What are the greatest impediments to restoration ?

[mike_malone]

 I think i smell a rat.Unless i am mistaken,Mr.Coleman is in Paris and i do not think he would be logging on to this site.So,i think i know who posted this.
    If you use the fairway bunker on #11 RG as an example,the original was shorter and more left than the current one.The original seems almost out of play,while the current is much in play.The original sat on a natural plateau,the current is builtup in a flat spot.So,the current is not a restoration ,it is a new idea.I like the old idea better.
    I am saying i do not know what Mr.Flynn had in mind for the original bunker,but am interested in "divining"it.I do know he did not intend a penal bunker in the hitting area.
   Actually i thought Bork was kind of cool the way he parried with the Senators.

[Jim_Coleman]

    I don't leave until 8 tonight.  It's me allright.  Can't you tell by the biting wit?

[mike_malone]

 I was sure the nonsense you wrote had to be the work of Scuderi

[Patrick_Mucci]

Brad Klein,

I asked the question about lengthening in the sole context of tees, however, you bring up a good point.

If tee lengthening was impossible, but moving the green was possible, and the landscape for the new green was similar to that of the old green, with modern day technology, shouldn't it be possible to build an almost identical green ?

Why is replicating a green, with its dimensions and contours be all that hard ?

[ed_getka]

It will be interesting to see how the restoration/renovation goes at Brookside CC (Canton OH). This Ross course has some fantastic greens, that survived through a number of changes to the course over the years. Brian Silva is beginning work any day now and will continue through next spring. I golfed there with Dan Belden and his father and they filled me in on a ton of stuff regarding the course. Dan's great-grandfather was a founding member and Dan's father has been golfing there over 50 years.
  Brad Klein was there a number of years ago and was pretty impressed with the greens. He also recommended something to help the members to understand the proposed changes. Placemats! The members see the course as it is for awhile and then they change to placemats with proposed changes. It seemed like a good idea to me. You can mull over changes while you chew your food.
  It sounds like you need a great salesman involved in the project from what Dan described to me. The member who did this must be really persuasive, because the course in its current state is a 7 on the Doak scale at least. Add in the 4 million dollars the work will cost and I can see why members would be reluctant, but the vote was overwhelmingly positive. If anyone is interested in the project I would encourage you to contact Dan Belden. He knows a lot about the course and architecture in general, plus he is a very good golfer. It was a very enjoyable and informative day at his club.

[Mark_Fine]

Ed,
I've recently played Brookside and can't believe they need to spend $4MM to "restore" it     That number alone will deter clubs from restoration.  Frankly, if they are spending $4MM to restore that golf course, there is more than restoration going on.  That must include clubhouse work, etc.  
Mark

[ed_getka]

Mark,
 I don't know all of the details I'm sure, but I know they are putting in 4 row irrigation for the whole course to have better control over their watering. Many original bunkers are being put back in and most greens are being brought back out to their original dimensions. I have no idea how much these things cost. Also many tees are being added.

[Dan_Belden]

Mark:

   The entire project for the golf course has been budgeted in the 3 million range, with about 1.5 for the irrigation, and another 1.5 for the bunkers, tees, tree removal,etc..etc...  Then there was an additional 750,00 for some club house renovations.  
   The renovation/ restoration includes rebuiding every bunker, replacing many lost bunkers, rebuilding every tee, recapturing several acres of fairway,expanding the greens to there original sizes, and cutting down a large number of trees.  
   The membership was brought up to speed over two years. Including a Donald Ross day that included a lecture from Brad Klein. Placemates in the mens grill with the original routing,  informational meetings presented to the membership on the proposed work, and then a vote on the project last fall that past by a 2/3rds majority.  Also, the project was presented as a maintenance project.  Many of the tees we use today, were the original tees built in the 20's.  Things need to be fixed.  
   I think the most important part of the project, which began today by the way, is that fact that we are getting it all done at once.   Granted there is a little bit of redesign, a few new bunkers, but no changes to the greens or the original routing.  I would say it is about 95% renovation when you consider everything.
 

[Brad Klein]

Three cheers to Brooskide and its planning process. Crucial there has been the support of the old guard (inc. Dan Belden, dare I refer to you in that manner?), the 30-year veteran pro (Jim Logue), the 30-year veteran superintendent (Bob Figurella), the general manager (Andy Grove), and an energetic and persistent chairman of the renovation process, Steve Cress. Last year they ran about 15 information workshops for members to which all were invited. The key is education - and plowing ahead despite the naysayers after you've hired the best help

Their collaborative effort brought experts together for planning everything on the same day last week, a week before Sept. 2's D-Day blitz invasion. On the same day at Brooskide they had the tree (removal) guy, a hydrogeologist/well-driller, the construction foreman, and architect Brian Silva.

If one major impediment to good restoration is bad planning, then Brookside is well under way doing things the right way. Its efforts will be documented in a subsequent article in Golfweek's SuperNews.

[Brad Klein]

Pat, regarding your comment about moving a green wholesale, I assume you have been to a construction site and seen the process in action.

It's complicated and never easy to reproduce under the best of circumstances, esp. when you rely upon multi-tiered USGA-spec greens.

[ian]

Growth, each and every day the golf course is slightly different from the previous day. Its a bigger factor than people think. Turf, trees, erosion, its an endless list, each one requires some form of maintenance that permanently changes what was there the previous day.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Brad Klein,

I have been on site during construction of greens and know the complexity and difficulty in producing layers of contours with USGA spec greens, however, with GPS, laser measuring devices and other high tech tools now available, I would think it easier to plot the contours down to 1/4 to 1/2 an inch.

Reproducing them still takes a craftsmens approach, but it would seem that high tech can supply the quality control and assurance necessary to reproduce a green to within tolerable
deviations from the original ?

Aren't there companies that specialize in this type of work, measuring and profiling a green down to the smallest increments and then reproducing it ?

[Brad Klein]

Pat, there are specialists in the field, but much of that is marketing fluff. A few can do it, many can't, and I'm not about to name names on a public forum like this about the false promises, esp, from the 1980s when a few reputations were made without being earned..

The problem lies in green construction, where you have to get the contours right three times:

1) at subgrade;
2)when you put the gravel and 14-inches of sand;
3) and then when you ride rake the final mix. Very tough to preserve those contours uniformly. It can be done, and GPS certainly helps.