Believe it or don’t, but Donald Trump is warming up to the joys of naturalism. (Or minimalism. Or neo-classicism. Whatever.) First, he hired Martin Hawtree to design his celebrated oceanfront links in Scotland. Then, he persuaded Gil Hanse to oversee the first wave of renovations at Doral. After that, he tapped Hawtree for the second course in Aberdeenshire. And now he’s put the icing on his evolutionary cake: Trump has inked Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw, naturalists par excellence, to produce an 18-hole golf course in Charlottesville, Virginia. The Austin, Texas-based design duo has already roughed out a routing for the track, which will take shape on land formerly owned by the late John Kluge, who was once believed to be the richest person in the nation. “I’ve never seen a piece of land as good as this,” one of Trump’s sons told Golf magazine. “My father’s in love with the place.” Kluge had built a personal, Arnold Palmer-designed course on his property (it was abandoned years ago), but Golf says that Coore & Crenshaw don’t plan to incorporate any of it into their design.
Rumor has it that Bandon Dunes, the world-famous golf destination, is planning another course. Details are sketchy, but it’ll apparently be another par-3 track, similar to Coore & Crenshaw’s 13-hole Preserve course. If the whispers check out, the course will be the resort’s sixth, not counting the one that nobody admits exists.
Baby, it’s still cold out there. And for that reason, many U.S. golf courses are feeling a financial chill. By this time last year, courses all over Minnesota, the Dakotas, Wisconsin, Michigan, and other Midwestern states had already been open for weeks, maybe a month or more. But this year is a very different story. In 2012, the Minnesota Golf Association recorded 54,288 rounds played during the first two weeks of April. This year: 424. “This is [the] worst I’ve seen in my 30 years in this business,” the general manager of a Twin Cities course told the Minneapolis Star Tribune. Also in Minnesota, the Winona Daily News reports that some local courses haven’t yet opened and can’t predict when they will. “Everything is just way too wet,” said the director of golf at Cedar Valley Golf Course. “Believe it or not, we still have some snow in areas.” In Wisconsin, according to the director of golf at Wisconsin Country Club, “Last year was bordering on record early. This year, we’re bordering on record late.” And how do such conditions affect the bottom line? In March of this year, Lost Nation Golf Course in Willoughby, Ohio rang up just 1,000 rounds, off by more than 2,000 from the number it had in 2012. If it’s any consolation, the weather will warm up. But not soon enough, I fear, for a repeat performance of 2012.
Greg Norman was scheduled to visit the site of a forthcoming resort-style golf course this weekend, but the natives on Australia’s Great Keppel Island weren’t expected to roll out the proverbial red carpet for him. In fact, here’s the welcome Norman received: One of the island’s indigenous Woppaburra people told the Rockhampton Morning Bulletin that a golf course intended “for rich man’s pleasure” would be built “over our dead bodies.” It’s surely an idle threat, since the resort’s developer, Tower Holdings, can afford to buy all the influence it needs. “We are hopeful of working closely with Woppaburra in the years ahead, and I like to think we could build a good relationship,” the firm’s project manager told the newspaper. “They will be one of the significant beneficiaries of the new resort, with employment, business, and tourism opportunities.” Such statements usually make for good press, but Tower’s resort has been percolating since 2008, if not before. Why hasn’t the company already built “a good relationship” with the Woppaburra?
Late last year, Ron Whitten of Golf Digest opined that Tom Doak’s course at Dismal River Club in Mullen, Nebraska would be “the architectural story of 2013.” Today, the course’s creators have begun to stoke what will surely be a media frenzy, like the one that accompanied December’s opening of the Streamsong courses in Florida. Doak, who’s long wanted to create a course in the state’s Sand Hills, told the Omaha World-Herald, “I’ve been waiting for the right time and the right piece of ground, and this is it.” Dismal River’s majority owner, Chris Johnston, told the newspaper that the track will be “unlike anything else in the Sand Hills” and, perhaps going just a bit overboard, compared Doak to Michelangelo. If the comparison is apt, will the course be Doak’s David? His Pietà, maybe? Or will it be the Sistine Chapel? I suppose we’ll find out in July, when the course is expected to open.
Tiger Woods has boosted television ratings, served as an effective salesman for many corporations, and made golf attractive to legions of young people. Despite all that, and much more, Mark King, the CEO of TaylorMade-Adidas Golf, thinks that Woods hasn’t had “any effect on the economics of golf.” King’s take, as delivered to CNBC: Golf has been on a 16-year continual decline since Tiger came into golf. Now, has he had an impact on people watching TV, because he’s maybe the greatest athlete of our generation? Absolutely. But are those people running out, taking golf vacations, buying a home on a golf course, buying a new driver? No, they’re not. Well, maybe since 2009 they’re not. But before that, from the time Woods arrived on the golf scene in the mid 1990s, didn’t they do all those things repeatedly? Maybe King is simply unhappy that Woods delivered the goods for Nike.
