The talk of how great Yale could be fully restored has me sad and pissed off again.
We have gone over the rape of the front 9 at Yale several times on GCA and our infamous outing of May 2001 witnessed it in person. The back nine work has started and it is MILES better then the front 9 work, however, we have already seen that careful research by George Bahto uncovered photos of #18 that show the newly restored right greenside bunker and green shape and size are clearly not in keeping with the original work. In fact that right greenside bunker on 18 that we saw in my photo was a second attempt. Apparently the first try was nixed by a committee and that sad bunker is the resulting acceptable one.
I have been told that my
“criticisms of the work at Yale tend to
become very directed criticisms of Roger Rulewich. In fact, I sense a very personal attack”.
Isn't he the architect of record? He is being paid for this work at his old school and he will take credit for the work done. Why not the criticism?
I was informed that
“It is not accurate to criticize Roger Rulewich for the shaping of any of the current bunker work. Whether you do it or anyone else does it, it is done in error. If one must criticize, then one must criticize the entire group involved. But recognize that in that group are a number of intelligent people, using their best judgement to reconstruct a wonderful asset.”
This group is composed of nine individuals, not in the business, that oversee Roger’s new work on the back nine. I guess there needs to be nine novice babysitters to oversee the work after what was done to the front 9! I recently went to Essex County CC where George is doing a restoration of 80 bunkers on that course. The difference in attention to detail between Essex and Yale is striking to me.
At Yale they are supposedly going by a 1934 aerial to guide the restoration. There are hundreds of construction photos as well but I don’t know if they are being utilized.
Here is a blowup of the bunker on the eden hole (#15) at Yale from the 1934 aerial. There is clearly a moderate sized “finger” that extends up the right side of the green that creates a “sucker” pin on the front right. Below are two photos of the new restored bunker on #15 at Yale that Roger and the committee of 9 approved this fall. I can see only a tiny finger that hardly extends up to the green. No amount of recovering lost green space can recreate that sucker pin position with the new bunker as constructed. The overall shape of the bunker is different as well. I wonder how many hours of research studying photos and looking for new photos went into this project?
This lack of attention to detail and supposed maintenance and drainage issues are in part why Yale will not be restored to its previous glory. It will be considerably better then it was but it is an opportunity lost.