Golf Club Atlas
GolfClubAtlas.com => Golf Course Architecture Discussion Group => Topic started by: wsmorrison on October 12, 2003, 07:56:35 AM
-
I admit, just as the overwhelming majority of my reading list consists of classic novels (history and golf architecture as well); the overwhelming majority of the courses I study and play are classics.
The scant evidence I have seen to date would seem to indicate that modern architects and construction crews don't seem to utilize sheet drainage in the same amount and to the same effect as classic age architects. Of course the subsurface drainage technology wasn't what it is today and by and large the architects weren't getting a percentage of the construction project as they seem to be getting today (a potential conflict of interest). In the modern era, what is the level of practice of surface drainage and does it have a practical, if not artistic value, as well?
-
Wayne:
It's probably no secret that some of the old architects (Thomas, Mackenzie) created things that not only functioned well in the context of drainage and sheet drainage but ALSO appeared to look quite natural as they did so.
Max Behr in a few essays and also in a few architectural "comparisons" attempted to prove that particular natural formations (shapes and angles) rendered drainage and sheet drainage more functional than others but far more interestingly that in doing so allowed particular formations to be less temporary and far more permanent (weak vs strong).
Basically he was studying Nature's own ways (particularly through water and wind) of creating devolution and destruction on the one hand or permanency of structure on the other hand.
This is another example of how he (they) believed that "permanent architecture" was a basic goal--and that to make that happen what man needed to do (architecturally) was to use things (formations of nature and the shapes and angles of Nature) and make things that not only functioned like nature but looked like it too!
-
Wayne,
Here in the Canadian prairies, surface drainage is definitely not an lost art. Due to our extremely cold winters, and slow spring thaws, it is essential that water be able to drain via surface topography, because the water simply can't penetrate the soil and enter the sub-surface drains. Especially in the southern prairies, where the landscape tends to be quite flat, much time and expense are dedicated to ensuring a positive flow of surface drainage.
Tyler Kearns
-
Here's a great example of the lost art of surface drainage that shows what brilliant geniuses some of those old architects were.
You know that radical little bowl on the mid-left of NGLA's #1 green? Well, I've been looking at that for some years now and wondering how in the holy hell that deep little basin can drain and how brilliant MacD/Raynor (or Maxwell?) must have been to build that.
Early one morning I was standing on #1 green with Salinetti and Burrows and I asked Salinetti how that little thing could drain so well when it looked like a basin without a drain in it?
He looked at me and said; "It doesn't, it drains just about as well as a basin without a drain in it!"
So there--if that doesn't tell you everything you need to know about the genius of some of those old guys I can't imagine what would! I can't imagine how in the holy hell they did it but somehow they managed to make a radical little bowl-like contour on that green that looks like a deep basin that doesn't drain any better than a basin without a drain in it! ;)
The genius of those guys!!!!
-
Wayne,
No question its changed, but IMHO, for the better. If you don't like the aesthetics, you would, as a superintendent like the results!
First off, I think many fail to realize that the classics have added tons of drainage pipe over the years in long swales that didn't drain as well as you may romantisize they did. Often, the super added 4" french drains, which as Tyler says, don't work well, and even if constructed well, will clog and require maintenance over time. Basically, the "modern theory" is, if its a surface drainage problem, solve it with a surface drain (ie catch basin inlet rather than french drain)
Here is how my surface drainage design has "improved" over the years, based on experience, the ability to get the course open quickly and in good shape, and just good old common sense observation:
1. Water concentrates into stream flow at about 300 foot of run. Place drain inlets at 250 maximum runs to prevent erosion during grow in.
2. Sod holds water! If there is any inkling that we will sod an area, it needs to be graded to 6-10% slopes, even if the natural area is a traditionally "sound" 3%.
3. In seeded areas, even 3% causes problems sometimes (shifting soils, etc.) so plan to grade those to 4-6%, knowing that some areas will require slower slopes to make things work in the field, so leave some wiggle room.
4. Cart paths block water, and standing water, when run over by cart wheels causes problems. Grade raised paths, and add lots of basins and pipes on the uphill or both sides of the path, since it is the most heavily trafficked part of the course. Incidentally, once water collects on a path, you can never let it get off the path, as the erosive force is just too much for turf to stand up to.