Speaking of things that have little or no effect, was Adam Scott’s victory at the Masters good for golf? Or will it only be good for Adam Scott? The unfortunate truth is, Scott is a veritable nobody. In a recent poll of 1,100 people, Scott’s name was known to just 44. Or consider his Q rating, the measurement of his familiarity and appeal. According to the people who calculate such matters, the “average sports personality” checks in with a Q rating of 16. Tiger Woods tips the scale at 26. And Scott? The month before he won the Masters, he had a rating of 12 among sports fans in general, and he registered only slightly higher among golf fans. Scott will do for golf what Bubba Watson, the previous Masters winner, did for golf: Not much. He may attract a few vacationers to Australia, but his ability to sell the sport to the masses is severely limited.
Next week, a Dublin, Ohio-based design team expects to open its first two golf courses in China. Dana Fry and Jason Straka, former members of Mike Hurdzan’s architectural group, will unveil 18-hole tracks at Qizhong Garden Golf Club in Shanghai and Phoenix Hill Golf Club in Anji County (in Zhejiang Province), and they want you to know the courses will rank among the nation’s finest. “I am confident Qizhong Garden Golf Club is likely to take its place as the best course in the Shanghai area,” Fry declared in a press release. Fry, who operates out of an office in Hong Kong, thinks Phoenix Hill may have an even higher ceiling. “This golf course, in my opinion, will be one of China's top-rated courses,” he said. What’s more, Fry and Straka’s to-do list includes a links-like layout for Batu Bay Golf Club in Inner Mongolia, and it may very well be even better.
“Batu Bay has the chance to become one of the world’s great courses,” Fry said late last year. I can’t vouch for the quality of the golf courses in question, but I can say confidently that Fry and Straka are adept at raising expectations.
In a decision brimming with symbolism, a church in Detroit, Michigan has decided to pull the curtains on its golf course and sell it to a developer of cemeteries. Greater Grace Temple plans to close Rogell Golf Course, which features an 18-hole, Donald Ross-designed golf course, at the end of next month. According to WDIV-TV, the graveyard will be the first to open in the city since the course made its debut in 1914, as the centerpiece of the private Phoenix Country Club.
Sunday, April 28, 2013
Friday, April 26, 2013
The Pipeline, april 26, 2013
Most developers believe that the market for golf-focused retirement communities has fizzled out, but DMB Associates thinks the nation’s senior citizens still have a little life left in them. The company is thinking about building an enclave for “active adults,” complete with a player-friendly golf course, at Verrado, a master-planned community it’s long been developing in suburban Phoenix, Arizona. Rumor has it that a designer for the 18-hole track has been selected, but so far his identity remains a secret. DMB has close relations with several well-known architects, as it’s developed courses by Tom Fazio, Tom Weiskopf, Rees Jones, and Tom Lehman at its many communities in Arizona, California, Utah, and Hawaii. Verrado is already home to Raven Golf Club, which features one of the state’s top-rated layouts, and the master plan for the 8,800-acre spread at one time called for as many as three 18-hole tracks.
Mike Asmundson may soon be returning to Chile, where he has five golf courses to his credit and hopes to soon break ground on a sixth. The Port Townsend, Washington-based architect has designed a second 18-hole course for one of the swankiest private clubs in Santiago, Club de Golf Francés. The 1,200-member club, which opened in 1957, has already purchased the site for the addition, plus land for roughly 100 single-family houses. “The ball is now in their court,” says Asmundson. “They have to sell [the idea] to their members.” The sale shouldn’t been too difficult, considering that Francés’ existing 18-hole layout floods whenever the Mapocho River rises above its banks.
The original version of the preceding post first appeared in the February 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
One of Arnold Palmer’s most distinctive courses is about to get a makeover. I’m talking about Tralee Golf Club in Country Kerry, Ireland, Palmer’s first commission in Europe and one that checks in at #82 on Golf Digest’s list of the top 100 golf courses outside the United States. “I may have designed the first nine,” Palmer famously said of the 7,187-yard seaside track, “but surely God designed the back nine.” Divine intervention or not, Palmer’s firm has been directed to create a new practice area for the nearly 30-year-old club, an amenity that will require several holes to be redesigned. Brandon Johnson, the Palmer associate who’s overseeing the project, says the firm “may do a substantial redesign.” If major changes occur, they wouldn’t be entirely unexpected. Though the course is widely admired, some critics only give it qualified praise. An undated review by Golflink.com, for example, commends the back nine for its “riveting views of the dunes” but complains that the course’s front nine is “spectacularly undistinguished” and has “an artificial feel.”
