[Andrew Carr]

Sad day for a historic Long Island Club.  I hope the 2 or 20 will be replicated somewhere.

http://www.newsday.com/business/engineers-country-club-votes-for-sale-to-rxr-realty-1.14279786

[Joe Bausch]

This link doesn't require a subscription:

https://www.longislandpress.com/2017/09/26/engineers-country-club-in-roslyn-harbor-oks-sale-to-rxr/

[Mike Sweeney]

I am a big fan of this Herbert Strong course, and this is a "wake up call". Here is a very good review from Ran from the "old days":


http://golfclubatlas.com/courses-by-country/usa/engineers-country-club/


Now this is a really good course, in a really populated area, in a really prosperous area. Trust me, they are not growing any additional land on Long Island.

[Cob Carlson]

I played this course for the first time 4 weeks ago. I was blown away by how great a track it was. Wonderful short par fours, the '2' or '20' par three, the spectacular green complexes, and the challenging long par fours. Open fronts to greens, perfect bunkers, elevation changes, and natural contours on every hole. It is a special routing and I can't gush enough.


SO MUCH FUN TO PLAY!



Disappointed that the young gun who was interested in turning the place into a PURE golf club got turned away by the membership. And I hope that the chosen developer only builds on fringes of the current course layout.


Engineers is a CLASSIC BEAUTY!!!

[Tom_Doak]

The article linked by Joe says that the real estate company plans to keep the club open.


I don't know where they plan to get any commercial real estate to develop on the margins of the course; perhaps they just mean that they will keep it open while they are exploring re-zoning.  It would take them at least five years to get zoning to do a major development on that land, according to friends in the area.


Engineers is a fascinating course.  I would be more judicious about calling it a "great" course as some of the holes are really funky in a difficult way, but there is certainly a lot of great stuff out there.  I know when they were interviewing consultants 10-20 years ago they were struggling over whether to neuter some of the wilder greens, and they did do some of that, which I don't think helped the cause.  But the sporty nature of the course was not marketed well to find members who would embrace it, and many of the locals did not embrace it for what it was.  I've seen a couple of other courses in the Met area that would fit the same description, and those clubs are probably shifting uncomfortably in their chairs today.

[jeffwarne]

As long as.....
 great courses like Engineers are continually maligned by better players wanting level lies and "it all out in front"
or members demand /course managers deliver super fast greens that neuter the playability, design, and use of interesting pins
(and no, softening the slope and creating flat tiers does NOT creat the same challenge)


As bad as the dark ages were in building bad stuff and maiming classics,
the alarming rate that great old courses are being green complex neutered and reduced to pitch and putts by better players,(despite the naive comments by those who don't recognize it or have the same luxury)
coupled with the decisions of our governing bodies,
puts us right in our own version of the dark ages-despite all the enlightenment provided by the current wave of architects and critics.


Played Cold Spring yesterday-another unheralded wonderful classic MET course that even the members don't appreciate-it was slated to be routed backwards by Jack Nicklaus (because he's such a creative genius) in a total redo that has thankfully been shelved.
Meanwhile the club may fold as it's in a competitve market and has alienated many with the now scrapped plan.




Two years ago I met a couple of Engineers members out on the course that had no idea how great their course was, and were apologizing for all its quirks/"design flaws" etc. When good players are constantly maligning your course and continually suggesting homogonized changes, I guess you begin to believe it....and make a lot of unfortunate choices

[Tom_Doak]

Two years ago I met a couple of Engineers members out on the course that had no idea how great their course was, and were apologizing for all its quirks/"design flaws" etc. When good players are constantly maligning your course and continually suggesting homogonized changes, I guess you begin to believe it....and make a lot of unfortunate choices

It's not just the good players ... it's also the management company types [well, some of whom are good players] who keep telling you that you have to make changes and homogenize the course because you can't afford to lose customers to quirky design.  In other words ... the conventional wisdom peddlers.

