Armchair (AAC) 2015/2016 IV (9 Holes)

[Bob Brightly]

Ian,
Thank you for taking the time to review the plans. Your comments on my layout were too kind.  After reviewing the actual design I see how the real GCA's paint a piece of artwork, rather than designing a road or sewer. I am extremely embarrassed about blowing the contour interval. I KNEW they were in meters, but working on an 8 1/2 by 11 print of the aerial (probably not recommended), my brain read and counted the interval in feet! I hope the critics will place all the blame on this half of B&B. Still fun to try.  Thanks again to Ben and Ardrian.
Bob

[Dan Delaney 🐮]

Following permission from Adrian.


Here is the actual planning application proposal by SAS Golf Design which:


- Uses inert landfill - red contour lines are the new levels


- Does not use or touch areas around the existing tree roots


- The direction of playing balls is away from Nore Road and the existing footpath north of the site


- Tree loss to be as minimal as possible


- Sensitive wildlife areas facing the Bristol Channel are no go areas


- Green to tee walking distance to be as minimal as possible


- No sand bunkers due to costs so all bunkers are grass bunkers


- 1500m2 Himalayas style putting green


- Chipping area on existing chipping area









Final detailed layout plan submitted to planners

Wow. 
I'm impressed, and even more so humbled in comparison to my best efforts that fell so woefully short.


I have a couple questions for Adrian & Ben - but please no rush in responding.  I've learned a lot from this exercise, the rest is just icing on the cake.

• What was the most constraining or disruptive variable to your routing?  The least?  Acres, Badgers, Boundaries, Slope or Trees (and their huggers)
• What was the first and last hole to fall into place in the current routing?
• Of all of the found holes, what is the one you most regret not including in the design?

P.S. I think the 9th looks spectacular.  Very classy finish.  Much more professional that my own, doglegging to a green set down the hill for some last hole eye candy.

[Adrian_Stiff]

Hi Dan - It was obviously quite a small parcel of land at 33 acres but the South boundary of Nore Road and the housing on the West side and footpath to the North were still restrictive. The flattest land is in the middle section so the idea was to have the longer holes here and have the short holes to the edges and more difficult areas. Badgers were not really a problem in the design itself. The trees had to be kept as much as possible in our mediations with the planners. We toyed with a double green idea for 2 and 5 at one stage.


Many of the AAC submissions routed holes over unusable land for golf fairways, our second hole plays over very steep land to the flatter, then we used as much as we could of the very steep land for our short 3rd, which got us back up for the 4th tee. Ours is still very tight. Quite a lot also used the area left of our 9th, which again is very steep and no good for golf.


We actually got planning for this from the council but afterwards a few individuals that like walking their dogs over the course did not like the idea of us importing inert fill to make up some of the areas more level. The idea was to import 16,000 cubic metres which would raise about £120,000 of income which would have financed about 75% of the construction cost. They got a posse of people to demonstrate and persuaded the council (different department) that the works would be unsafe and that the ground is unstable and the our reconstructed work could slip and could kill people on the footpath. The land owner is the council and following the ladies submissions ordered that we undertake a geological survey. The cost of which is £38,000. There was no guarentee if that survey was undertaken that the council would have given landlord consent. We have a lease of 25 years and the lease says that the council has to be reasonable in their actions. I say they have been unreasonable they say they have not been. So the project is stopped.

[Ryan Coles]

Adrian

Is there any prospect of purchasing the land from North Somerset Council?

I guess herein lies the problems in the field: clear the hurdles, solve the puzzle, establish financial viability and then alas, more hurdles....

[Adrian_Stiff]

Ryan - About as much chance as you hoisting the claret jug next year and me finishing second. Just put a society your way.


Ultimately it will be houses I think, the land must be worth £30,000,000.

[Ian Andrew]

We have decided that picking a winner won’t actually work.

Before you roll your eyes and accuse us of being some of those ridiculous people who want to give every entrant a ribbon for participation, I can assure you this was not what we expected either. We all picked completely different entries. Not a surprise, since each entry had something each of us liked and we all recognized that even our first choice had some aspect that wasn’t ideal. So we immediately turned to each other’s second pick and not one matched anyone else’s fist picks. To complicate matters we now had new entrants showing up at 2nd and 3rd twice each too. So, no clear cut winner.

It was also interesting to see that not only did the entrants see the site differently, but so too did the judges.

Adrian and I seemed to spend quite a bit of time addressing spacing. Mike did as well, but I credit him with pointing the ideas out and judging each use of land. I think he had the right mindset in this regard. We all singled out holes placed too close together. I seemed to be the most concerned about the risk of running holes right up against the out of bounds. And all of us had all sorts of issues with greens, tees and fairways being beside each other.