The original version of the preceding post first appeared in the February 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
Sometime next year, a wealthy Hungarian -- one of the nation’s richest people, according to the Budapest Business Journal -- aims to open an 18-hole golf course in Zalacsány, to attract travelers to a boutique hotel he recently purchased. Gábor Széles is his name, and he’s said to be an “industrialist,” a description that unfortunately conveys little. Széles is building the golf course on property adjacent to the Batthyány Castle Hotel, an ancient place that features 33 rooms and offers various opportunities for pampering and what its website calls “royal indulgence.” In the future, Széles will reportedly add a spa to the property, because no vacation getaway is complete without one.
Over the past few years, Pacific Links International has made headlines by buying golf properties. But next year, the company hopes to make a splash with a complex in Tianjin, China that seems conceived purely for marketing purposes. It’s called the 27 Club, and it’ll feature holes designed by “27 golf champions,” a group that includes Tom Watson, Greg Norman, Annika Sorenstam, Fred Couples, and Mark O’Meara. The firm’s website says the facility “is destined to become one of the world’s most sought-after golf experiences in Asia” and “a venue for significant global professional tournaments,” but I view it as nothing more than golf silliness, like the “signature” course at Legends Golf & Safari Resort in Limpopo Province, South Africa. The Legends concept has likely served as the inspiration for the 27 Club, as each of its holes was designed by a “legend” -- Colin Montgomerie, Bernhard Langer, Retief Goosen, K. J. Choi, and Vijay Singh among them. The 27 Club may indeed be “among the most ambitious golf project[s] conducted in Asia,” as PLI claims it is, but it isn’t likely to be among the most memorable.
It appears that the first Aborigine to earn a spot on the PGA Tour wants to put his “signature” on the planned golf course at Ayers Rock Resort in Yulara, Australia. The Australian reports that Scott Gardiner, who now lives in the United States (in Farmington, Arkansas), “has joined forces with some friends who are bidding to design a golf course near Uluru.” The Gold Coast Bulletin identifies one of the friends as Michael Clayton, the Victoria-based architect who’s probably best known for co-designing (with Tom Doak) the first course at Barnbougle Dunes in Bridport, Tasmania. Ayers Rock’s owner, the government-sponsored Indigenous Land Corporation, wants to build a “desert” course that will extend the stays of vacationers to Yulara, which is located on aboriginal lands in the Northern Territory, hundreds of miles from any sizeable city. “There is not much to do there in the eye of many tourists,” an official with an ILC affiliate told the Brisbane Times. If that’s true, hiring Gardiner and Clayton to co-design the golf course may be a wise choice. Not so long ago, there wasn’t much to do in Bridport, either.
Some information in the previous post first appeared in the December 2011 and April 2013 issues of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
The 5,000 members of Derrick Club in Edmonton, Alberta will be limited to playing nine holes this year, as Jeff Mingay’s renovation of their 6,606-yard course begins in earnest. Mingay, a Windsor, Ontario-based designer with minimalist bona fides, plans to create six new holes and redesign every surviving feature on the remaining holes. “When we’re done,” he said late last year, “the club is going to have a brand new course that will match all its other excellent facilities.” Mingay is a hands-on, boots-on-the-ground designer who apprenticed with Rod Whitman and was involved in the creation of two premier Canadian courses, Sagebrush Golf & Sporting Club in British Columbia and Cabot Links in Nova Scotia. He expects to wrap up Derrick’s makeover in the fall of 2014.
Some information in the preceding post first appeared in the January 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
Club at SpurWing, in Meridian, Idaho, recently unveiled a new driving range, and by this time next year it expects to debut a nine-hole, Damian Pascuzzo-designed “challenge” course. The new attractions are among a series of improvements initiated by Roger Anderson, the club’s new owner. “We do look at it as an opportunity to be one of the best private clubs in the valley and possibly even the entire state of Idaho,” the club’s general manager told KIVI-TV. The investments appear to be paying dividends, as SpurWing has reportedly added more than 200 members since Anderson bought it in 2011. The “challenge” course, which will consist entirely of par-3 holes, will complement the club’s 18-hole, Myron Tucker-designed layout.
If the staffers at Gary Player’s headquarters in Travelers Rest, South Carolina are counting down the days to the opening of their next course, it’s easy to understand why. The 18-hole track, described in a press release as “a bump-and-run design,” opens this fall, and it’ll be located mere steps from Player’s office in the barren commercial district at the Cliffs at Mountain Park. The 5,000-acre community is one of a chain of seven Cliffs-branded spreads in the Carolinas, each of which feature layouts created by Jack Nicklaus, Tom Fazio, Tom Jackson, or Ben Wright. It’s possible that the chain may someday add a Tiger Woods-designed course to the collection, but the Cliffs’ new owners don’t appear likely to green-light their most ambitious golf venture until certainty returns to the local real estate market.