5. Treat fairways like an engineer treats a road - swales on both sides, inlets to carry water below as necessary, so no drainage except what falls on them crosses the fairway.
6. Remember, many environmental reggies now require us to move water away from natural outlets to let it settle out sediments before entering streams. Like it or not, this often means grading much of the site.
7. Don't skimp on pipe size! Because the capacity of a pipe goes up the square of the diameter, ( a 6" pipe has a sq. inch cross section of 3x3x3.14, or about 27.3 sq. inches, while a slightly more expensive 8 inch pipe has 4x4x3.14, or49 sq. in., almost twice as much for about 45% more cost) Larger pipes can also be laid on shallower grades, which often helps out tremendously!
There is more, of course, but you can see that we deal with things like more sod, cart paths and environmental restraints, the public perception that a new course should be perfect - no time to slowly fix drainage problems - compared to courses years ago in the Golden Age.
In short, designers in both eras designed to the technology available and the expectations prevalent. In that way, they are equally good drainage designs. As noted, I believe current drainage designs are the best ever, technically. I agree that seeing more basins on the golf course can be a distraction. I would complain more about that, but in fact, I rarely can recall taking a drop from a basin that affected play, even in a greenside chipping area or center of the fairway, so I think its a good trade off.
Also, I think TEPauls point about natural slopes is probably a separate issue. You can have very natural and flowing 4-10% slopes across your golf course and have good drainage with a natural look. Its the 20-33% mounding that often looks unnatural.
-
How about some of the old punch bowl greens that were probably designed just to retain water? Do you wonder why some of those geniuses such as Macdonald, Behr, Hunter et al were such strong advocates of a floating golf ball? ;)
-
You see, this type of thread is one of the reasons I love Golfclubatlas.com so much. You never know when some really creative architectural concept might get inspired on here.
I consider George Thomas to have been probably the greatest conceptual genius in the annals of golf architecture and if he could come up with the idea of a bunker smack dab in the middle of a green (Riviera's #6) and have it last then why can't I come up with concept of a water hazard smack dab in the middle of a green and have it accepted and last?
The only remaining problem to solve is whether to make it a regular yellow line water hazard or a red-lined lateral water hazard. For the sake of the condition of the green I think I better go with the red-lined lateral! ;)
Another good reason to line it off--either yellow or red lined is there's always that danger some of these golfing yahoos will mistake it for "casual water" and take the wrong kind of relief.
So you need red or yellow water hazard lines to remind those mind-numbed yahoos that this isn't "casual", this is "SERIOUS".
-
YES, EMPHATICALLY YES!
I think there are too many modern golf architects that either do too much, or not enough of it.
Point in example--They try to disguise it as HUGE fairway contours, as if the Red Sea was going to be parting, or they simply are relying so much on underground drainage now, thus the penchant for manhole-sized covers and drains to decorate the golf landscape.
Wayne-Thanks for a GREAT topic!
-
Jeff,
We had a situation where sod had to be used and, as you said, it drains poorly. surface water was diverted from the area but it still remains wet. Is deep tining worth a try?
-
Jim,
You could deep tine, but what soil type and drainage qualities does it have that you are tining to? It might just go down the the tine hole and stop and hit an impervious soil layer and sit there with an even greater reservoir of water.
RT
-
RT,
Some tailings but mostly subsoils from a nearby excavation. Now that I think more about it the underlying stuff is probably not much better. Dang!
-
Thanks, guys. Wonderful responses. Nice to see this kind of informational exchange....GCA.com at its best!
-
Wayne Morrisson,
I wonder how much influence USGA constructed greens have had upon the moving of surface water on greens.
With high perc rates, has the need to move surface water diminished ?
-
8)
Can't imagine the old guys had access to the materials of construction or budget that opens the possibility of forcing the drainage issue at any site. Perhaps thats why they liked building on sand where the water just seems to "disappear" from whatever surface you put grass on or from those rough bunkers. :o
-
Something to touch on, Given the once desert-like terrain of SoCal (lets face it, I live in a place that was one time a desert!) the work of Billy Bell should never go un-noticed. I think he was the king of surface drainage. I think they practiced it much more back in those days because they didn't have machinery to be digging trenches to bury undeground drainage, and the cost of having crews hand dig it in what is an inordinate amount of clay soils in are region is also another reason to understand how important his work was with both Thomas, the brief glimpse with Tillinghast, as well as his own stand alone work.
