Leaving Well Enough Alone

[Tom_Doak]

The thread about Royal Dornoch goes on for seven pages and counting, but a lot of it really seems to be fighting between


(a)  people who don't see why the club couldn't leave well enough alone, and
(b)  people who believe even the best design can be improved upon.




In the hundreds and hundreds of threads we've had on Golf Club Atlas about restoration of golf courses, the topic of preservation lies in abstract.  Everyone here seems to be in favor of restoring great old courses, but most of them wouldn't need any restoring if they hadn't planted trees when everyone else did, or hadn't let Mr. Jones build his new tees, or hadn't let the green chairman tinker with the bunkering.  In short, they might have been fine, had the members been content to Leave Well Enough Alone.




Everything in design is a matter of opinion, so there is no real way to prove one's case here, whichever side you are on.  The one fact of the matter is that Leaving Well Enough Alone comes without cost and without risk, while redesigning a course comes with exchanges of money.  As a wise man once told Woodward and Bernstein, follow the money, and you'll understand the story better.


It is possible to IMPROVE a course by changing it, but it is also possible [though much less discussed, because no one is selling that point of view] to SPOIL a course by changing it.  There are plenty of examples of each, that many of us would probably agree with, even though it's all subjective.


To illustrate, let's each name an example on each side of the coin.


My input:


IMPROVED:  Rye, England
SPOILED:  Wentworth (West)

[Jeff Schley]

Improved: Scottsdale NationalSpoiled: Cog Hill

[Tommy Williamsen]

One I've played off the top of my head.

Improved: Philly Cricket. Tree removal was phenomenal.

[SL_Solow]

Tommy,  Per Tom Doak's original proposition, you could also list Philly Cricket as having been spoiled by tree planting.  Therein lies a significant portion of the rub; what should a club do when faced with the result of improvident changes.  Some, like Bob O Linc, try through the  restoration route returning to old plans and photos where available to replicate what was there.  Others where changes constituted more than unfortunate plantings go the "sympathetic restoration " route which seeks to make changes deemed to be consistent with the initial style and/or intent of the architecture without replication.  Still others redesign.

[Buck Wolter]

Would Royal County Down be the nearest comparison? It can't be often you get one new hole on a course of that pedigree, you don't hear much good or bad anymore about that hole -- I guess that's a good sign.

[Peter Pallotta]

A question: is there any reason to believe that today's architects and club committees are any wiser or more well-intentioned than yesterday's architects & club committees?
I don't think so, but of course I could be wrong.

[Adam should've left well enough alone the first time Eve called him over to try this new fruit she'd just heard about. It's been downhill ever since -- but just think of all the money that's been made that otherwise wouldn't have!]

[V. Kmetz]

In the hundreds and hundreds of threads we've had on Golf Club Atlas about restoration of golf courses, the topic of preservation lies in abstract.  Everyone here seems to be in favor of restoring great old courses, but most of them wouldn't need any restoring if they hadn't planted trees when everyone else did, or hadn't let Mr. Jones build his new tees, or hadn't let the green chairman tinker with the bunkering.  In short, they might have been fine, had the members been content to Leave Well Enough Alone.

Everything in design is a matter of opinion, so there is no real way to prove one's case here, whichever side you are on.  The one fact of the matter is that Leaving Well Enough Alone comes without cost and without risk, while redesigning a course comes with exchanges of money.  As a wise man once told Woodward and Bernstein, follow the money, and you'll understand the story better.

TD, I understand and generally agree with the premise and it takes more than one person to alter an established course, but when I follow that money and regard those changes isn't there a ASGCA member and his familiars guiding and profiting from the work?  I mean the tinkering prez/golf/green/ chair commissions, but the GCA accepts.  I've never, not once, seen a GCA come onto property and say "Things are pretty good, you don;t need much... a bunch of trees and some drainage and you're all set." No, it's all "master plan" and "Phased" construction and aspects that will now require the environmental consultant to be hired for thousands... there's a guy who is the advising architect for the course that's nearest and dearest to my heart and he's never so much as seen a picture of the place before the millennium.


What say you?