Mike Asmundson may soon be returning to Chile, where he has five golf courses to his credit and hopes to soon break ground on a sixth. The Port Townsend, Washington-based architect has designed a second 18-hole course for one of the swankiest private clubs in Santiago, Club de Golf Francés. The 1,200-member club, which opened in 1957, has already purchased the site for the addition, plus land for roughly 100 single-family houses. “The ball is now in their court,” says Asmundson. “They have to sell [the idea] to their members.” The sale shouldn’t been too difficult, considering that Francés’ existing 18-hole layout floods whenever the Mapocho River rises above its banks.
The original version of the preceding post first appeared in the February 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
One of Arnold Palmer’s most distinctive courses is about to get a makeover. I’m talking about Tralee Golf Club in Country Kerry, Ireland, Palmer’s first commission in Europe and one that checks in at #82 on Golf Digest’s list of the top 100 golf courses outside the United States. “I may have designed the first nine,” Palmer famously said of the 7,187-yard seaside track, “but surely God designed the back nine.” Divine intervention or not, Palmer’s firm has been directed to create a new practice area for the nearly 30-year-old club, an amenity that will require several holes to be redesigned. Brandon Johnson, the Palmer associate who’s overseeing the project, says the firm “may do a substantial redesign.” If major changes occur, they wouldn’t be entirely unexpected. Though the course is widely admired, some critics only give it qualified praise. An undated review by Golflink.com, for example, commends the back nine for its “riveting views of the dunes” but complains that the course’s front nine is “spectacularly undistinguished” and has “an artificial feel.”
The original version of the preceding post first appeared in the February 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
Sometime next year, a wealthy Hungarian -- one of the nation’s richest people, according to the Budapest Business Journal -- aims to open an 18-hole golf course in Zalacsány, to attract travelers to a boutique hotel he recently purchased. Gábor Széles is his name, and he’s said to be an “industrialist,” a description that unfortunately conveys little. Széles is building the golf course on property adjacent to the Batthyány Castle Hotel, an ancient place that features 33 rooms and offers various opportunities for pampering and what its website calls “royal indulgence.” In the future, Széles will reportedly add a spa to the property, because no vacation getaway is complete without one.
Over the past few years, Pacific Links International has made headlines by buying golf properties. But next year, the company hopes to make a splash with a complex in Tianjin, China that seems conceived purely for marketing purposes. It’s called the 27 Club, and it’ll feature holes designed by “27 golf champions,” a group that includes Tom Watson, Greg Norman, Annika Sorenstam, Fred Couples, and Mark O’Meara. The firm’s website says the facility “is destined to become one of the world’s most sought-after golf experiences in Asia” and “a venue for significant global professional tournaments,” but I view it as nothing more than golf silliness, like the “signature” course at Legends Golf & Safari Resort in Limpopo Province, South Africa. The Legends concept has likely served as the inspiration for the 27 Club, as each of its holes was designed by a “legend” -- Colin Montgomerie, Bernhard Langer, Retief Goosen, K. J. Choi, and Vijay Singh among them. The 27 Club may indeed be “among the most ambitious golf project[s] conducted in Asia,” as PLI claims it is, but it isn’t likely to be among the most memorable.
It appears that the first Aborigine to earn a spot on the PGA Tour wants to put his “signature” on the planned golf course at Ayers Rock Resort in Yulara, Australia. The Australian reports that Scott Gardiner, who now lives in the United States (in Farmington, Arkansas), “has joined forces with some friends who are bidding to design a golf course near Uluru.” The Gold Coast Bulletin identifies one of the friends as Michael Clayton, the Victoria-based architect who’s probably best known for co-designing (with Tom Doak) the first course at Barnbougle Dunes in Bridport, Tasmania. Ayers Rock’s owner, the government-sponsored Indigenous Land Corporation, wants to build a “desert” course that will extend the stays of vacationers to Yulara, which is located on aboriginal lands in the Northern Territory, hundreds of miles from any sizeable city. “There is not much to do there in the eye of many tourists,” an official with an ILC affiliate told the Brisbane Times. If that’s true, hiring Gardiner and Clayton to co-design the golf course may be a wise choice. Not so long ago, there wasn’t much to do in Bridport, either.
Some information in the previous post first appeared in the December 2011 and April 2013 issues of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
The 5,000 members of Derrick Club in Edmonton, Alberta will be limited to playing nine holes this year, as Jeff Mingay’s renovation of their 6,606-yard course begins in earnest. Mingay, a Windsor, Ontario-based designer with minimalist bona fides, plans to create six new holes and redesign every surviving feature on the remaining holes. “When we’re done,” he said late last year, “the club is going to have a brand new course that will match all its other excellent facilities.” Mingay is a hands-on, boots-on-the-ground designer who apprenticed with Rod Whitman and was involved in the creation of two premier Canadian courses, Sagebrush Golf & Sporting Club in British Columbia and Cabot Links in Nova Scotia. He expects to wrap up Derrick’s makeover in the fall of 2014.