[BCowan]

This course was high on my list. Jeff aren't u getting the perspective of top tier Engineer members?  I would wager site unseen the clubhouse and membership model did them in as in 60 year Olds in charge trying to maintain a 1950s CC model. 


Sweeney,


It's the same unlogic response I got about Lulu, which I went and researched their population increasing and their average income and I think population size as the burb I grew up in Toledo.  We have 2 privates in the burb I grew up at, one with $575 month dues and other with $340 a month dues. Which one has all the debt??

[Joe Bausch]

I was fortunate to play Engineers recently (with Matt Frey) with the assist of a fellow golf architecture enthusiast.  I was made aware of the vote to sell a few weeks back and hence really wanted to see the place before any further changes are made.  [Note, I started a thread on Engineers as it was in 1920 before the US Am with hole diagrams I dug up from the Fulton History site:  http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,44016]

I loved my day at Engineers.  Even with a few greens that have been softened, it is so much fun.  Yet a particular experience I had there on the sixth green that I found outstanding might cause most other golfers to curse:  my approach shot to a middle left pin was pin high right and maybe 40 feet away.  A big breaking putt that needed to go very high and far enough to stay in a flatter area by the hole... by the time my putt was finished rolling, I had 60 yard wedge as my 4th shot!

The 2 or 20 hole (the par 3 14th) is neat b/c you get a decent look at the green while on the 2nd green.  I made a par on it.  So I was closer to a 2 than 20.  Yet my 3 came with zero putts.  Not something you do every day!

Lighting was pretty good for most of the round on this very photogenic layout:

http://www.myphillygolf.com/uploads/bausch/Engineers/index.html

[Carl Nichols]

I was fortunate to play Engineers recently (with Matt Frey) with the assist of a fellow golf architecture enthusiast.  I was made aware of the vote to sell a few weeks back and hence really wanted to see the place before any further changes are made.  [Note, I started a thread on Engineers as it was in 1920 before the US Am with hole diagrams I dug up from the Fulton History site:  http://www.golfclubatlas.com/forum/index.php/topic,44016]

I loved my day at Engineers.  Even with a few greens that have been softened, it is so much fun.  Yet a particular experience I had there on the sixth green that I found outstanding might cause most other golfers to curse:  my approach shot to a middle left pin was pin high right and maybe 40 feet away.  A big breaking putt that needed to go very high and far enough to stay in a flatter area by the hole... by the time my putt was finished rolling, I had 60 yard wedge as my 4th shot!

The 2 or 20 hole (the par 3 14th) is neat b/c you get a decent look at the green while on the 2nd green.  I made a par on it.  So I was closer to a 2 than 20.  Yet my 3 came with zero putts.  Not something you do every day!

Lighting was pretty good for most of the round on this very photogenic layout:

http://www.myphillygolf.com/uploads/bausch/Engineers/index.html

Looks like a perfect members' course

[Josh Tarble]

Maybe the equity members were tired of people complaining about the course and decided to cash out?  If it's close to the acreage price of the other clubs mentioned in the article, each equity member made out with a very nice payout.  Nice enough to pay initiation at nearly any other club in the MET area I'm sure.

[Adrian_Stiff]

One of the worst websites for a golf course I have seen and will be a contributor to the downfall.


It is basically telling you nothing.

[SB]

The club failed for a variety of reasons, none of which were the website or the slope of the greens.  This will not be the last club to fail in that area - one nearby is likely going to sell (or already did sell) to a for-profit group, and there are another 2-3 that are living on the edge.  Now that real estate is booming again and land is hard to find, I think we'll see a lot more clubs like this sold since the land is so valuable.  It beats getting hit with assessments every year. 


That said, a club recently turned down a reported $200 million offer, but they were healthy and didn't need to sell.  Most clubs would jump at that offer regardless of how healthy they were.

[SteveOgulukian]

The plan right now is to build on top of holes 12 and 13 and reroute the course.  That's still a couple of years away however and I'm sure plans will change.

