Is it easier to totally redesign an existing course or design it from scratch ?

[Patrick_Mucci]

Assuming the same piece of property

[Tom_Doak]

It depends what you mean by "easy".

If you just want to go with the flow of the last routing, then it's easy to leave it and just build new greens and bunkers.

If you want to make the routing your own, it's much harder to do with an existing course in place.  Everything that's been done over the years since the original course was built has been done to reinforce the previous routing.  Making a new routing is definitely going against the grain.

I was surprised how well the rerouting of Medinah #1 worked out, honestly.  There are places where the members must struggle to remember how the old holes occupied the same space.  A lot of tree removal was required to make that happen; not every club would give an architect the same latitude there.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Tom,

Does the existing routing, in any way,  predispose the architect in terms of the redesign of an existing course ?

Are topos your best friend and key to creating a new course ?

[Carl Rogers]

Doesn't the cost of demolishing & replacing the sprinkler system becomes a key decision driver of whether to retain the existing routing?

[Tom_Doak]

Doesn't the cost of demolishing & replacing the sprinkler system becomes a key decision driver of whether to retain the existing routing?

Perhaps, but in many cases a total redesign of the course is going to include all new irrigation anyway.  The key decision driver is really whether or not the club is ok with closing the course completely for the renovation.  If not, you can't really change the routing or the greens, which are the two main components of the design.  Most of the rest (bunkers etc) is really just window dressing.

[Tom_Doak]

Tom,

Does the existing routing, in any way,  predispose the architect in terms of the redesign of an existing course ?

Absolutely.  I don't like to see anyone else's ideas for routing a new course until after I've come up with my own, because latching onto a little piece of another plan gets you moving in a certain direction.  So, trying to really start over on routing an existing course is very difficult, you keep getting stuck on the same things the previous architect got stuck on.

[Ed Homsey]

Pat--Thanks for a fascinating topic, and special thanks to Tom for sharing his thoughts.  One question popped into my mind, i.e. does the name and reputation of the previous architect ever become a factor in the rerouting of an existing course?

Some answers were coming to me as I posed this question, e.g. you probably would not be asked to rerout a Donald Ross course, or any architect of similar repute.

Ed

[Mike Nuzzo]

The more people that get in Tom's way the harder it is.
If the members can clearly communicate their wishes and get out of his way it will be much easier than a potential new owner who can't do either.
Cheers

[Jay Mickle]

I recall seeing in an earlier post that the on the Pinehurst property, that was formerly "The Pit", Coore and Crenshaw used very little of the land occupied by the former course for their possible routing for a new course.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Tom Doak,

What happens when you come across a really good hole ?

Is there a temptation to leave it ?

If you do, doesn't that taint or complicate your creative process.

Initially, wouldn't solely using a topo to create your design remove the possibility of being influenced by the existing design ?

[Jeff_Brauer]

Pat,

They run the gamut, of course, but I always felt, for reasons Mike Nuzzo describes, that designing a new course, providing its an owner you have synergy with and the "right" amount of involvement is easier than a redo.

As mentioned, in a remodel, existing tree corridors, irrigation, paths and drainage (if you plan to save some of them) begin to proportionally make it less feasible to re-route an existing course.  It just starts to get more expensive (with clearing, topsoil stripping, shaping, irrigation, paths, seeding/sodding and drainage. You have to question whether the new hole is really worth the 10-25% extra cost to build over rebuilding in place.  It's never a clear black and white decision, but in most cases, the budget factor tends to push you towards keeping most re-routing.

As to topo maps, I use them, of course, but unless there is an unused and heavily wooded portion of the site, in most cases, you can see potential new holes on an existing course without using topo maps.  From time to time, I go to existing courses and wonder how the architect didn't see a certain hole.  Right now, up in MN, I have re-routed three holes from a 3-4-5 sequence of awkward holes to a much better 5-4-3 routing, each with better views of Lake Superior and each fitting the topo better than before.  What's funny is the other holes fit the land so well.  Not sure if Don Herfort was off the day those last three were built, or had some constraints (real or imagined) that kept him from what I consider to be a better routing.  (We did keep most of the basic corridors)

[Patrick_Mucci]

Jeff & Tom,

Interesting stuff and info I hadn't considered.

Did you ever see the before and after at Commonwealth National in Willow Grove, PA ?

[John_Conley]

I recall seeing in an earlier post that the on the Pinehurst property, that was formerly "The Pit", Coore and Crenshaw used very little of the land occupied by the former course for their possible routing for a new course.

I played The Pit about 22 years ago and haven't been back to the area.  Is it gone now?

[Jay Mickle]

The Pit (Dan Maples) closed 3+ years ago and was purchased by Pinehurst a year or so later. Minimal mowing is still done to maintain the hole corridors. In the area. The Carolina (Arnold Palmer) has also closed.  Golfers find other options, I feel for those that have houses on the vacant fairways.

[BCowan]

The Pit (Dan Maples) closed 3+ years ago and was purchased by Pinehurst a year or so later. Minimal mowing is still done to maintain the hole corridors. In the area. The Carolina (Arnold Palmer) has also closed.  Golfers find other options, I feel for those that have houses on the vacant fairways.

Jay,

   I heard the soil which the Pit sat on is contaminated and that the renovation was halted.  Have you heard this too?  I played the Pit about 20 years ago. 

[Jay Mickle]

I have not heard anything about that. The property of about 250 acres( I recall) backs up to residential on one side the Country Club of North Carolina on another, Pinehurst resort property on a third and a small area of office and manufacturing between the existing course and Rt.5. While what you have heard is possible I believe that it is more likely that the resort has not yet committed to going forward with another golf course. They have within the past few months purchased National (Jack Nicklaus) to make Pinehurst #9.

[Stuart Hallett]

From experience, everything boils down to the quality of the original routing, & budget.
Members often find a routing change too radical & endeavor to get rid of you ASAP.
People want change, but a revolution is just too much !

I would therefore say that new builds are much easier. Or as a grow-in Super said to me once, "When the players arrive, I'm out of here !"

[Tom_Doak]

Tom Doak,

What happens when you come across a really good hole ?

Is there a temptation to leave it ?

If you do, doesn't that taint or complicate your creative process.

Initially, wouldn't solely using a topo to create your design remove the possibility of being influenced by the existing design ?

Pat:

The topo maps usually have the tree lines and grassing lines on them, but even if they didn't, the tees and greens of a course that had been "built" in the modern way would stick out like a sore thumb on a topo.

Certainly, if there is a great hole on site, there will be more than a temptation to leave it alone.  That really shouldn't create any more of a challenge than when I find a good hole of my own -- except that there will be a lot more pressure from the client to leave it alone, because he knows where it is.