Some information in the preceding post first appeared in the January 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
Club at SpurWing, in Meridian, Idaho, recently unveiled a new driving range, and by this time next year it expects to debut a nine-hole, Damian Pascuzzo-designed “challenge” course. The new attractions are among a series of improvements initiated by Roger Anderson, the club’s new owner. “We do look at it as an opportunity to be one of the best private clubs in the valley and possibly even the entire state of Idaho,” the club’s general manager told KIVI-TV. The investments appear to be paying dividends, as SpurWing has reportedly added more than 200 members since Anderson bought it in 2011. The “challenge” course, which will consist entirely of par-3 holes, will complement the club’s 18-hole, Myron Tucker-designed layout.
If the staffers at Gary Player’s headquarters in Travelers Rest, South Carolina are counting down the days to the opening of their next course, it’s easy to understand why. The 18-hole track, described in a press release as “a bump-and-run design,” opens this fall, and it’ll be located mere steps from Player’s office in the barren commercial district at the Cliffs at Mountain Park. The 5,000-acre community is one of a chain of seven Cliffs-branded spreads in the Carolinas, each of which feature layouts created by Jack Nicklaus, Tom Fazio, Tom Jackson, or Ben Wright. It’s possible that the chain may someday add a Tiger Woods-designed course to the collection, but the Cliffs’ new owners don’t appear likely to green-light their most ambitious golf venture until certainty returns to the local real estate market.
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
How Can I Miss You If You Never Go Away?
Back in September, I intimated that I might be moving. If you’ve noticed my absence over the past week or so, it’s because I was in transit. Now, with an address in Baltimore and a freshly installed internet connection, I’m ready to write again. Also, my search for a street performance by Dustin Wong begins in earnest.
Better late than never: The legal squabbles in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil have been resolved, and construction will soon begin on the golf course for the 2016 Olympics. “I can announce happily that last weekend all the permits needed to start constructing the course [were] issued down in Rio, so that work can now proceed [apace],” Peter Dawson of the Royal & Ancient said in a comment published by Channel NewsAsia. Gil Hanse, the course’s designer and builder, has been waiting six months to hear those words. My question: Is it all downhill from here, or will there be other mountains to climb?
Many U.S. golf courses registered a welcome boost in rounds and revenues last year, but Barney Adams doesn’t believe the good times are here to stay. In fact, the straight-talking founder of Adams Golf fears that golf participation in our nation may fall by as much as 50 percent over the next 20 years. “The product is being rejected,” he declared in a recent conversation with the Desert Sun. “The fact that 30 percent of the people who played the game avidly in 2000 have walked away from it tells me there is a product rejection.” What’s more, Adams doesn’t think the key to growing the game lies in recruiting new players. Instead, he contends, the golf industry should concentrate on turning “occasional” golfers into “avid” golfers -- that is, to persuade our 25.7 million existing customers to play more. “You don’t have to invent them,” he argues. “They are already there.” In other words, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.
“Show me a hero,” F. Scott Fitzgerald once wrote, “and I will write you a tragedy.”
These words came to mind as I meditated on the decline and fall of Donald Trump in Scotland. It’s a sad story, and I fear that it’ll have a cruel, graceless ending.
Trump crossed the Atlantic with apparent good intentions, promising to build an impeccable golf course that would add to the treasures of his mother’s birthplace. By all accounts, he succeeded. But then, in a flash, glory turned to shame. As the people of Scotland laid plans to harvest the winds that blew across his seaside links, he ordered them to stop, contending that wind power was fool’s gold. When they ignored his mandate, he became aggrieved, then angry, then vengeful.
You see, for Trump, wealth and fame and power are not enough. He must also be adored. This is his fatal flaw. He’s convinced himself that he’s doing more for Scotland than Scotland is doing for him, and it galls him that the nation isn’t grateful for his service. So today, like Don Quixote, he tilts at windmills. He picks fights he cannot win and creates enemies he cannot slay.
Had Scotland not been committed to developing alternative sources of energy, this chapter of Trump’s life might have turned out differently. He might have been a hero. Instead, he’s a villain. And the tragedy is, it was his choice.
The preceding post originally appeared in the April 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
The captain of Europe’s 2014 Ryder Cup team has been tapped to oversee a makeover of the top-rated golf course in Ghana. I’m talking about Paul McGinley, the touring pro turned “signature” designer, and Achimota Golf Club in Accra, which was established (with a seven-hole track) by a group of Scots in 1934. The renovation, which has been in the works since 2011 (if not before), will feature “a major redesign and upgrade” of the 18-hole track, according to Peace FM Online, the intent being “to bring the course to world-class standards.” McGinley, who takes his design cues from Harry Colt and Donald Ross, believes that other commissions are sure to come because Ghana’s courses have been “left to rack and ruin over the last few years.”
