I was a public course rat playing a lot of golf for 30 years prior to making the transition to a club. I played many good-enough and plenty not good enough courses along with the treats sprinkled in every year. We may pooh-pooh the focus on conditioning and turf quality here, but the primary thing separating the average course and something that is thought to be better is the conditioning. In many ways conditioning is seen as a signaling device for a course that is deemed worthy of being taken care of.
I grew up at Bethlehem Municipal in Pennsylvania. It is a William and David Gordon course built roughly contemporaneously with Saucon Grace, Weyhill and the third nine at Bethlehem Steel Club, now called Silver Creek. Admittedly the muni was not on land that was as interesting as the Saucon courses, but it was not awful. I started playing there in 1980 and since then the deterioration in the architectural interest due to maintenance practices and cost saving rebuilds of the bunkering is very sad. If the course had been maintained in a fashion that was anywhere close to the others the gap in the quality of the courses, architecturally or in how the architectural features still on the ground actually played, would not be nearly as great. As it currently stands there are few reasons to discuss the muni but this was not always the case. I am sure that there were many courses that were above the "good enough" level when built that no longer are there. I am also sure that there are many courses that are moderately to highly regarded that if maintained for 50 years, or even 10, like a muni would no longer be thought of as worthy of discussion.