify something for others, even when I basically agree with you.  Of course, I don't appreciate your untruths, and feel the need to say something to balance/correct the record.

For the record, I do conduct weekly meetings, etc. as you suggest, and of course an all hands on deck approach with great communication is ideal. But personalities and professional experience always come into play and not every job ends up rainbows and bunny rabbits. 

Sometimes you do get a less experienced architect with a more experienced contractor, and/or super, or vice versa.  And, and not taking a broad swipe at either contractors or superintendents who I respect, but some (like the population in general) either love conflict and create it, or hate conflict and avoid it, when teamwork is required, but suffers.

In a big ego business, sometimes, competing personalities do end up on a job together.  And in those cases, (maybe 3-6 in 60 projects) it becomes something I need to handle, even if I meet with them privately after the public meeting (if I recognize it at the time)  All goes into the project management skills both you and I have to employ in our own situations.

I still have life long friends in the Biz solely from developing great synergy with them on the project, and having fun while doing great work. Over 60 major jobs, it's inevitable that 10% are great, 80% are pretty good with problems, and 10% go worse than you would like.  It sounds like every job you have done comes out perfect, so good for you.

It is pretty clear, that despite my respect for you and your talents, we would have no chemistry, and no owner should ever be saddled with both you and me on a project, even when by many measures, we would have great complimentary contributory talents.  Clearly, neither the architect and contractor would do their best work under the circumstances.

[Don Mahaffey]

Don,

Well, of course publicly suggest I am not truthful, just as you suggested, based on a recent post that I create necessary work to bill more from my clients.  Talk of tall tales!  It seems you have a need to imply to the world something bad about me after every one of my well intended posts meant to clarify something for others, even when I basically agree with you.  Of course, I don't appreciate your untruths, and feel the need to say something to balance/correct the record.

For the record, I do conduct weekly meetings, etc. as you suggest, and of course an all hands on deck approach with great communication is ideal. But personalities and professional experience always come into play and not every job ends up rainbows and bunny rabbits.  

Sometimes you do get a less experienced architect with a more experienced contractor, and/or super, or vice versa.  And, and not taking a broad swipe at either contractors or superintendents who I respect, but some (like the population in general) either love conflict and create it, or hate conflict and avoid it, when teamwork is required, but suffers.

In a big ego business, sometimes, competing personalities do end up on a job together.  And in those cases, (maybe 3-6 in 60 projects) it becomes something I need to handle, even if I meet with them privately after the public meeting (if I recognize it at the time)  All goes into the project management skills both you and I have to employ in our own situations.

I still have life long friends in the Biz solely from developing great synergy with them on the project, and having fun while doing great work. Over 60 major jobs, it's inevitable that 10% are great, 80% are pretty good with problems, and 10% go worse than you would like.  It sounds like every job you have done comes out perfect, so good for you.

It is pretty clear, that despite my respect for you and your talents, we would have no chemistry, and no owner should ever be saddled with both you and me on a project, even when by many measures, we would have great complimentary contributory talents.  Clearly, neither the architect and contractor would do their best work under the circumstances.

Jeff,
My comments about the golf industry in previous posts were not directed at you specifically. Just because I reply to a post of your does not mean everything I write applies to you specifically. If I need to write in disclaimers I will. I could take it as you are grouping all supers and young architects into your comments, but that's silly as the vast majority are nothing at all like the ones you cited.  

I believe the crop of young architects out there is very impressive as the downturn has weeded out the opportunists and left those who are very serious about their careers. While the overall number of young architects in the business may be low, I find them to be extremely talented. So i guess I'm a little sensitive when the old guard takes a swipe at them with "rookie" comments.  

I do tire of going to conferences and such and hearing all the rumors that are mostly negative.  I guess that is one reason I don't attend many anymore; that and most of the info is the same just packaged differently.

I think you are too sensitive to counter points. Unless you enjoy the negative industry talk, I'm not sure why you would take issue with what I wrote.

