The 2024 restoration of Wilshire Country Club

[Mark Kiely]

There's already a 2008 thread with the title of "The restoration of Wilshire Country Club," but I just heard Terry Gannon mention a new project that will prevent the club from hosting next year's LPGA tourney.


My first thought was "Didn't they just do a pretty successful restoration not that long ago?" but then a Google search unearthed a comprehensive video to members with Kyle Phillips explaining that the previous work barely scratched the surface and there are additional infrastructure reinforcements needed.


The video linked above is 21 minutes, the main points being:
1. Reinforcing the barranca
2. New irrigation
3. Re-grassing the greens with bent grass to rid themselves of poa
4. De-treeing the playing corridors and moving trees to the perimeter of the property


I'm pretty sure there are a couple Wilshire members who post here. Would be interesting to hear any other details if they want to chime in. I had hoped to get out to the tourney this week but my schedule didn't allow.

[Matt_Cohn]

A couple of those new greens would have to be some of the biggest single greens anywhere in the world, right?

[Tim_Weiman]

There's already a 2008 thread with the title of "The restoration of Wilshire Country Club," but I just heard Terry Gannon mention a new project that will prevent the club from hosting next year's LPGA tourney.


My first thought was "Didn't they just do a pretty successful restoration not that long ago?" but then a Google search unearthed a comprehensive video to members with Kyle Phillips explaining that the previous work barely scratched the surface and there are additional infrastructure reinforcements needed.


The video linked above is 21 minutes, the main points being:
1. Reinforcing the barranca
2. New irrigation
3. Re-grassing the greens with bent grass to rid themselves of poa
4. De-treeing the playing corridors and moving trees to the perimeter of the property


I'm pretty sure there are a couple Wilshire members who post here. Would be interesting to hear any other details if they want to chime in. I had hoped to get out to the tourney this week but my schedule didn't allow.

Mark,


Is moving trees to the perimeter of the property a requirement for permitting the project?


Tim

[Mark Kiely]

Hi Tim. I have no knowledge of this except for hearing what I heard during the TV coverage today and watching that video to the members. I've never played it nor been on the property. Just found it interesting that it's going back under the knife so soon.

[Tim_Weiman]

Hi Tim. I have no knowledge of this except for hearing what I heard during the TV coverage today and watching that video to the members. I've never played it nor been on the property. Just found it interesting that it's going back under the knife so soon.

Mark,


Apparently something similar is happening with the Yale project.


Tim

[Jeff Schley]

Interesting, it wasn't too long ago they did previous restoration work.  Keeping up with the neighborhood.

[PCCraig]

I played Wilshire a couple of months ago and really enjoyed it. It's a lovely golf course.


Chatted with one of the Professionals there and it sounds like the work is really being driven by the Barranca. Guess it floods (extremely) all of the time and the work is necessary. Think they are using the time to take the already successful work further.


It's a really cool place. Excited to see how the work turns out.

[Adam G]

A lot of it is naturalizing the baranca, but my understanding is that the reason they are doing it so soon is because the irrigation system desperately needs to be replaced, and they decided not to address that last time due to the Great Recession. 2008 was not a great time to add extra expense to the project. Since they have to do the irrigation and deal with flooding, which would require fully shutting things down for a while, they decided to add the other stuff.
The green expansions are quite significant -- 18 is about half the peninsula which also has a tree on it now and the entire peninsula will be green! My understanding was this was seen as aggressive green expansion in 2008 but now everyone is fully onboard to totally return to Macbeth's vision.
Happy to be corrected on any of this by my friends on here who are members.

[Alex Miller]

Can answer some questions on it if you all like. Mostly barranca and irrigation, but quick hits:

• This work is a continuation of the plan Kyle Phillips put together last time around, much of which was not executed to completion
• Still have basically original irrigation systems which require a lot of spot watering and maintenance
• Previous restoration did not have quality bunker liners - likely due to the context Adam mentions
• Barranca running through the property captures all the water from the surrounding Hollywood Hills when it rains, and in part due to time and recent dry years combined with heavy rains has eroded at various places.
• Barranca will be rebuilt with a hydrology study done (there has been a lot of urbanization around the club in the last 100 years) in order to become both more playable and handle the water when storms do come.
• With the scale of the rest of the work already being done, there will be some moving of paths and plantings to the exterior of the course. Very few trees to be removed as much of that was already done, but the one on the corner of #3 is one of them.
• Green expansion for #3 and #18 will be really great. While not weak by any means today those two holes should become standouts.
• Greens may (seems likely) be changed to Bent. All contours are being taken and will be retained as much as possible. I personally love Poa, but the reality is the climate is different than in 1919 and the water requirements for Poa is not in the mindset of sustainability. Not just for the environment but the viability of golf in a desert environment which LA basically is. A bent green was installed at the back of the driving range ~4 years ago so testing has been done.

Pat - glad you enjoyed it. It's still in great shape and hopefully showed off on TV this past weekend.