Some information in the preceding post originally appeared in the February 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
Not surprisingly, security will be especially tight at this year’s U.S. Open championship. In the wake of the deadly bombings at the Boston Marathon, the U.S. Golf Association has checked and double-checked its safety procedures and is taking special precautions to ensure the well-being of the 200,000 spectators expected to attend the week-long event at Merion Golf Club in June. “We’re confident that the plans we have and the manpower we have are more than sufficient to cover the crowds and any issues that could arise up there,” a local chief of police told WHYY News. The USGA is working with local and state police departments plus officials from three federal agencies: Homeland Security, the FBI, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives. Better safe than sorry.
The United States Golf Association has also addressed a potential public relations problem associated with the U.S. Open. As I reported a couple of weeks ago, carpenters’ and stagehands’ unions in the Philadelphia area had set up a picket line at Merion Golf Club because one of the USGA’s vendors was using foreign labor instead of local workers. To end the protest, the USGA has agreed to hire roughly 40 unionized workers for various construction projects. “We’re proud to have reached a good agreement with the unions and look forward to having [their] local members help ensure Merion is ready to host the very best U.S. Open,” a USGA spokesman told the Philadelphia Inquirer. And to think, it only took a little negative publicity to make it happen.
Better late than never: The legal squabbles in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil have been resolved, and construction will soon begin on the golf course for the 2016 Olympics. “I can announce happily that last weekend all the permits needed to start constructing the course [were] issued down in Rio, so that work can now proceed [apace],” Peter Dawson of the Royal & Ancient said in a comment published by Channel NewsAsia. Gil Hanse, the course’s designer and builder, has been waiting six months to hear those words. My question: Is it all downhill from here, or will there be other mountains to climb?
Many U.S. golf courses registered a welcome boost in rounds and revenues last year, but Barney Adams doesn’t believe the good times are here to stay. In fact, the straight-talking founder of Adams Golf fears that golf participation in our nation may fall by as much as 50 percent over the next 20 years. “The product is being rejected,” he declared in a recent conversation with the Desert Sun. “The fact that 30 percent of the people who played the game avidly in 2000 have walked away from it tells me there is a product rejection.” What’s more, Adams doesn’t think the key to growing the game lies in recruiting new players. Instead, he contends, the golf industry should concentrate on turning “occasional” golfers into “avid” golfers -- that is, to persuade our 25.7 million existing customers to play more. “You don’t have to invent them,” he argues. “They are already there.” In other words, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.
“Show me a hero,” F. Scott Fitzgerald once wrote, “and I will write you a tragedy.”
These words came to mind as I meditated on the decline and fall of Donald Trump in Scotland. It’s a sad story, and I fear that it’ll have a cruel, graceless ending.
Trump crossed the Atlantic with apparent good intentions, promising to build an impeccable golf course that would add to the treasures of his mother’s birthplace. By all accounts, he succeeded. But then, in a flash, glory turned to shame. As the people of Scotland laid plans to harvest the winds that blew across his seaside links, he ordered them to stop, contending that wind power was fool’s gold. When they ignored his mandate, he became aggrieved, then angry, then vengeful.
You see, for Trump, wealth and fame and power are not enough. He must also be adored. This is his fatal flaw. He’s convinced himself that he’s doing more for Scotland than Scotland is doing for him, and it galls him that the nation isn’t grateful for his service. So today, like Don Quixote, he tilts at windmills. He picks fights he cannot win and creates enemies he cannot slay.
Had Scotland not been committed to developing alternative sources of energy, this chapter of Trump’s life might have turned out differently. He might have been a hero. Instead, he’s a villain. And the tragedy is, it was his choice.
The preceding post originally appeared in the April 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
The captain of Europe’s 2014 Ryder Cup team has been tapped to oversee a makeover of the top-rated golf course in Ghana. I’m talking about Paul McGinley, the touring pro turned “signature” designer, and Achimota Golf Club in Accra, which was established (with a seven-hole track) by a group of Scots in 1934. The renovation, which has been in the works since 2011 (if not before), will feature “a major redesign and upgrade” of the 18-hole track, according to Peace FM Online, the intent being “to bring the course to world-class standards.” McGinley, who takes his design cues from Harry Colt and Donald Ross, believes that other commissions are sure to come because Ghana’s courses have been “left to rack and ruin over the last few years.”
Some information in the preceding post originally appeared in the February 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
Not surprisingly, security will be especially tight at this year’s U.S. Open championship. In the wake of the deadly bombings at the Boston Marathon, the U.S. Golf Association has checked and double-checked its safety procedures and is taking special precautions to ensure the well-being of the 200,000 spectators expected to attend the week-long event at Merion Golf Club in June. “We’re confident that the plans we have and the manpower we have are more than sufficient to cover the crowds and any issues that could arise up there,” a local chief of police told WHYY News. The USGA is working with local and state police departments plus officials from three federal agencies: Homeland Security, the FBI, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives. Better safe than sorry.