My basic point is none of us are above questioning and if our ideas are justifiably, then they will survive scrutiny. That vetting out should be part of the project process and helps to avoid the issues brought forward by the OP.

[Ian Mackenzie]

Routing a course in and around a river can make for interesting design opportunities.
Except, of course, if/when the river routinely floods washing out bunkers and creating mud out of fairways.

The "Every 100 Year Rain" storm now arrives 1-2 times per season in the Midwest of the US.

[Steve Okula]

It would be a petty boring world without flashed bunker faces, and they can be sustainable if constructed correctly.

 

This I don't understand. I'm certainly willing to concede they can be built correctly--but then what? Don't you end up with a decision based solely on aesthetics?

If one believes it's OK to have the occasional plugged lie in the face of a bunker,then I understand the point of flashing sand up the face. But don't most clubs spend a lot of maintenance time/money on tamping down the sand in the face to avoid a plugged lie? Further,if the object of the exercise is to have the ball release down off a bunker slope,why not just grass the faces to begin with?

Sand flashed bunkers look cool--but I don't see the argument in favor versus grass faced.

What am I missing?

The guy wrestling a fly mower.  "low maintenance" is a term coined by a non maintenance guy.

I never said low maintenance--nothing bunker related is low maintenance. But compared to 4 guys literally pounding sand every few days,wrestling a fly mower or string trimmer once a week seems like a pretty good alternative.

I don't know what sand you're using that needs regular "pounding", but with a 0-2 mm angular sand it is entirely unnecessary. We add 15cm to a bunker and yes, it's a little fluffy for about 3 months but then it settles down through regular precipitation and traffic and there is never any need to compact it. The balls do not plug. (Even if they did, I would call that "golf").

I'm at a Jones Sr. club with 36 holes and over 100 flashed bunkers. There is no way in hell I would turf down all the bunker slopes. The regular weekly handmowing would kill us.  We get  a hard enough rain to cause serious erosion 4-6 times a year, but the 2 days it takes to fix the bunkers after such an event is a tiny fraction of the cost of guaranteed weekly flymo's and strimmers.

I've used angular sand in greens construction as well and never had any issues with it.

[JMEvensky]

Steve O,river bottom sand in 40+ year old,never fully renovated,bunkers. Not certain of the size,but I doubt there's much uniformity. The golf course has 60 bunkers.

I agree on the plugged lie being an acceptable part of the game--but we're in the minority. Not many memberships will put up with that--certainly none in my part of the world.

It seems that all the arguments in favor of flashing are visual. I can certainly understand flashing in newly constructed or renovated bunkers,but what about the vast majority of clubs who've deferred the serious maintenance on their bunkers?

I'm in AG Crockett's camp. The aesthetics just don't seem worth it. The cheapest permanent fix for a lot of clubs is grassing the faces--the members might not even notice.

[Jeff_Brauer]

Don,

I have always sensed an attitude of "old guard" vs. new guard in your posts.  Given your age and experience, I always had you pegged as old guard, so I sometimes get confused.  I am not just piling on any rookies, and understand the dream is still alive, and I was one years ago, too.  Life goes on.

There are different kinds of rookies. Those who train for years and those who just sort of appear.   I agree those who "just appeared" in the business, probably have more to prove to the vets than long time apprentices from old guard firms.  

Of course, 80% of all new businesses fail after a short time, many deservedly so!  There are cases of inexperienced people designing and building golf courses, which frustrates some of us, but things happen many different ways.  Pete Dye just sort of appeared and turned into a superstar, and we have to let the open market let everyone prove themselves.

In mentioning one architect situation years ago, it was to fairly (I thought) illustrate that there can be problems on all sides of the job, not just on the super, owner, or contractor side.  I agree that most any design decision is a balance of factors, and yes, we are certainly open to questioning the balance we opt for.

