BCC- before and afters

[J_McKenzie]

The "amazing greens" thread prompted me to post these before and after's from Brunswick Country Club.  Incredible greens and green complexes considering the land is basically dead flat.  Incredible variety and challenge with pin locations.

Hole #2, before


Hole #2, after


Hole #8, before


Hole #8, after


Hole #8, Ross Sketch


Hole #16, before


Hole #16, after

[Norbert P]

 Very cool.  Is the 8th a Biarrrritz?

The buildings behind #2 are gone.  New hole in its place?

Did this cost 10 million dollars?  (Referencing another thread )

[J_McKenzie]

The eigth green is actually three tiers, four if you count the fairway entry, that are all elevated a foot.  You can see the green profile if you look at Ross' sketch, Section A-A.  The missing buildings are the old cart barns that have been moved to a different location.  That area is to the left of #10 tees which are barely visible in the after photograph.  Hopefully, nothing will be put back in that space.

This construction work was performed over a 10 month period by a crew of one shaper and three laborers under the supervision of Scot Drader, who also helped with some excavator and dozer operation.  The superintendent and three or four of his guys helped throughout, while still maintaining certain aspects of the golf course.  Even the Director of Golf and the club president and vice president contributed a major amount of manual labor.  Total cost for this project, including new cart barn, new maintenance building, and fairly substantial irrigation work- less than $2 million.  It was an impressive effort with great results.

[Norbert P]

  Thanks, and yes, I missed the A-A cross section.  Very interesting work and what a huge difference in interest. Donald Ross would be proud.  In his sketch, he draws a line in the back right corner with a "?"  .  What do you suppose he meant by that notation?  Is that a pinable area?

[J_McKenzie]

The arrow is actually from notes taken recently.  Nobody was sure what the dotted square that the arrow points to represented, but we determined it was to define the original sand green that Ross designed over.

John

[Sean_A]

John

The few pix you posted are tantalizing except for those dreaded cart paths!  Can you post more pix?

Ciao

[Patrick_Mucci]

J MacKenzie,

Photos # 3 and # 4 appear to be vastly different.

Photo # 3 shows a very small green, almost a temporary, judging by the distance between the two pine trees behind each photo.

Was the photo that appears below the regular green or a temporary ?



Were any of these photos doctored ?

The photo of # 8 green below seems to indicate that it's at least four (4) times the size of the 8th green as it appears above.



If the green was built as reflected in the sketch, how did it shrink to such liliputian proportions

[Tyler Kearns]

The arrow is actually from notes taken recently.  Nobody was sure what the dotted square that the arrow points to represented, but we determined it was to define the original sand green that Ross designed over.

John,

We are presently in the planning stages of a restorative-based project at Ross' Pine Ridge GC. There, Ross inherited a Thomas Bendelow design, and did keep most of those greens as part of his extensive renovation, focusing his work mostly on bunkering. On the half-dozen greens he designed, his hole-by-hole plans show plenty of detail, however, like you noted, when Bendelow's green was incorporated, a dashed square represented the existing green.

TK

[J_McKenzie]

Sean,

It's interesting that you mentioned the cart paths because that was one of the more dramatic changes made to the course.  BCC had almost wall to wall concrete slab paths that were in bad spots, poorly installed, and barely wide enough for a cart to stay on.  We saved enough money in other budget categories to be able to remove those paths and replace them with a native sand material primarily in the area around the tees and greens.  We were able to do this by drastically  improving the course drainage system- we excavated and cleaned up the existing drainage ditches and lakes, plus installed sub-surface drainage in a few select areas.  This has been one of the members favorite changes and they are not nearly as intrusive as the photo makes them appear.  I will try to post additional photos later.

Patrick,

Believe it or not, photo #3 is the green we were playing prior to the renovation.  The photos are not doctored, but the 'before' pictures tend to be taken from a closer range than the 'after' pictures (you can use the power pole in the background as a reference point).  

These greens had not been touched since they were originally built in 1938-1939 and had shrunk to almost half of their original size, plus the putting surfaces were literally 8-14 inches higher in grade.  This was the result of 68 years of regular maintenance- topdressing and mowing.  Notice how rounded the bunkers had become as well.........

[Sean_A]

Sean,

It's interesting that you mentioned the cart paths because that was one of the more dramatic changes made to the course.  BCC had almost wall to wall concrete slab paths that were in bad spots, poorly installed, and barely wide enough for a cart to stay on.  We saved enough money in other budget categories to be able to remove those paths and replace them with a native sand material primarily in the area around the tees and greens.  We were able to do this by drastically  improving the course drainage system- we excavated and cleaned up the existing drainage ditches and lakes, plus installed sub-surface drainage in a few select areas.  This has been one of the members favorite changes and they are not nearly as intrusive as the photo makes them appear.  I will try to post additional photos later.

Patrick,

Believe it or not, photo #3 is the green we were playing prior to the renovation.  The photos are not doctored, but the 'before' pictures tend to be taken from a closer range than the 'after' pictures (you can use the power pole in the background as a reference point).  

These greens had not been touched since they were originally built in 1938-1939 and had shrunk to almost half of their original size, plus the putting surfaces were literally 8-14 inches higher in grade.  This was the result of 68 years of regular maintenance- topdressing and mowing.  Notice how rounded the bunkers had become as well.........

John

I see what you mean about the paths.  It looks like the one skirting through the trees wouldn't be visible from the fairway.  Still, I would rather see the paths more integrated into the landscape, perhaps roughed up a bit so they are an integral part of the course.  Perhaps they take a neat & tidy look (which I really like under the trees) one step too far.  I look forward to more pix.

Ciao

[J_McKenzie]

Sean,

The paths are brand new and will be maintained to become more rugged looking as time goes by.  Here are a few more images from the front nine:

Hole #6, before


Hole #6, after


Hole #7, before


Hole #7, after


Hole #9, before


Hole #9, after

[Patrick_Mucci]

J MacKenzie,

Those are amazing photos.

They show how insidious green shrinkage can be.

Ever so slight each year, hardly noticable, but eventually, the green is a fraction of its former self, until someone produces an old photo that has a sobering effect.

The recapturing of the original intent is spectacular in comparison.

I would imagine that the membership is ecstatic.

What prompted the restoration ?

[Andrew Bertram]

Very impressive renovation.

The members must be so impressed with the change from uninspiring greens that have slowly diminished over the years to some very good green structures with a variety of hole positions and challenges.

Who did the design work, was it in house at the club?

[Mike Tanner]

Thanks for posting the pix. Did the project managers have  documentation of all the original greens like the sketch of no. 8 you included?

[J_McKenzie]

Patrick,

The main reason for the renovation was agronomic.  The bermuda grass on the greens was well over thirty years old and had mutated to the point that every green had different maintenance needs- there was no consistency.  Each year the transition from winter overseed to summer grass was taking longer and with poorer results.  The small size of the greens posed numerous problems, plus the green's subsurfaces were still the original push-up soil from the late 1930's and it was basically used up from a fertility standpoint.

Andrew,

Love Golf Design (Davis & Mark Love, Paul Cowley, Bob Spence) performed the renovation and managed the construction through our construction superintendent- Scot Drader.  Mark was on site for the day to day work.

Mike,

We did have sketches for all 18 greens plus his original notes for general construction.

John
 

[Patrick_Mucci]

J MacKenzie,

That's interesting.

What grasses did you settle on for the greens, fairways and tees ?