The one fascinating issue where we differed was on where entrants had designed holes that doglegged in one direction where the land was falling in the other direction (known as a reverse cant). I thought the site was too severe to allow that choice. The other two felt that was not the case and went so far as to point to a few as standouts. As my wife will often point out, “Different is not necessarily wrong” (while rolling her eyes at my choice while I’m not looking).

So here are the picks:


Andy Gray (Adrian)

Adrian thought his layout used the contours effectively and managed the issues of safety. Ian pointed out holes like the 6th being one of the best choices in the competition. But he also questioned others that turned into the slope. Mike felt it featured awkward walks but that eventually helped address safety issues later on and justified the choices.





Ben Hollerbach (Mike)

Mike liked the tacking across the property and thought the use of the views on the site was excellent. He noted that holes would need to be shifted in the field to make it work on site. I found things too tight in the middle and questioned the use of multiple holes that dogleg one way while the land falls severely in the other direction. Adrian felt some holes were just too dangerous, but it was a layout that with some tweaking could work.



Bob Monte (Ian)

Mike thought it had excellent individual holes and utilized the coastline well. He said it could be a very fun course and possibly the best for the average market. Adrian thought it used the contours very well, but was on the short side. I really like the way it used the land and flowed around the site, but questioned whether six threes 130 yards and under met the original objectives … but it was a layout I wanted to play.



Honorable Mentions


Matthew Rose
Mike felt it made very good use of all of the property. He liked the five holes playing with coast as a feature. He said the more he studied it, the more he liked it.

Bob Brightly
I thought Bill deserved full marks for trying so much including a reversible layout, that in the end it made him try to squeeze too much out of (or into) a small site.

Steve Lang
Adrian said he managed the safety well and had a good grasp of the existing contours.


Special Mentions

Drew Groger for his presentation … wow


To all of the entrants:

This wasn’t an easy site because it’s small and it’s quite steep.

Thanks for your thoughts, we had fun reviewing each.


Adrian, Mike and Ian

[Ian Andrew]

OK, found a way to post the plans - help with scale will be appreciated...

Ian

[BCowan]

Ian, Mike, and Adrian,

   Thank you so much for the time you put into judging these.  The challenging site aspect really made this exercise fun.  Congrats to Andy, Ben, and Bob.

[Dieter Jones]

Well done all. Out of interest how many entries did you get in total and can we see the others? I'm particularly interested to see the Drews "wow" presentation.

[Kalen Braley]

I didn't get my submission in, but admittedly it doesn't appear to be as creative as some of these ones...

I really got hung up on having enough space in between holes, as well as keeping a good margin from the property lines, which made me hesitant to use diagonal holes for the most part.

[Garland Bayley]

REPOST with smaller pictures

We have decided that picking a winner won’t actually work.

Before you roll your eyes and accuse us of being some of those ridiculous people who want to give every entrant a ribbon for participation, I can assure you this was not what we expected either. We all picked completely different entries. Not a surprise, since each entry had something each of us liked and we all recognized that even our first choice had some aspect that wasn’t ideal. So we immediately turned to each other’s second pick and not one matched anyone else’s fist picks. To complicate matters we now had new entrants showing up at 2nd and 3rd twice each too. So, no clear cut winner.

It was also interesting to see that not only did the entrants see the site differently, but so too did the judges.

Adrian and I seemed to spend quite a bit of time addressing spacing. Mike did as well, but I credit him with pointing the ideas out and judging each use of land. I think he had the right mindset in this regard. We all singled out holes placed too close together. I seemed to be the most concerned about the risk of running holes right up against the out of bounds. And all of us had all sorts of issues with greens, tees and fairways being beside each other.

The one fascinating issue where we differed was on where entrants had designed holes that doglegged in one direction where the land was falling in the other direction (known as a reverse cant). I thought the site was too severe to allow that choice. The other two felt that was not the case and went so far as to point to a few as standouts. As my wife will often point out, “Different is not necessarily wrong” (while rolling her eyes at my choice while I’m not looking).

So here are the picks:


Andy Gray (Adrian)

Adrian thought his layout used the contours effectively and managed the issues of safety. Ian pointed out holes like the 6th being one of the best choices in the competition. But he also questioned others that turned into the slope. Mike felt it featured awkward walks but that eventually helped address safety issues later on and justified the choices.




Ben Hollerbach (Mike)

Mike liked the tacking across the property and thought the use of the views on the site was excellent. He noted that holes would need to be shifted in the field to make it work on site. I found things too tight in the middle and questioned the use of multiple holes that dogleg one way while the land falls severely in the other direction. Adrian felt some holes were just too dangerous, but it was a layout that with some tweaking could work.





Bob Monte (Ian)

Mike thought it had excellent individual holes and utilized the coastline well. He said it could be a very fun course and possibly the best for the average market. Adrian thought it used the contours very well, but was on the short side. I really like the way it used the land and flowed around the site, but questioned whether six threes 130 yards and under met the original objectives … but it was a layout I wanted to play.





