Desolation Row, august 12, 2016

     Antioch, California. The rising price of water has forced Jack Roddy to draw the curtain on Roddy Ranch Golf Course. “This isn’t a matter of a lack of golfers,” a spokesperson for the course’s management company told the San Jose Mercury News. “If anything, the number of rounds has been going up.” In fact, Roddy Ranch’s 18-hole track has reportedly attracted roughly 40,000 rounds annually in recent years. But the 16-year-old, J. Michael Poellot-designed layout can’t survive without water, and Roddy believes it’ll soon cost as much as $600,000 a year to quench its thirst. He hasn’t yet decided what to do with his 235-acre property.

     Bloomingdale, Illinois. The end of the current golf season will be the end of the line for the 27-hole Blackhawk Trace Golf Club at the Indian Lakes Resort. The resort’s owners say that the complex, designed by Robert Bruce Harris in the mid 1960s, has lost $5 million since 2011 and must close to ensure the survival of the property’s hotel. “The Indian Lakes Resort had a great run, but a suburban Chicago hotel and golf resort isn’t relevant to the local business community or today’s traveler,” a spokesperson for the resort told the Daily Herald. The Hilton chain has operated the resort’s hotel since 2007, but its contract expires next year.

     Lake Worth, Florida. A home builder has agreed to buy one of the three 18-hole golf courses at Fountains Country Club, an aged venue that’s looking to become, in the words of its president, “a premier country club in South Florida.” Fountains, part of an 865-acre community that’s struggling due to declining membership, will reportedly receive $17 million for its original course, the 44-year-old North course. The track, like the others at the club, was co-designed by Bruce Devlin and Robert Von Hagge. According to the Palm Beach Post, the sale will enable the club to “bring in amenities that homeowners now want,” notably a new swimming pool, and reduce its debt. The transaction is expected to close next year.  

     Massillon, Ohio. Two years short of its 50th anniversary, Rolling Green Golf Course now belongs to a home builder. The seller, Jack Blakney, had owned the 18-hole track since 1996. The new owner expects the bulldozers to arrive sometime this fall.

     Attleboro, Massachusetts. The nine-hole course at Locust Valley Country Club has gone belly up. Various sources say that the club opened in the 1920s or 1930s (perhaps as late as 1939), and the Attleboro Sun Chronicle describes it as “the place golfers who did not belong to a country club could go to play a round of golf at a reasonable price.” As we all know, such venues are at the top of the golf industry’s endangered list. The newspaper reports that Locust Valley had been “losing money for years.” David Bourque, who’s owned the property since 1996, is looking to sell it, most likely to a home builder.

      Mount Carroll, Illinois. The nine-hole golf course at Oakville Country Club didn’t open this season, and chances are that it’s closed for good. Earlier this year, Nancy Woodside divided the Oakville property, a golf course since the mid 1960s, into 46- and 13-acre parcels and sold them. The larger tract (seven holes plus the clubhouse) went to John and Betty Tautz, reportedly for $315,000, and the smaller one went to Jeff and Patty Lessman, for an undisclosed price. Both of the new owners told the Daily Gazette that they’d like someone to revive the golf course, but Jeff Lessman acknowledged that “there doesn’t appear to be anyone who is interested.” Woodside and her late husband had owned Oakville since 1986.

     Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The clock is ticking on Brookside Golf Course, a nine-hole track that’s been in business since the mid 1950s. The Archdiocese of Oklahoma City bought the course in early 2015, reportedly for $2.1 million, and it plans to eventually build a church on the 53-acre property. The seller, a group that operates as Brookside Golf Club, currently leases the property from the archdiocese. According to the Oklahoman, the club will remain in place for two more years.