Golf's Worst Cart Path?

[Dan_Callahan]

In the last day or so, the topic of cart paths has come up a few times in other threads—from the observation that Tom Fazio's highest priority in designing a course is hiding the cart paths to the way the asphalt detracts from the look of Astoria.

It got me to wondering what course or hole has the absolute most invasive cart paths I have ever seen. Hands down, the winner would be the 7th at Ekwanok in Vermont. This otherwise unique and very natural hole is seriously compromised by the cart path that runs right down the center of the fairway—and directly in your line of sight:



I'm not sure if this is visually as disruptive as the paths at Astoria, but it seems like at Astoria they had no other choice. At Ekwanok, they could have directed traffic to the left of the mound, or even routed carts up into the woods on the right. Paving the middle of the hole was just an awful decision.

[Jim Franklin]

Wow, that is amazingly awful.

When I played Sanctuary, my playing partner commented the entire day how intrusive the cart paths were. He was right for the most part as they could have hidden them better, but the course needed the cart paths and they did not take away from my enjoyment in playing the course.

[Jeff_Mingay]

There are some really poorly located paths at Cape Breton Highlands Links... scars all over Canada's best course, unfortunately.

The 9th at Highlands Links is an Alps hole, and there's a cart path slashing across the hill fronting the green. Ugly, ugly, ugly. That one's pretty bad. So is the continuous path heading up the par-five 16th, in similar fashion to the photo of the 7th at Ekwanok Jim shows above.

Imagine, Highlands Links was walking-only until the paths (and carts) were introduced in 1996 too.

[Evan Fleisher]

They ought to just connect up those two sections of cart path in the picture...just in case you dribble one off the tee, and it goes straight up the gut...then you'll at least get that "million mile" cart patch roll/bounce and still have a shot at the green!  

Yikes!!!

[Michael Moore]

Dan Callahan -

First let me say that this path looks real bad and plays even worse.

However, this photo caused me to remember a key passage from Donald Norman's seminal The Design of Everyday Things. In his discussion of the concept of "affordance" (e.g. cart paths "afford" driving towards the green), Norman makes the observation that people generally walk towards their target regardless of the path, and that path designers should find out where people walk and place the path there.

I will give the pathmaker here the benefit of the doubt and presume that carts had been wearing and tearing the fairway down the middle of this hill.

I would be curious to hear how real pathmakers leverage this concept of affordance.

[ForkaB]

The worst cart path in golf was the first one.

[Marc Haring]

A comparison.




I don’t know where this course is but it does illustrate how incredibly intrusive cart paths can be.

[Brian_Sleeman]

The worst cart path in golf was the first one.

Or the ones people sometimes make for themselves...


The effectiveness of signage...

[Scott_Burroughs]

Here are some prime offenders, the ocean/cliffside cartpaths
at Half Moon Bay (Ocean) , 2 entire holes along the ocean/cliff!:



and at Samoset Resort in Maine, where not only is the
cartpath on the par 3 that juts out into the ocean between
the green and the ocean (!), the next hole has the cartpath
on the oceanside of the hole, but has the detour of the path
between the fairway and the fairway bunkers!




I like Rihc's answer.

[Dan_Callahan]

Is this even worse? At Gillette Ridge, the second hole is a par 5. The tee shot, which is quite nice, looks like this:




Unless you kill the ball, your layup will be blind. Knowing there is water to the right and the fairway gets very narrow the farther you go, you want to leave the ball at about 140 for a nice approach to the green. Unfortunately, what you can't see is a cart path that cuts directly across the fairway at exactly the spot you would want to lay up to. Here's a shot taken while standing on the cart path:



I've played the course twice, and both times at least one person in my group hit the cart path trying to lay up and ended up in the water.

So I don't know which is worse: the cart path that ruins the asthetics of a hole or the hidden path that sneaks up and bites you in the ass because you didn't know it was there.

[Evan Fleisher]

Scott,

Do those aerials belong on the FRAMING thread?!?!?  