[SL_Solow]

Vinny,  lots of changes made by committees without architectural input.  In particular, a tremendous amount of tree planting to narrow corridors while making the course harder and "prettier" .  I can't count on the fingers of both hands the number of courses in the Chicago area alone that were impacted by this trend.

[MClutterbuck]

Tom,


Mostly agree, but...


How many times have you made changes to your courses? Of those, have you ever agreed that the changes made sense? Was the final result better? What about other great architects?


Now what if you had decided to retire and pursue other interests. Would those same proposed changes still make sense? Is there anyone alive that can work on them instead of you and do it right?


Are all architects perfect in their design from day one, so that nothing is learned in regular member play that would make certain changes positive?


Can membership composition be different to first intended, or may the course be changed from majority membership play to daily green fee play and therefore warranting changes?


I am not a fan of changes. I am also not a fan of no changes ever. A prudent approach is always best, but hard to set a hard rule...

[Sean_A]

I am sure there are countless courses like Rye which were improved from primitive origins...Dornoch being an obvious case in point. Although, I am just as sure that on those same courses cool elements were lost in the name of improvement.

I spose the elephant in the room for spoiled courses not due to war or some other catastrophic event is ANGC. Although, on a far more personal level I will say Huntercombe.

Ciao

[V. Kmetz]

Vinny,  lots of changes made by committees without architectural input.  In particular, a tremendous amount of tree planting to narrow corridors while making the course harder and "prettier" .  I can't count on the fingers of both hands the number of courses in the Chicago area alone that were impacted by this trend.

I definitely understand, but it does beg the other question(s) I was going to ask TD


Under what authority is tree planting/removal  (which can be put in and/or removed easily) a GCA's job that only an expert can direct?
How is an additional teeing area or five really a despoilment of the course? It may be a waste of money and might be subjectively undesirable, but how is Ross or Mackenzie weeping?


To me, an architect's expertise is needed/heeded/rejected when it comes to


1. subsurface infrastructure
2. bunker/hazard location and construction
3. greens
4. grasses


I don't think I will ever understand the mowing lines/GCA of trees/multiple tees are good/bad debates.

[John Emerson]

A question: is there any reason to believe that today's architects and club committees are any wiser or more well-intentioned than yesterday's architects & club committees?
I don't think so, but of course I could be wrong.

[Adam should've left well enough alone the first time Eve called him over to try this new fruit she'd just heard about. It's been downhill ever since -- but just think of all the money that's been made that otherwise wouldn't have!]

To think we haven’t evolved since the early part of the 20th century is a bit ludicrous.  Look how far medicine has come as an example.  There are luxuries that gca’s of today have that many of the day didn’t.  Google being the biggest.

[Peter Pallotta]

John -
in decades long past clubs hired architects to make their courses better, and decades later clubs hired architects to *undo* the changes that actually (they'd come to believe) made their courses worse. What evidence/rationale is there that suggests this *isn't* a 'perennial pattern', ie that *now*, this time, we'll get it 'right'?

[Mark_Fine]

Tom,
This is a great topic but obviously a controversial one.  It has been discussed here before. 


Did anyone ever see what happens to a golf course if it is left to go fallow?  After several months some might not even recognize it as a golf course anymore.  Courses are constantly changes simply due to mother nature and maintenance practices.  It is really hard to think that any course could ever be kept "the same" for very long.  Trees grow and die.  Bunkers change shape (some of the new wild ones even collapse).  Floods cause stream banks/beds to be altered.  This list goes on.  Some golden age architects didn't even finish bunkering their courses until several years after seeing how they were played. So what do you leave well enough alone?? 


Golf courses are not paintings or static pieces of art.  They are constantly evolving.  Many of the golden age architects were smart enough to build elasticity into their designs knowing they were going to need to be altered in the future as the game evolved.  This mostly meant adding length but it sometimes meant other changes as well. 


I know Tom is probably referring to the bones of the golf course but the reality is that golf courses will change whether we like it or not.  No different than for example a farm changing hands and the new owner wants to plant corn instead of having apple trees or   When courses change hands, similar things can happen. 