The United States Golf Association has also addressed a potential public relations problem associated with the U.S. Open. As I reported a couple of weeks ago, carpenters’ and stagehands’ unions in the Philadelphia area had set up a picket line at Merion Golf Club because one of the USGA’s vendors was using foreign labor instead of local workers. To end the protest, the USGA has agreed to hire roughly 40 unionized workers for various construction projects. “We’re proud to have reached a good agreement with the unions and look forward to having [their] local members help ensure Merion is ready to host the very best U.S. Open,” a USGA spokesman told the Philadelphia Inquirer. And to think, it only took a little negative publicity to make it happen.
Wednesday, April 17, 2013
morocco Kyle Phillips Makes Alliances
Will a Moroccan golf developer’s second community in Marrakech be a mirror image of its first?
Alliances Group’s 475-acre Al Maaden community, in the foothills of the Atlas Mountains, opened in 2010. Like most traditional, Western-style golf communities, it features an 18-hole golf course flanked by houses, a few hotels, a shopping area, and the usual recreational amenities.
Alliances’ forthcoming 625-acre community, Akenza, appears to be cut from the same cloth. It’ll have a golf course, 1,050 villas and apartments, three hotels, a shopping area, and recreational attractions.
There may even be some similarities in the golf courses. The 18-hole track at Akenza, like the one at Al Maaden, will be designed by Kyle Phillips, an architect based in Granite Bay, California.
The course at Akenza will be Alliances’ third solo effort in Morocco. Its first, at the Port Lixus golf community in Larache, opened in 2009. If you’re wondering about the community’s the master plan, it does indeed closely resemble the ones created for Al Maaden and Akenza. One difference: Port Lixus’ 18-hole track was designed by Enrique Saenger, a Spanish architect.
Alliances hasn’t yet set a date for Akenza’s groundbreaking. “Residential sales have slowed, so the developers are going to park it for a while,” says Phillips.
The course at Akenza will be Phillips’ third in Morocco. His 18-hole track at the Taghazout golf community in Agadir, a coastal city, is under construction and expected to open next year. Whereas most golf communities line their courses with houses – Phillips calls them “18 sausage links engulfed by development” – the course at Taghazout will be a walker-friendly “core” layout. “It’s going to be a pretty neat golf course,” he believes.
It’s worth noting that Alliances is a minority investor in Taghazout.
The original version of this post first appeared in the February 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
Alliances Group’s 475-acre Al Maaden community, in the foothills of the Atlas Mountains, opened in 2010. Like most traditional, Western-style golf communities, it features an 18-hole golf course flanked by houses, a few hotels, a shopping area, and the usual recreational amenities.
Alliances’ forthcoming 625-acre community, Akenza, appears to be cut from the same cloth. It’ll have a golf course, 1,050 villas and apartments, three hotels, a shopping area, and recreational attractions.
There may even be some similarities in the golf courses. The 18-hole track at Akenza, like the one at Al Maaden, will be designed by Kyle Phillips, an architect based in Granite Bay, California.
The course at Akenza will be Alliances’ third solo effort in Morocco. Its first, at the Port Lixus golf community in Larache, opened in 2009. If you’re wondering about the community’s the master plan, it does indeed closely resemble the ones created for Al Maaden and Akenza. One difference: Port Lixus’ 18-hole track was designed by Enrique Saenger, a Spanish architect.
Alliances hasn’t yet set a date for Akenza’s groundbreaking. “Residential sales have slowed, so the developers are going to park it for a while,” says Phillips.
The course at Akenza will be Phillips’ third in Morocco. His 18-hole track at the Taghazout golf community in Agadir, a coastal city, is under construction and expected to open next year. Whereas most golf communities line their courses with houses – Phillips calls them “18 sausage links engulfed by development” – the course at Taghazout will be a walker-friendly “core” layout. “It’s going to be a pretty neat golf course,” he believes.
It’s worth noting that Alliances is a minority investor in Taghazout.
The original version of this post first appeared in the February 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
Sunday, April 14, 2013
The Week That Was, april 14, 2013
Most people in golf development may still be beating a path to China or India, but our industry’s true emerging hot spot may be Africa. “I actually see near-term and significant activity in many countries throughout Africa,” Gary Player declared in a recent conversation with the National. In particular, Player is cashing checks from clients in Morocco, Gabon, Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa.