[Pete Buczkowski]

Here are some prime offenders, the ocean/cliffside cartpaths
at Half Moon Bay (Ocean) , 2 entire holes along the ocean/cliff!:

Hi Scott,

I played HMB in November...17 cart path is not noticeable at all, and 18 is only noticeable on the uphill semi-blind tee shot, otherwise its recessed about 5 feet below the fairway.  I'd rather have the fairway closer to the ocean, but I can understand keeping the path there, since the hotel guests use it as a walking path.





Perhaps its not that bad?  The one on 16 though is much more noticeable, since the tee is significantly elevated.  Either way they don't affect play much, though I'd rather have 16 & 18 closer to the ocean if it were possible.

[Michael Wharton-Palmer]

Along similar lines to Rich's comment...ANY CART PATH

[Tom Huckaby]

Re HMB-Ocean, Pete's comments are right on...
and on top of that, I believe for erosion reasons
they were REQUIRED to keep the golf holes back from
the cliffs on 16 and 18... And the path is indeed a
public walk-way... Lots of real-world reasons for
these being as they are.

Of course in a PERFECT world, Rich is right, there are
no paths, and we get those holes
right up to the cliffs, and screw the public... Ahhhhh,
when will we see this perfect world?
 

[PThomas]

I didn't think those paths at HMB were that bad either when I played there

[Scott_Burroughs]

It's for erosion reasons?  So what do they do, force EVERY
SINGLE PLAYER to ride there on the most dangerous part?  
Seems like for safety reasons, you know, people, it
would be best to keep as many people AWAY from the edge
as possible, w/only some of the golfers venturing over there
to play their ball.  And they wouldn't have to rebuild the
cartpaths every time part of the edge of the cliff fell into the
ocean.

But I'm sure there are good reasons for doing it the way it
was done....this is California, you know...and the Coastal
Commission is made up of 100% rational people....

 

This reminds me, I still haven't seen 'American Wedding' yet.

[Tom Huckaby]

Scott:

It does seem kind of weird.  But at least your ire
is aimed at the right party now.  In any case, the
reality is this, as posted by Pete Galea, who was there
throughout construction:

The two offendiing paths along the ocean are part of a mandatory coastal access for the public, which doubles as cart path.

TH

[Kenny Lee Puckett]

#13 at Yale.

Look at the Courses by Country Section.

JWK

[Scott_Burroughs]

I don't think it's ire, more like ire-ony.  

The two offendiing paths along the ocean are part of a
mandatory coastal access for the public, which doubles as cart path.

At Po'ipu Bay on Kaua'i, the left (ocean/cliff) side of holes #15
and #16 have walking paths for the resort guests that I think
were ancient paths by ancient Hawaiians that they can't
disturb, so those holes aren't quite as close to the edge as
would be 'preferred'.  Luckily, no unsightly cartpaths will be
there and on those holes, carts go down the fairway/rough (#15) or inland side (#16).
It's on the desert side of the island, so no saturated turf and landslide issues).

I'll assume natural walking paths wasn't an option at HMB.

#15 at Po'ipu Bay, with trails between the bushes and rocks at left:


#16:

[Brian Joines]

This hole at Blackthorn GC in South Bend, IN would look a lot better if this cart path wasn't here.

[Andrew Bernstein]

Had to dig deep to find this topic, but after viewing the aerial for a course outside my hometown, I needed to vent.

What in the world was anyone thinking when these cart paths were built? Surely, at some point in the process, someone had to object. At least one would hope so.

Is public shaming the only way to fix this problem in golf?

[Richard Choi]

Andrew, that is awesome. That made my day (I can't stop laughing). Thanks.

[Brent Hutto]

Maybe they built the cart paths first and had to fit the rest of the golf course features in around them. Good god.

[Norbert P]

    The pathos of paths.

  I have a suspicion that that bunker was constructed after the cart path was laid.  With the highway right (slice side), I suspect many were playing left edge which may have created a safety issue with players on approaching tees.  

  Barney has the best answer.  . . .       The worst was the first.

[JLahrman]

    The pathos of pathes.

  I have a suspicion that that bunker was constructed after the cart path was laid.  With the highway right (slice side), I suspect many were playing left edge which may have created a safety issue with players on approaching tees. 

  Barney has the best answer.  . . .       The worst was the first.

It's also possible that going around the bunker would bring the path too close to the adjacent par-3 green.