I never even realized how much so until one day at Riviera with Lynn Shackelford who was quick to point it out on the left fairway at #8. The little drainage ditches that cut though fairways and the like are so intrical to why Riviera works so well as a golf course. It was a most learned lesson. In fact, I consider Riviera to be one of the most excellent classrooms.
-
Sad irony that Behr's talk about "permanence" is not reflected in modern day existence of his courses "as built".
-
I've just gone through a situation where a superintendent "couldn't" accept sheet drainage on a new fairway, even though the slopes were 3% and greater. During grow-in he noticed standing water and wet areas and was convinced it would "never" drain properly. We wound up installing $8,000 worth of drainage just before finishing to satisfy his concerns. I feel the $$ could have gone to better uses. I am a great fan of handling water with natural slopes and minimizing drain pipe, inlets and ponds. But I am a realist and want the course to be free of nusance water problems. I agree, however, it has become a lost art, so to speak, to use simple methods in the design. Today a typical drainage plan will take as many hours to produce as the more evident features of a course. OK — if the site warrants such effort.
-
Quick question, does anyone of you know where I can get a copy of Max Behr's essays that are mentioned in this thread?
-
"Sad irony that Behr's talk about "permanence" is not reflected in modern day existence of his courses "as built"."
Mike:
It is sad and it certainly is irony. It's a little tricky trying to categorize Max Behr and his writing on various diverse subjects to do with golf and architecture. He wrote during a most formative time in American golf and American golf architecture. Things were moving relatively fast and things were forming and coalescing in various ways, particularly to do with the USGA which are today very much part of the fundamental structure of golf in this country as we know it.
He wrote about a number of things in his somewhat interconnected "essays" that are of real interest to look back on today.
1/ The essential spirit or essence of golf as evidenced in architecture.
2/ Technical and aesthetic ideas in architecture in detail (including permanence through such things as drainage).
3/ The fundamental roll of equipment (balls and impliments) in the sense of a necessary "balance" between man and nature (and man-made golf architectural features to mimic "nature").
4/ The handicapping system
5/ The use of penalty in golf and architecture
6/ Permanence in architecture (in an actual and economic sense)
7/ Fundamental relationships as refected in golf and architecture--ex., Man vs man in comparison to Man vs Nature.
Some of Behr's contemporaries (1920s) were writing and warning about many of the same things he was but not in such written detail. It is irony to look back and notice how completely many things in golf and architecture diverged from the things Behr recommended. Was he wrong? Perhaps. Were others wrong not to listen more carefully to some of the things he wrote about and recommended? Perhaps. To me it would seem so as many of the things we see as problematic today Behr had many of the very same solutions for we offer today and are coming up with today, over 75 years after Behr wrote them. Sometimes it seems like some of what he wrote was done today or just yesterday.
His style of writing was completely unique, incredibly labyrinthian and almost bizarre but his message and the clarity of his reasoning once one gets past those obstacles is truly impressive.
Frank Pont:
Some of Behr's essays are in Goeff Shackelford's book "The Art of Golf Design" and he's now trying to complile more. I think I probably have most of them too but in piecemeal arrangement.
-
There're additional ironies and sometimes almost humurous facts to do with Behr when one looks back on him today. He could certainly be categorized as an extraordinary "renaissance man", a wonderful athlete in a number of sports, certainly including golf and apparently tennis and other sports, but also probably as somewhat of an eccentric. A unique and individual thinker who appeared to go far deeper into some subjects than any others. The fact that he was occasionally dismissed in his own time as somewhat of a crackpot by some--probably mostly to do with the bizarre style of his writing that was almost destined to be misunderstood! Behr was in many ways a critic of some of the things the early USGA was doing (things that are fundamental and structural today) and the last irony is that Behr was a wealthy man, an Easterner, and apparently lived (before migrating to California following his wife's death and his own saddness) on that beautiful farm that almost abuts the USGA headquarters in Far Hills NJ. Of course, the USGA was in NYC then and did not move to Far Hills until many decades after Behr too had moved on!
-
Wayne Morrisson,
I wonder how much influence USGA constructed greens have had upon the moving of surface water on greens.
