The "Safety" factor might be the worst!

[redanman]

Back to this thread finally and I have to agree with Mark, Mike that the blind shots pose the biggest obstacles to safety at Lehigh.   How Flynn used the blindness one would not often expect to get hit too hard if you did get hit.

However, build those holes on that stream today?  With the impact on the nesting habit of the speckled liberal dodo bird?  I don't think they would do it that way now.

Another LCC safety concern for John and Jane Blow would be the steepness of the hill for those in carts with a few brewskies in them.  Ah to add a visual!

And as to Architects and their "Honorable Paul Turner Bloody Christmas Trees, Hell!" memorable  plantings, I was told by the staff that the need was determined by their insuror, i.e. their liability rates would be lower if trees were planted.  So that sounds like a reasonably sound business plan even if an awful architectural one. (Unfortunately, I think we see those terribly unfortunate spruce and other conifers scraping the ground inappropriately on courses in the name of safety and liability. Personally- .)

Brad, if I may add a story to Tom Doak's upcoming response to your question about Merion's safety issues, (boundary proximities are the problem).....as I was told by an older member.....When Yul Brynner was to be in Philadelphia for a week's run of the King and I role that he so dominated, he asked a relator (Perhaps even Tom Paul) to secure for him a quiet country house on a golf course.   They put him up in  a house over on the East side of Merion-The week of the Open!  

Housing on seven eight and nine are all on the power fade side.  Tightly on the power fade side, especially seven.

[ForkaB]

redanman

Great tyop.

I can just see that old business card:


Tom Paul, Relator

"Have Property, Will tell you all you ever wanted to know about Maintenance Meld....."

[Paul_Turner]

I'm surprised at the Merion in England/Oz quote from Tom Doak.  

We have many courses on common land where the golf is shared with the general public (walkers etc);and you can't get much more "dangerous" than that.  So perhaps Moortown is an exception?  I'd need more examples.

PS

At The Architects a lot of the Xmas trees appeared to be planted on high mounds which were there for safety already?  i.e. on the 10th.

[TEPaul]

Brad Miller:

The danger areas of Merion are very much all along the right side of hole #2--it's within feet of Ardmore Ave on the right, a very well traveled road these days. Even some of the touring pros in the 1981 Open pumped some drives and second shots out onto Ardmore Ave.

The other two danger holes are #14 and particularly #15 as a golfer can easily hook a ball onto Golf House Rd, a less traveled road. Particularly #15--a long driver could hit one down the left side and right onto the road.

However, as I mentioned a few years ago about this danger issue at Merion, the club obviously has a very sophisticated insurance policy on the one hand, and for very dire accidents (like balls thru windshields and serious injuries to motorists) they have a maintenance crew that can have that car(s) (with people inside) down at the maintenance area and compacted into something the size of a very small suitcase and on it's way to deep burial at the Knickerbocker sanitary landfill, all inside of seven minutes!

[Todd_Eckenrode]

I would agree safety is more limiting in producing great golf.  Environmental restrictions are constraints, but also provide opportunities for hazards and interest if done properly.  Certainly this doesn't apply to every case, but many it does.  Safety "standards" are extremely limiting to creativity with effects mentioned of straightening of hole patterns, longer distances between holes (though I agree this is one area that's been overdone with safety concerns), and greater space between holes running parallel.  In the end, a more "standard" level of design is produced often with little quirk.  Not to mention what all that extra space does to budgets if not designed on land that's perfectly suited to golf.  If significant grading is required in surrounding areas, or the native landscape is unappealing, these "dead areas" are costly to design and maintain.  It's a bit of a vicious circle at times.

Re. the propeller reference earlier.  Another good ex. is the finishing 3 at The Valley Club.  All par 4 dogleg lefts, with the turnpoints arranged in the middle.  Works very well there, as 3 distinct holes of charachter.

[Mark_Fine]

Safety is not a very inspiring topic when it comes to golf course architecture and surely one we don't really care to discuss.  But unfortunately it is one that must be understood.  It is probably more significant than many of us realize in how it affects and constrains creative golf course design.  I see many new courses around the country and often wonder "why the architect choose to do what he did"?  Many times the answer to that question is safety related and the architect had little or no choice.  

[Tom Doak]

Re:  Merion, if you built it today, with the published safety guidelines that Jeff Brauer refers to, you would have to throw out holes 2, 7, 8, and possibly 14 and 15 for being too close to the property lines.

Re:  Moortown, Paul, I don't know why the standard is different.  When the course was built originally, the old par-3 12th and the par-4 17th were built right up against the property lines, but there were other golf courses (Moor Allerton and Sand Moor) across the fence.  Those golf courses sold out to housing estates and moved, and the new homeowners demanded changes.  I've been told that in these sorts of disputes in England or Australia, the golf course has no chance -- it's creating the danger so it has to make the change, no matter how long it's been there.

[Steve Lang]

Let's not forget the infrastructure related..  

Aren't those cart bridges over waters and such, with more than 4 foot falls/elevation over their edges and having only 6-8 inch high curbs illegal under OSHA standards for the workers at a course,.. never mind the person who might take their cart over the edge some day and sue!