I think I just might bet my entire life and my entire fortune too on the fact that we will hear from one Patrick Mucci on this subject!  

The pond at the sixteenth is very small, roughly circular and perhaps fifty feet in diameter and a few feet deep at most.

Go...if feasible.

Does it help take water off the course?  If it was found to be non-useful, how is it proposed to be eliminated?  How does it stay filled, or does it?  What say the environmental regulators about filling it or draining it?  Do they require mitigation, if they allow it at all?  

The pond stays filled naturally except in times of drought, when it is augmented with a tap. There are no environmental issues. The area was lined about twelve years ago when Lake Cornelia was lined to prevent seepage. It presently is very natural looking with assorted beasties living there. It is a lateral hazard, very much in play for a pulled approach shot and requiring a drop in deep rough.

The pond has been there for a least twenty four years. An older member told me that it was decided some years before that to create the pond because the area was always marshy and wet, apparently from a undergound spring of some sort.

Because Travis had a big bold bunker (3 b's) that guarded the left side of that green, extending back in the direction of the drive (not too far from the pond). It was a major factor in the strategy of the hole (unlike the pond) and from a strictly artistic point of view, it was aesthetically pleasing--it was perhaps the most stiking bunker on the course (at least one of the most striking).

If I had a say (and I don't), I'd eliminate the pond (if feasible) and re-establish the bunker.

rgkeller,

In viewing the 1936 aerial, there is no pond, only bunkers and sand waste areas.

The entire area around that pond appears bone dry.

I suspect some misguided green committee inserted the pond for reasons known only to them.  Perhaps they liked blind water hazards or were trying to make the golf course tougher.

It should go, primarily to kick off a sincere restoration effort.

What does Tom Doak think about the idea ?

rgkeller,

In viewing the 1936 aerial, there is no pond, only bunkers and sand waste areas.

The entire area around that pond appears bone dry.

I suspect some misguided green committee inserted the pond for reasons known only to them.  Perhaps they liked blind water hazards or were trying to make the golf course tougher.

It should go, primarily to kick off a sincere restoration effort.

What does Tom Doak think about the idea ?

I doubt that DS, JT, and NF lied to me about the water levels in that area preceeding the placement of the pond. I can personally attest to the fact that prior to the lining effort the "pond" would periodically fill and dry into a mudhole depending on the rainfall. Bunkers there would have to employ some sort of draining system.

IMO the sixteenth is a beautiful hole and the pond adds both beauty and a legitimate playing hazard, completely in the context of the course.

You would have to ask Tom Doak about his opinion. While you are at it, ask his opinion about the bunker to the front left of eight (built in the mid 1980's), the mounds to the right of seventeen (added in the late 1980's), the bunkers to the right of seventeen (added in the late 1990's), the fifth green (redone in the early 1990's), and the bunkers behind and to the right of the ninth green (added in the late 90's and early 00's.)

None of these additions restored a thing.

And why, in your opinion, did GCGC reach its architectual pinnacle in 1936?

Such a viewpoint, then, eliminates any improvements that were made to the course in the years since 1936.

Restoration for the sake of restoration is insanity.

Any attempt to replicate the bunkers to the left of sixteen will prove to be impossible (there is a reason that the remaining left bunker was shallowed out) and, would in any case make the hole worse - not better.

God save us all from fanatics of all kinds, restoration fanatics included.

In simple words Pat - is it possible that some of the changes at GCGC made after 1936 were for the better?

If your answer is yes - then why would you painstakingly restore the course according to the 1936 aerial and lose some of the later changes which improved the architecture of a course?

If your answer is no - then that's your opinion and I'd accept that.....

rgkeller,

Could you cite those improvements ?

Take a look at the 1936 aerial and hole # 14 and tell me if you think the current hole is an improvement.

Take a look at the 12th hole and tell me if you think the current version is an improvement ?

Take a look at the 7th hole and tell me if the current version is an improvement ?

One has to ask the question, to what architect should GCGC be true ?

Emmett
Travis
Jones
Various green committees
Doak
Future architects

I think there can be but one answer.
Emmett/Travis

And then, what year ?

1936 seems logical, and is easily documented.

Lengthening can be accomodated, as many early architects built in elasticity in their designs.

A great example of restoration efforts and results can be found just a few miles east, at NGLA.

GCGC should follow their example, and not fall victim to the idea of design and archiecture by referendum.

The present twelfth is a mess and should be restored.

The seventh can be largely fixed if someone would make the greenskeeper mow the fairway properly and move it to the right after the cut.

The present fourteenth is at least the third version. It has finally become presentable although, for some reason, it was designed with a series of small pot bunkers and mounds that appear near no other green on the course.

The present ninth is a mess because a series of superintendents, green committees and architects kept adding things to the hole and now we have a huge green surrounded by superfluous and poorly conceived bunkers.

The latest, and I believe the fourth, attempt at the fifth hole leaves us with an iron/iron hole with an indistinguished green that has settled in spots - just as the green it replaced did.

The eighteenth green is much smaller than it once was, the deep bunker in front was once well into the green on both sides. And Lake Cornelia was much much higher and very near the front of the green.

The Sixteenth, however, remains an excellent hole, perfectly suited to the land and engulfing the low and wet spot into a small and effective hazard. A big improvement indeed.

GCGC should be faithful to Walter Travis' influence and vision. He believed that poor shots should be penalized. Nothing on the present sixteenth violates anything Travis ever did.

The pond at sixteen.

The second bunker to the right of sixth fairway.

The third bunker to the left of sixteenth fairway.

Additional length at eight, six, fifteen, and three.

The irrigation system.