I bet some of our savvy link hunters here can find numerous articles concerning lawsuits concerning golf courses where a person has died from being struck due to proximity issues, etc.....
I gave this a quick search because I thought you were overstating the incidence of death by golf ball. From the first two stories I found, it seems to happen once every year or two. One of the people killed was a maintenance worker struck 100 feet away from the tee. But, more than half the instances cited were others in the same foursome as the golfer who hit the shot, who had wandered ahead before he played. Let that be a lesson to everyone on the forum!
Joe
Every business probably needs some sort of General Liability insurance coverage- and that is why they are cheap. When you are dealing with towering cranes in wind swept canyons of buildings and streets filled with people- it is a different level of risk!
In doing a Google search- I did find this old GCA thread where Jeff Brauer commented:
Peter,
As someone on this site pointed out, there are actually far fewer lawsuits about safety than most would have you believe. It's just that we hear about the ones that do happen, and get a bit fearful.
As Jeff alluded, lawsuits come down to expert witnesses. Most architects believe that a safety standard published in a book is a bad thing, because a witness could come in and prove, that your design is one inch short of a printed standard, and you may be liable, even if the situation actually makes sense otherwise and is safe.
ASGCA thought about putting out safety standards in the 70's, but were advised against by attornies for reasons above. The last time we met with European architects, they were hot to do the same thing (in 2000) but we couldn't talk them out of it. Maybe someone over there could get you a copy.
Most architects do start with standards about in line with Rando or Hurdzan's though. The more interesting aspect to me is not pure separation, but angles of play. There are certain zones, usually about 15 degrees each side of intended line of play where most shots land. I have long contended that some of the genius of Ross routings can't be replicated today, because he was not afraid to put a tee adjacent to fairway landing zone while creating his "fan shaped" routings. The tendency today is to line up tees and greens a bit more to keep high concentration zones like tees away from critical areas.
http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,4661.0
Maybe Jeff can update and comment-
Mike,
Nice find! As to your point about general liability, architects carry that, and also errors and omissions, since general liability rarely covers design defects. I will again agree that lawsuits against golf course architects are pretty rare, but they do happen, and we are generally scared crapless about it......at least the first time. For the record, I have been sued exactly twice in 33 years - both for rejecting obviously dead sod or sprigs on behalf of the owner, which I am contractually obligated to do, but vendors don't always see it that way.
Over 30 years, I have agreed to act as expert witness to defend golf courses on a few occasions, maybe 5 total. I am no longer in much demand, (not that it bothers me) because of Google. Lawyers find articles I wrote for Golf Course Industry (and formerly Golf Course News) over the last dozen years, including one titled (after the old Ford ad) "Safety is Job 1." Kind of kills the credibility of testifying that a golf course did what it could.....
Not much has changed. There have been a few more (not many) studies we can extrapolate from to estimate where golf shots end up. I have analyzed the numbers I have seen, from finding an old ASGCA members 1970 "safety cone" study to newer stuff. Most confirm what everyone knows - more golfers slice than hook, and slices tend to be wilder than hooks. And, most golf courses/residential are built well below some 99% safety standard that anyone might establish. (You can't get to 100% safety, even designing for only good players)
Without going into great detail, and considering the worst players only, it probably takes 24 degrees right, 16 degrees left (at about 180 to 200 yards off the tee) to achieve "99%" of golf balls landing inside the play corridor. You can reduce the adjacent property slightly i.e., 15/22.5%, 14/21 degrees, etc.,) accepting 90+% probability of golf balls NOT finding adjacent areas. Add in the distance factor, and any given lot won't see even that many shots, i.e., a shot 24 degrees off line and landing at the particular distance your lot or the green you are standing on at that moment is from the tee that day.......
The legally vague standard that architects need to design to keep "the preponderance" of golf balls out of adjacent areas is still in force, even if over time, those standards have certainly tended to rise, often a result of precedence setting lawsuits. Every case is unique.
Honestly, the typical 1980's golf/course housing standard of 325 ft corridors, with property lines 150 feet off centerline left, and 175 ft. off center right is pretty safe. Expanding that to 160/190 or so for 350 feet between property lines is statistically better, of course. The number of shots going further left/right dwindles quickly after that. While golf ball strikes are unfortunate, whoever devised those corridors got it pretty close, as far as my amateur stats analysis skills tell me.
And, they do apply to adjacent tees and greens. The theory is 4-8 golfers (and sometimes, 2-8 caddies) might congregate there increasing the chance of a stray ball hitting someone, over an adjacent fairway where they spread out. I typically leave 30 deg. from back of tee to center of green in routing (slice side, less on hook) since I don't know where the cart path, etc. will go at that point.
Tom's response doesn't surprise me. I still recall a similarly old thread (maybe the same one....) where we debated whether we would prefer to save a tree, if it meant pushing a tee closer than comfortable to the adjacent hole somehow. He was less concerned about that than I was. That said, every situation is unique. I could easily see situations where the tree would help safety, etc., but in general, I am more conservative (see my post above!) than many other architects.
He points out the extremes - death - but injuries cause lawsuits far more often, including brain damage. I defended one club many years ago against the vague charge that a women's son was "never quite the same" after being struck in the head with a golf ball. And I hear of more suits related to golf carts than almost anything else, not golf shots.
Short version is yes, architects worry about safety in their designs, as they should.