With high perc rates, has the need to move surface water diminished ?
-
Patrick,
In a word, no. Every square foot of a green needs surface pitch of at least 1% - and in northern climates, where freezing can be an issue, preferably 1.5%.
Forrest,
I think I've workded for that superintendent - about 44 times! That influences me greatly, to get the drainage in before they complain about it. Perhaps our differences come from me working in more rainy climates than you.
As Steve Lang noted, Houston, with 90 in of rain annually, and heavy clay soils, would NOT have been the ideal area for Ross to do his Pinehurst greens and chipping areas......
And I should mention, while drain pipes do correct many maintenance nuisances, they do tend to clog, if not designed with enough pitch to be "self cleansing" or if in a flood plain, and the area around any inlet can stay soggy, without even other precautions, like gravel and tile, so there are tradeoffs.....
-
Pat,
I'm not so sure that the USGA spec greens are always the modern marvels they are supposed to be. Probably due to the high demands on getting the construction right. The worst green at Rolling Green is number 16, a short par 3 with the green benched onto a hillside with a lot of fall-off around the green. This is the only USGA spec green (isn't that right, Mike?) and it is the worst green by far agronomically. Water pools on it (so much for high perc rates) so there is constant wet wilt and fungus. There had been a problem with too many trees and poor air circulation. Quite a number of trees came down (granted a few more need to come down as well) and a circulation fan is used yet it is still the only green that is completely problematic.
-
Pack rats. Out here they build nests in drain pipes. Little homes with running water every evening.
-
I don't think surface drainage is a lost art. It has just become a more complicated art. As most golf courses today involve housing development, golf drainage becomes part of the overall drainage plan and in many cases accepts water from other parts of the development. Also, as Jeff says, after 300 feet you have a stream. When developere wish for housing to line both sides of a fairway then the routing is usually done in the swales with the houses above. Thus creating a majjor need for catches etc.
But as we move back toward "core golf" developments we will probably see more sheet drainage.
-
This past August, I was struck by a small feature on a MN Ross course.
The problem: The hole is an uphill par 5 with an extremely severe back to front green. The only shot that will really work is to run a shot up the hill onto the putting surface. High spinning shots just rocket back off of the front of the green. By the design, any water placed on the green either mechanically or naturally runs off the front. Which would normally create a surface too soft to allow the required shot.
The Solution: Ross(or his builder) placed a small roll in front of the green. A miniature ditch really that draws the runoff from the green away from the approach. Even though the approach is steep enough to drain naturally, a dry firm area was created that is almost unnoticeable allowing the shot to bump up the hill to the green.
I can't help but think that the modern solution would have been the installation of a french or curtain drain just at the front of the green. A solution that would have worked very well. In time it may fail and require repair. Ross's little swale has been there 80 years.
-
(Tom Doak from Tasmania)
Wayne,
I'm a huge believer in surface drainage. On many of our courses there are no inlets at all. On average, I'd guess there are about two places where we should have put one, to stop so much sheet drainage from going across a particular point in the fairway.
(An example ... Stonewall Two, which has no drains at all ... too much water comes back down the middle of the seventh fairway from the front of the green. We should have put a drain just past the landing area there.)
Pete Dye always said 95% of golf design is making drainage look good. He's fallen into the catch basin trap himself now, but I'm sticking with the old way for as long as I can.
BTW, the project manager at Cape Kidnappers wanted to put in a bunch of catch basins in the fairways on that site. It would have looked awful. I told him we ought to be able to figure out how to get it to surface drain, considering that we had 500 feet of fall to work with!
-
Tom Doak,
Glad to see that the art is still being practiced. Hope things are going well down under. Springtime is upon you, and I imagine it is wonderful down there (although away from home). Any chance to see some recent photos from CK?
FYI: Cubs lead the series 3 games to 2 and the Yankees lead Boston 2 games to 1 and are playing now. Rooting for a Cubs/Sox series!
I am going over to see Stonewall II in a few weeks and will keep my eye on how you solved the problem. I think surface/sheet drainage is a challenge and another way that today's architects and builders can express their talents where it is possible.
I think this is a most informative thread and I appreciate all those that contribute. It really helps to hear from those of you in the business. It also helps to hear from those with a trained eye . I know for one, I am now visiting courses and considering this subject with careful observation.