Has golf architecture progressed or regressed?

[Tony Ristola]

One the whole, in the big scheme of things, has golf architecture progressed or regressed in the past 75 years?

Are the courses more fun?

Architecture more interesting?
Cost effective; affordable?
Is it more formulaic?
Helped or hindered the sporting spirit?
Has mass grading made it more interesting or stale?
Has the marketing end helped or hurt?
Maintenance? Lacking nature or improving nature?
Lots of potential angles to consider.

Progression or regression? As nothing stands still.

[Tom_Doak]

Tony:

I don't know how anyone could measure this.

Today golf architecture is all over the map.  There are so many people doing so many different things that I don't think you could call any trend representative of the whole.  There is some great work being done and there is some crap work being done (despite what several people have said about the standard being much higher now than before, there is still a lot of expensive crap out there).

There was probably a lot of crap in the other "Golden Age" too, but it's all fixed or gone now, so it's hard to give a completely accurate assessment of that era, either.

As for your questions, though, most of them favor the older stuff.  Golf is certainly more formulaic now, less sporting, less natural, and more costly to play.

[John Kavanaugh]

I don't see how anyone can say golf is more expensice now than anytime in the past 75 years....Today golf reaches from the meth heads to the department heads of society.  I don't believe the game has ever been more open to everyone.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Tony,

I would imagine that the answer lies in the question:

Would you prefer to play a pre or post 1960 golf course ?

A classic, "Golden Age" course or a modern one.

Or, put another way, in viewing "Golfweek's top 100 list, would you prefer to play the pre 1960 list or the post 1960 list ?