[Mike Hendren]

Great Tour Joe B - as always. 

Give me Engineers, and you can keep Sand Valley and Erin Hills.

Bogey

[Joe Bausch]

Great Tour Joe B - as always. 

Give me Engineers, and you can keep Sand Valley and Erin Hills.

Bogey

Thanks, Bogey.

Engineers is an eagle.

 

A really special golf course could be lost based upon the sale.  I hope somehow this thread and my photo album might change the course of what seems to be the inevitable.

[BCowan]

I played this course for the first time 4 weeks ago. I was blown away by how great a track it was. Wonderful short par fours, the '2' or '20' par three, the spectacular green complexes, and the challenging long par fours. Open fronts to greens, perfect bunkers, elevation changes, and natural contours on every hole. It is a special routing and I can't gush enough.


SO MUCH FUN TO PLAY!



Disappointed that the young gun who was interested in turning the place into a PURE golf club got turned away by the membership. And I hope that the chosen developer only builds on fringes of the current course layout.


Engineers is a CLASSIC BEAUTY!!!

Cob,


I was hoping you could expand on this?  So there was a young guy who wanted to purchase it and turn it into a golf club?  Reading this makes me think of the father of grunge, "how many more". 


It really irritates me the hard work and sacrifices made by the founding generation in the Golden age to see pissed away by modern yuppies trying to cash out. I'm pro free markets but also pro good Stewart's of what one inherits and for voluntary quest for community. 

[Don Mahaffey]

Two years ago I met a couple of Engineers members out on the course that had no idea how great their course was, and were apologizing for all its quirks/"design flaws" etc. When good players are constantly maligning your course and continually suggesting homogonized changes, I guess you begin to believe it....and make a lot of unfortunate choices

It's not just the good players ... it's also the management company types [well, some of whom are good players] who keep telling you that you have to make changes and homogenize the course because you can't afford to lose customers to quirky design.  In other words ... the conventional wisdom peddlers.

conventional wisdom peddlers...how's that working out?
t

[John Kirk]

conventional wisdom peddlers...how's that working out?
t

Couldn't help chiming in from the cheap seats.

The conventional wisdom peddlers are not only winning; I think they already won.  In fact, they dictated what became conventional wisdom.

I played Engineers about ten years ago.  A great day of golf at a nice country club with a pool, tennis courts and understated clubhouse with nice locker rooms.

[Don Mahaffey]

John,
Of course they've won, but at what cost to the game?

[John Kirk]

All I have is a predictable response.  The "cost" was immense to both the game of golf, and that part of the golf construction industry that valued developmental and operational efficiency over profitable complexity.  It's a systemic problem that poisoned both private industry and governmental function.

The practitioners of efficient golf design should now emerge as dominant.  I say the history books will look back at the past fifty or so years of the Industrial Age with disdain, arguing that the "conventional wisdom" of the day was wasteful and short-sighted.

[John Kirk]

If there's anything I excel at, it's killing a thread.

[Cob Carlson]

Ben: My host at Engineers asked me to keep things anonymous, but basically a young man who had made some serious money on Wall Street had a proposal in front of the club to fill in the pool, get rid of the tennis courts, expand the driving range, and lower annual dues by $5000 per member, and turn Engineers into a GOLF CLUB.


Big $$$ won out.

[Carl Nichols]

Ben: My host at Engineers asked me to keep things anonymous, but basically a young man who had made some serious money on Wall Street had a proposal in front of the club to fill in the pool, get rid of the tennis courts, expand the driving range, and lower annual dues by $5000 per member, and turn Engineers into a GOLF CLUB.


Big $$$ won out.

That seems unrealistic, unless the monthly dues are incredibly high. 

[Steve_ Shaffer]

Carl,


This is New York City. I would think that 20K/year is not unrealistic so a drop of 5K would be nice but not a deal maker for an equity member who wants to cash out.

[Tags:]

Tags:

[Tags:]

Tags:

Call to undefined function theme_linktree()