Honorable Mentions


Matthew Rose
Mike felt it made very good use of all of the property. He liked the five holes playing with coast as a feature. He said the more he studied it, the more he liked it.

Bob Brightly
I thought Bill deserved full marks for trying so much including a reversible layout, that in the end it made him try to squeeze too much out of (or into) a small site.

Steve Lang
Adrian said he managed the safety well and had a good grasp of the existing contours.


Special Mentions

Drew Groger for his presentation … wow


To all of the entrants:

This wasn’t an easy site because it’s small and it’s quite steep.

Thanks for your thoughts, we had fun reviewing each.


Adrian, Mike and Ian

[Matthew Rose]

Thank you gentlemen..... it was a lot of fun, and I learned a lot. Those are the two main reasons why I enter these contests, and on those two fronts, I've never been disappointed, even though I'm clearly an amateur at best.


As always, looking forward to the next one.

[Josh Bills]

Thank you all for setting this up and reviewing my plans as well.  Clearly not up to par with others, but the feedback from Ian was so generous.  I look forward to the next contest as well and hope to keep improving, as it was fun to attempt.  I'm sorry that the actual course may never be built, as that is unfortunate for all those in that area and for golf in general.   

[Ian Andrew]

The best exercise I've seen to help people begin to understand the routing process is a large block of rolling land about 25-30 acres with nothing but contours. Turf students were then asked to design a 3 hole combination out of that block. Even that is trying for most.

You need to walk before you can run.

[Steve Lang]

   WOW, thanks again to Ben and the judges, especially Ian for giving some personalized feedback, very unexpected and worth the effort to enter!


I would love to have been the proverbial fly on the wall (or on conference call) listening to the judges debate the merits and issues affecting this site.. they probably worked harder than the entrants and the stymie in the end is probably best for all, can't put modern hole lengths and concerns for safety on such a tight site.  Hate to see the walkers on Gordano Round or folks on a crowded course get beaned or having to get with their solicitors to try and bring charges against the architects!


I very much enjoy these AAC's so congrats to all entrants..  I really want to know if Bob Monte put blood sweat and tears into his effort to get those reds?

[Bob Montle]

   


I very much enjoy these AAC's so congrats to all entrants..  I really want to know if Bob Montle put blood sweat and tears into his effort to get those reds?

No blood Steve!
I was in a rush Friday night getting it drawn up for submission.  My wife didn't like the look where I just inked in fairway boundaries and she gave me Orange and Blue hi-lighters.  So that is how the fairways became Red and the bunkers became Blue.

Many thanks to Adrian, Ben and Ian for making this possible.  Challenging and great fun.   I'm looking forward to an 18-holer.

[Thomas Dai]

Such a shame that this project seems unlikely to progress.


Safety has come up a few times above. Discounting being hit by a golf club, being hit by a golf ball is always a major concern and thus discussion point.


What about if it didn't hurt or cause damage to be hit by a golf ball?


Another thread currently ongoing mentions 90%-80% reduction in the distance the ball goes. Why go this route in changing the ball?


What if regulations were introduced that softened the ball such that it wouldn't hurt or cause damage if one was hit by a shot? Wouldn't such a ball also be likely to limit the distance a ball would travel bringing back courses on smaller areas of land, like the above proposed project, and other related aspects about course length, technology, expense etc that get mentioned herein. Jeez, it might even float!


Atb

[Adrian_Stiff]

Such a shame that this project seems unlikely to progress.


Safety has come up a few times above. Discounting being hit by a golf club, being hit by a golf ball is always a major concern and thus discussion point.


What about if it didn't hurt or cause damage to be hit by a golf ball?


Another thread currently ongoing mentions 90%-80% reduction in the distance the ball goes. Why go this route in changing the ball?


What if regulations were introduced that softened the ball such that it wouldn't hurt or cause damage if one was hit by a shot? Wouldn't such a ball also be likely to limit the distance a ball would travel bringing back courses on smaller areas of land, like the above proposed project, and other related aspects about course length, technology, expense etc that get mentioned herein. Jeez, it might even float!


Atb

We got planning for the course Thomas the reason its been stopped is a group of women that amassed about 1100 signatures to stop it being upgraded on the grounds that the course would be unstable and could slip across the footpath and kill somebody.

[Ben Hollerbach]

Thank you to Mike, Ian and Adrian for putting in the time to review all of the submissions, and thanks to Ben for putting up the idea for another AAC. This was a very enjoyable exercise and I can't wait until the next comes along.

[Alex Miller]

I feel compelled to comment as I really am a fan of Andy's routing.