Most improved - The Old Course at St. Andrews
Most spoiled - The Old Course at St. Andrews

[Mike Nuzzo]

Many of the early era courses around Houston were fairly utilitarian
The routings were ok but the individual holes were bland.
Over the years the holes were "improved" be elevating tees, planting trees and sometimes building mounds around greens.
 
Memorial Park was similarly designed and a recent improvement.
I didn't see any other local courses previously to know which were spoiled.
River Oaks was pretty bad from a couple renovations before the recent redesign.
 
Peace

[Mike Nuzzo]

Tom,
This is a great topic but obviously a controversial one.  It has been discussed here before. 

Golf courses are not paintings or static pieces of art.  They are constantly evolving.  Many of the golden age architects were smart enough to build elasticity into their designs knowing they were going to need to be altered in the future as the game evolved.  This mostly meant adding length but it sometimes meant other changes as well. 

Just because the wind blows or the grass is growing doesn't mean the course is evolving. The topic is man made disruptions.
 
Peace

[Ira Fishman]

How does one determine the time cut off for the question? Even I am not old enough to remember the original routings for Ballybunion and Lahinch, but my understanding is that they were improved substantially albeit a 100 years ago. To press the point even further, was Woking not improved when Number 4 was altered?


Ira

[Tom_Doak]

Would Royal County Down be the nearest comparison? It can't be often you get one new hole on a course of that pedigree, you don't hear much good or bad anymore about that hole -- I guess that's a good sign.

Buck:


This thread is not about Dornoch, so unless you think that change at Royal County Down was a great improvement or a major step backwards, it's not relevant to my questions.


But, yeah, it's a very close comparison:  it's the same architects blowing up a hole on a top ten course because they've convinced the committee they're smarter than the previous guys.  How much better is Royal County Down as a result?  Just my opinion:  the new hole is more challenging for tournament play (and eliminates a bottleneck), but less fun for the members, as it turned a birdie chance into a bogey chance.

[Mark_Fine]

Mike,
A golf course can’t really stay as it was when it opened without man intervening and even then it is very difficult to keep it the same. Just changing out a superintendent can dramatically change a golf course.  Some of the changes I mentioned you can’t stop from happening.  One of the courses I recently worked on had green contours that were dramatically changed just from sand being hit out of the bunkers and on to the greens.  Some came up almost two feet.  Did you know that at Pinehurst #2 there is as much as three feet of top dressing in the middle of some of those greens that has built up over the years?  Just normal annual maintenance 

[Tom_Doak]

TD, I understand and generally agree with the premise and it takes more than one person to alter an established course, but when I follow that money and regard those changes isn't there a ASGCA member and his familiars guiding and profiting from the work?  I mean the tinkering prez/golf/green/ chair commissions, but the GCA accepts.  I've never, not once, seen a GCA come onto property and say "Things are pretty good, you don;t need much... a bunch of trees and some drainage and you're all set." No, it's all "master plan" and "Phased" construction and aspects that will now require the environmental consultant to be hired for thousands... there's a guy who is the advising architect for the course that's nearest and dearest to my heart and he's never so much as seen a picture of the place before the millennium.


What say you?

VK:  You should get to be more familiar with my consulting work.  I've told a bunch of clubs they didn't really need to do much.


Unfortunately, they don't listen well . . . they keep hearing about master plans and think they need one . . . and they think their course is "important" so they need an architect to come in regularly and hold their hands. 


I have been trying to get out of that business.  Maybe the members DO need that, but I don't want to spend much more of my precious time left on Earth flying to wherever, to tell the new committee the same thing I told the old committee.  At the same time, I hate the thought that there are six other architects drooling at the chance to jam their foot in the door and suggest more, so they can put that club on their resume and/or "feed their families".  [To be fair, though, Mark's not in the ASGCA.]  Even my own associates enjoy finding little things to fiddle with at great courses, and there is always something to be fixed, if you look hard enough for it.


