In all seriousness, there were many seemingly random bunkers in the Golden Age. I think they seemed random because there were more top shot bunkers, carry bunkers, and flanking bunkers in general. Each served a purpose, but the proliferation made them seem random, esp. after increased length made some obsolete.
The cost conscious era of 1960-1990 or so caused elimination of bunkers that saw too little "action." (Oddly, bunkers that saw "too much action" were often eliminated, too!)
The good times of the 1990's caused gca's to think the cost of bunkers didn't matter again. The advent of perfect bunker conditions, liners, and the post 2000 recession have superintendents questioning those costs again. Bunker removal projects are keeping many gca's alive and fed.
Short version - random bunkers are so 1990's (and 1920's) Precise bunkering is so 1970 and 2010.
In the end, its all about money over art.
Jeff,
How does this work during the design process? Are bunkers "lost" during intermediate reviews at owner request or are entire holes or routings changed by these restrictions? Or, are the terms set by the client at the start of the project (i.e. the amount of bunkering he/she wants)?
I have no doubts this is not an easy answer, but I find this very interesting.
Ben
Ben,
I was really thinking about bunker changes in the golf course existence process over time, but I get your question.
All clients vary of course, but us mere mortal architects are often given a target square footage of bunkers which we can use as we like. That number (for me) has come from developers standard criteria, or a suggestion of the feasibility consultant that a public course ought to have no more than xx bunkers (usually from 20-45 with severe warnings of the business consequences of having more than 50 or 60)
After the general direction is given, I only rarely have a client question the preliminary design. Sometimes, if a golf pro is on the committee, they may question certain fw bunkers that aren't 270-290 yds. Some GM's will go through and take out all bunkers on the right front of greens to speed play, etc. Everyone has their perspective. Even more get discussed in the field as most folks really can't envison it until then.
Philosophically, I am kind of a tweener between the strict LZ only bunkers and randomness. To start, if I have a client imposed limit, I like to put bunkers where they serve many functions - hazard, targets, aesthetics, safety, etc., to get the most value out of each. I would have to think a bit about putting one 80 yards off the tee "just because." That said, one of my laments is the objection to bunkers about 30 yards in front of the green. Its amazing how often a bunker there completes an aesthetic composition, and for so many, still serve as hazards because they use the run up game. But, they are discouraged often as not coming into play, and causing difficult long bunker recovery shots for the type of player who has the most trouble with them.
While bunkering is a complicated and yet intuitive process, that often starts with looking at the green first, generally for FW bunkers, I start with the LZ, adjust for elevation, wind, slope, etc., just to make sure that its not a hole where the golfers will really tend to hit it only 260 because of natural conditions. I have a couple dozen generalized strategic tee shot ideas (in one of the Paul Daley books if you care) and start looking for landforms that support those ideas on different holes.
If it happens that I calculate the LZ at a particular distance, but the natural landform for the bunker I envision falls somewhat differently, then I place the bunker there, knowing that not all people hit the "average" distance to the LZ point and that on any given tee shot, no one hits it perfectly every time, either. Thus, while a bunker is most likely to come into play as envisioned by the gca if placed near the typical LZ's, its just as likely to come into play for others if not at some prescribed distance.
It is probably a good thing if the long holes all have bunkers at slightly varying effective distances from the tee, not to mention, some should be carry bunkers, flank bunkers, distance limiting bunkers, etc. I also take comfort in the fact that a bunker can cath a tee shot on the fly, or after 20 yards of roll, and really serves to guard many different tee shot lengths wherever it is placed.
They all come into play for someone. Using PGA Tour Shotlink data to locate bunkers only really works on the PGA Tour, a very controlled and consistent group of players, and even they have some variation.