I don't see the yardages for his holes, but it would appear as Adrian says to make phenomenal use of the property and views while managing the safety issues of a small site. The walks appear more charming than awkward to me, with the crossovers after 1&8 and 3&6 to lend a nice community element that would be expected on this course. I also think Andy's tee to green walks were the shortest (of the one's I've seen) and the holes flow naturally from them.




Nicely done everyone! I wish I had had time to submit an entry myself but I don't think it would've topped Andy's 

[Adrian_Stiff]

Alex - They all could have been improved and I am sure everyone would have come up with better routing's if they had a site visit. Andy Gray for me had a golf course that was safe. The 2nd tee and 9th tee would have been better swapped over The whole road along the south of the property you need to be playing away from also that land is exceptionally steep there so cutting and filling is much more difficult. For me Ben Hollerbach's routing lost out because of this and a lot of the other entries did not work that out so I marked that as a key point in my assessments. I think architects can look at a topo map, shut their eyes and visualise a slope but you get that with practice, what is still hard is understanding that downhill holes can still be blind and there were a few of those in the entries. A few site visits you learn and a good way to learn is to read the topo map of your home course, you start to realise what 10 metres of climb is.


Bob Monte's was good too but just a par 29 so Bob got my 2nd spot but was technically good. There were bit's of Drew's that were really good. A lot never used or under used the middle section of land which is relatively flat.

[Josh Bills]

I will post my entry, maybe so others can see how not to do it.  A site visit would certainly have made it clear many of my holes simply were not practical.  As this was my first ever attempt, I was happy just to get all the holes included and yardages figured out.  While I would of assumed some earth moving would be required, I was unable to make a routing work without major earth moving, or being unplayable in parts on what I created.  Great insight was provided and I hope that at some point I can better appreciate the topo map and how to make holes work on existing terrain.  While I'm proud of a few of the holes, no doubt the entries selected are far superior. If any of the judges want to make mine an example, feel free.  Just, please don't bash too hard, this is my first time and I now appreciate how inferior it is, but also know seeing how not to do it can help others.  Josh

[Adrian_Stiff]

I will post my entry, maybe so others can see how not to do it.  A site visit would certainly have made it clear many of my holes simply were not practical.  As this was my first ever attempt, I was happy just to get all the holes included and yardages figured out.  While I would of assumed some earth moving would be required, I was unable to make a routing work without major earth moving, or being unplayable in parts on what I created.  Great insight was provided and I hope that at some point I can better appreciate the topo map and how to make holes work on existing terrain.  While I'm proud of a few of the holes, no doubt the entries selected are far superior. If any of the judges want to make mine an example, feel free.  Just, please don't bash too hard, this is my first time and I now appreciate how inferior it is, but also know seeing how not to do it can help others.  Josh

JOSH - I liked quite a bit of yours but it obviously had some holes that were no-no's so I marked it down for that and could not have it the winner. Hole 5 is the clear one that fails on safety and that land is too steep to cut and fill on that angle, from your 4th green it could just about work. The 9th again fails from safety but the contours would have been ok. Your 1st is probably best with the green left in that first field, it is dangerous for the 7th green though. Your 2nd is a good hole. The 3rd is a blind up the hill hole not really very good and your 4th is too near the houses. Your 6th is a peach and 7 you could probably get the tee back a bit. With a bit of shunting around and forgetting the 4th, perhaps a shorter 1st hole and short par 3 extra next hole it would be better. I think if you were on site it is the sort of thing you would find the solutions.

[Andy Gray]

Thanks for the kind words Alex!


Here are the yardages (in metres of course) for your reference.
1. 275m, 2. 155m, 3. 145m, 4. 350m, 5. 200m, 6. 255m, 7. 165m, 8. 115m, 9. 245m.

I feel compelled to comment as I really am a fan of Andy's routing.


I don't see the yardages for his holes, but it would appear as Adrian says to make phenomenal use of the property and views while managing the safety issues of a small site. The walks appear more charming than awkward to me, with the crossovers after 1&8 and 3&6 to lend a nice community element that would be expected on this course. I also think Andy's tee to green walks were the shortest (of the one's I've seen) and the holes flow naturally from them.




Nicely done everyone! I wish I had had time to submit an entry myself but I don't think it would've topped Andy's 

[Steve Lang]

   I enjoyed reading about Vardon's history in researching things.. and his Challenge Series to win some things.. Only outdone by reading about the area's history.. and glooming onto various names as themes for hole names.



I thought modern hole lengths just weren't appropriate, though some of my holes could have been made longer... I guess I'd add some tees after some time of watching / playing to see what might work safely.  I view SAFETY IS #1 is more than a saying...



I could easily see some modern hole lengths appropriate for a very limited set of "Challenge Holes", to be used if the field of play was safely open or in some championship or grande bet.  So one would reuse greens and some fairways.



More tees and bunkers I'd add later as noted, but some green layouts seemed appropriate and where they'd drain to...




Great fun from the armchair indeed!