[I was going to ask about that favorite course of yours and how it's managed to avoid ruin -- maybe that would be better left to DM's.  ]


The one thing I don't understand your view on is trees.  For my own new courses, I've spent a considerable amount of time flagging clearing lines, trying to work around significant trees, and deciding whether they will can stay or whether they'll be too much of a problem for play or for maintenance.  [Brooks Koepka made fun of this process in Houston:  "It's just a tree."]  For a lot of the courses where we consult, clearing has been a significant part of the work.

[Tom_Doak]

Someone DM'd me to nominate Desert Forest in the "Spoiled" category.  I've heard that before; I haven't seen the changes. 


Honestly, though, I thought the original course was somewhat overrated.  From what I understand, they asked for "more", and then they should have been more careful what they wished for.  If so, that's exactly the sort of problem this thread is about.

[William_G]

unfortunately TD your question is more complicated than a or b, you know that


certainly RDGC is not spoiled because of the new 7 and revised 8


in design it is in the eye of the beholder or the owner that matters


sadly, making a life of criticizing golf design takes some of the beauty away from the innate joy of golf [size=78%]as it was meant to be[/size]

[Mark Mammel]

Tom-I'm surprised to hear you suggest it's vanity for a club's leadership to regularly consult an architect about alterations to their course, especially if it has some history behind it. As we all know many clubs live and die by their changing greens committees, with the odd bunker put in here, and the tree planting committee adding memorial trees where family members think they would be pretty. Just the passing of time changes old layouts, and I believe we do a disservice to current and future members when we presume to know how to keep the bones of the course alive and the routing respectful of its origins while remaining challenging today. I know you and your peers would rather design fresh then restore existing, but both are honorable pursuits!

[Paul Rudovsky]

If we look at the history of original course architecture (as opposed to renovation architecture) it may offer a clue.  Specifically, look at the original courses built in the two Golden Ages (approx 1905-1930 and 1994-today) vs the period in between (1946-1993).  I think golf course architects are very much like professionals in other fields...when you see competitors doing great things, it "raises" their game...and when you see "so-so" work by your competitors, you tend not to push yourself.


I would guess that the quality of renovations over the last 20-25 years exceeds that of any other period in history...and no question exceeds the quality of renovation from 1946-1993.  Off the top of my head, I am guessing that seeing LACC-North after Hanse's efforts was the first time I walked off a renovation simply blown away (I had played LACC-N 2x prior), and other examples might be Quaker Ridge (where I had belonged for 25 years), Cal Club and Old Town (although I had not played these prior to their reno's), Bethpage Black (I remember it w 3' high weeds growing out of hardpan in the bunkers), Hanse's work at Brookline starting w the 10th hole about 10-12 years ago.  There is no question in my mind the earlier great retro's/renov's "upped" everyone's game.


Now I am trying to recall a great reno or retro from 1946-93...cannot think of any (which does not mean there were none). 


Having said the above...if you are dealing with an original designed by one of the greats...it is possible to improve it but you better be real careful and make sure you have a "comparable" architect with the appropriate personality leading the way.  In that sense, i think Tom's opening statement is right...but it seems obvious to me that improvements are more than possible as per the examples I gave above and many more.

[Tom_Doak]

Tom-I'm surprised to hear you suggest it's vanity for a club's leadership to regularly consult an architect about alterations to their course, especially if it has some history behind it. As we all know many clubs live and die by their changing greens committees, with the odd bunker put in here, and the tree planting committee adding memorial trees where family members think they would be pretty. Just the passing of time changes old layouts, and I believe we do a disservice to current and future members when we presume to know how to keep the bones of the course alive and the routing respectful of its origins while remaining challenging today. I know you and your peers would rather design fresh then restore existing, but both are honorable pursuits!

Mark:  Well, take a look at this thread more closely.  I asked for examples, good and bad, to see how things stood.  A few posters gave them early on, but since then it's been people insisting on the need for constant supervision, and the importance of hiring a "comparable" architect (which is about name recognition, not necessarily quality).


WBYC is a great place.  I miss going there.  I tried my best to document what you ought to do 25 years ago, and there was only enough momentum to proceed with it very slowly over all these years.  When we build a new course the objective is to get it done, not to keep finding new things to do.  (I understand not every club wants to shut down for a big project, and respect that.)