If the local sand that you can get for a reasonable cost doesn’t meet spec, why not adjust your design to the sand rather then spend huge amounts importing material to fit design?
Water quality is one local input that often impacts grassing and irrigation decisions, but should it also impact design decisions? Poor water quality usually means high salts that can build up in the soil. Because of this great surface drainage is a must as any areas that pool or drain slow will result in turf loss. Yet I continue to see courses in the south built with large water shed areas and long distances for water to flow before it gets into a pipe or off the grass. What not break up the ground a little more and instead of installing large drains, use a network of smaller drains so the water doesn’t have to travel so far?
Solving the problem of using local low cost materials that don’t quite measure up is one of the interesting challenges of golf design, or at least I think it should be. How much of golden age design was driven by function more then golf, and what are some of the ways we can build fun golf courses while working with what we have?
Don:
I never saw this thread; it must have passed off page one pretty quickly.
The answer to your question is that most architects don't consider such changes because
(a) Things like soil specs and water quality are not really our forte; and/or
(b) It's easier just to go with the status quo and tell the client it's worth it to pay for the highest quality materials and drainage &c.
I have tried to be more thoughtful and adaptable on some past projects, but it's hard work. You open yourself up to liability when you spec something that's different than the norm. You also have to find an owner and a superintendent who are on the same page, and that's pretty hard to do sometimes, especially since the superintendent is often not on board when the specs are written.
Also, it's not as easy to budget a new spec as opposed to the "same old, same old", and there is potential for cost overruns -- even though the "overrun" may still be significantly less expensive than the conventional approach! We've done "native soil greens" on a couple of courses where the superintendent got cold feet late in the game and wanted to screen all the material because of debris from clearing .. that's a tough change to make at the 11th hour.
Heck, I've had problems just trying to write a grassing spec that's perceived as "different", just because I know that if the superintendent doesn't believe in it, he can easily prove it was the wrong decision, to everyone's detriment.
You are asking great questions here, but what you're really saying is that projects should get people with practical knowledge on board right at the beginning, instead of waiting until it's too late. I've managed to do that sometimes
but it's not always so easy.