We also agree that certain segments of the industry can be very negative, often spreading unwarranted rumors about both architects and contractors.  I don't like that kind of negativity either.  Most people in the biz are pretty top drawer, and like you say, the industry is small, and those who constantly trash talk are well known. I think I do a fair job of tuning out the unwarranted comments, both by how generalized they are, and who makes them.

[jeffwarne]

Thank God Pete Dye "just sort of appeared"....and begat an incredible (unrelated by blood) legacy of talented architects who succeeded or failed on their own merits.
or we'd currently be facing a host of courses designed by grandsons of well known architects

[Brett Hochstein]

Regarding the cool vs practical spectrum, is that something that is discussed for the overall design or major features during design or during construction or ......?  Are there mileposts and acceptance points where there is some formality to the decision to go cool vs practical or vice versa?  Or is that client dependent?

A baseline strategy I like to use and have learned from others is this--start with the practical, then make it cool.  No feature really works if it doesn't drain, falls apart, or requires a ton of extra care. 

An example is the bunkers we recently rebuilt at Sallandsche in Holland.  A lot of them we wanted to be a little closer to the putting surface, but the domed slopes of the green edges would have meant a lot of runoff going straight into the bunkers, which leads to washouts and other longterm problems.  This is a constraint that must be worked around and was by pulling the sand back a little bit to allow for small runoff swales into fairway or rough.  After that, you do whatever you can to build it up and create a similar architectural effect.  The result is bunkers that function practically but look and play pretty cool as well.

Pete Dye said something like "90% of golf design is making drainage look good."  It may not be that extreme, especially as you disturb less of land that already drains, but it isn't necessarily far off either. 

[Jeff_Brauer]

Routing a course in and around a river can make for interesting design opportunities.
Except, of course, if/when the river routinely floods washing out bunkers and creating mud out of fairways.

The "Every 100 Year Rain" storm now arrives 1-2 times per season in the Midwest of the US.

Ian,

This sort of goes back to the argument about whether a golf course should ever be built on certain sites or not.  And is that a siting question or a design quality question? Traditionally, real estate developments have given over the flood plains to golf courses, which does cause problems.

I know many business consultants who figure maximum rounds by not only daylight hours, and rain days, but also days a particular course is out of play.  If you have a floodplain course, you probably need to figure a certain percentage of days out of play, and maybe hundreds of thousands per year or at least some cost averaged number for flood related repairs.

[Steve Okula]

Steve O,river bottom sand in 40+ year old,never fully renovated,bunkers. Not certain of the size,but I doubt there's much uniformity. The golf course has 60 bunkers.

I agree on the plugged lie being an acceptable part of the game--but we're in the minority. Not many memberships will put up with that--certainly none in my part of the world.

It seems that all the arguments in favor of flashing are visual. I can certainly understand flashing in newly constructed or renovated bunkers,but what about the vast majority of clubs who've deferred the serious maintenance on their bunkers?

I'm in AG Crockett's camp. The aesthetics just don't seem worth it. The cheapest permanent fix for a lot of clubs is grassing the faces--the members might not even notice.

When we have some fresh, loose sand in a bunker I do get some grief from members who think it's unfair.  But I have also seen people make up&downs from the same stuff, so I have no sympathy for the whiners.

My point is that from a maintenance point of view, provided the surface water is managed correctly, it is far less expensive to maintain a sand face than a steep (2/1 or 3/1) grass slope. We can rake the sand a lot quicker than hand mowing the turf.

[JMEvensky]

My point is that from a maintenance point of view, provided the surface water is managed correctly, it is far less expensive to maintain a sand face than a steep (2/1 or 3/1) grass slope. We can rake the sand a lot quicker than hand mowing the turf.

Understood. Our case is a little different in that we have some old,decrepit bunkers. So our options are rebuild/replace the sand,grass the faces,or do nothing and spend an exorbitant amount of money annually to get a ball to do what either of the other options would accomplish. Sadly,we're using the last option.

This is why I agree with AG Crockett--in our case,grassing seems like the most cost effective way to resolve the issue.