Montenegro’s most ambitious golf developer has sold out to one of its minority partners. Boka Group, a Bahamas-based firm led by John Gvozdenovic Kennedy and John James, has acquired the assets of LPGD Company LLC. LPGD, a Dutch entity, had hoped to build 27-hole golf complexes in Kavac, along the Bay of Kotor, and in Danilovgrad, a northwestern suburb of Podgorica, as well as a resort with six courses in of Seljanovo. So far, Boka Group has revealed plans to build just one of the courses, the one in Kavac. (LPGD had named it Tivat National Golf Club.) “This premier region has been crying out for a golf course,” Kennedy said in a press release. The course is scheduled to open in 2016, and Boka Group will use LPGD’s architect, Derbyshire, England-based Steve Marnoch. Depending on how quickly Orascom Development Holding proceeds with its Gary Player-designed course at the Luštica Bay resort community in nearby Tivat, it could be Montenegro’s first golf property.
Some information in this post first appeared in the April 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
Killarney Golf & Fishing Club, which hosted the Irish Open in 2010 and 2011, continues to sink deeper into a financial hole. Last fall, Killarney was forced to sell one of its three golf courses. Last week, its lines of credit were cut off, and they “will not be restored,” its lenders say. On top of that, according to the Independent, this year the club has lost 220 members and expects its income from greens fees to fall by 20 percent. Add it all up, and you get a club that’s effectively up the river without a paddle. To stave off a complete collapse, Killarney needs to renegotiate the terms of its agreements with its workers. “We need to act now to secure the long-term future of the club, which, as a top-quality tourist attraction, is a great asset for Killarney and Kerry,” the club’s general manager said recently. But how many concessions is labor willing to make? And will they be enough?
Four years ago, while the nation was being suffocated by Great Recession, all of golf’s vital signs had gone negative: sales of golf equipment were down, the number of annual rounds played was falling, and some of the PGA Tour’s biggest corporate benefactors were collecting TARP money from the federal government. “The sport’s bubble seemingly had burst,” writes Patrick Rishe of Forbes. But that was then. Now, Rishe says, golf is experiencing “a financial bounce-back.” Its television ratings are up, its talented young stars are becoming marketable, and the PGA Tour, which is pocketing a record $800 million annually from television contracts, has secured title sponsors for all 42 of its tournaments. Rishe’s conclusion: “Today, PGA Tour officials should be buying Frescas for corporate sponsors in jubilation for the relatively swift financial recovery from trying economic times.” The nagging question: How long before the good times return to the development sector?
The 269 golf properties on Long Island, in New York, are “scrambling for customers,” says Newsday, due to “overbuilding, a weak economy, and shifting leisure pursuits.” The decline is reflected in the number of rounds played at the six state-owned facilities on the island. In 1998, the newspaper says, 576,850 rounds were played at those courses. By 2008, the number had fallen to 466,343, and last year the state rang up just 369,595 rounds. “We’re in the same situation as many places throughout the country,” a real estate appraiser told the newspaper. Given such an unfortunate trend, one might think that Long Island has lost a lot of its golf courses. However, Newsday reports that only 10 golf facilities on the island have closed since 2004, and one of them -- Middle Bay Country Club in Oceanside -- is about to reopen.
Is Escalante Golf ready to resume its spending spree? The Fort Worth, Texas-based company has agreed to buy four prominent golf properties in metropolitan Houston from Redstone Companies, according to the Houston Chronicle. The group consists of Redstone Golf Club, BlackHorse Golf Club, Shadow Hawk Golf Club, and Houstonian Golf & Country Club. With the Redstone collection, Escalante now owns 14 golf properties in six U.S. states. The company went on a buying binge in 2011, when it acquired three properties in Florida (among them, Black Diamond Ranch in Lecanto) and one in Louisiana. In 2012, it added just one course to its portfolio, Golf Club at Dove Mountain in Marana, Arizona. But it’s started off 2013 with a bang, and it’s worth noting that Redstone also owns Vanderbilt Legends Club, a 36-hole facility in Franklin, Tennessee.
The city of Columbus, Ohio has pulled the plug on Walnut Hill Golf Course, a nine-hole track that’s been on the critical list for years. Walnut Hill opened in 1955, as an 18-hole course. Its owners, a group of residential developers, later shrunk it in half and then donated it to the city in 1974. In recent years, the track has been among the worst performers in the city’s seven-course portfolio, and in 2012 it lost almost $113,000. By closing it, the city believes it can return its golf operation to profitability, a goal that’s within plain sight. As a group, says the Columbus Dispatch, the city’s courses lost just over $63,000 last year.
Every day, golf gets a little more popular in India. But Callaway’s salespeople in the world’s second most-populous nation believe that what India really needs is a celebrity endorser who can command attention and instantly turn on millions to the pleasures of golf. “For us, businesswise, two things that could change the face of golf in the country are if it is taken up by a Bollywood star or a cricketer,” the company’s director of marketing told Deutsche Welle. Until that person emerges, Callaway will have to let its products speak for themselves.
Is something divine happening at a golf course in County Carlow, Ireland? An Irish newspaper reports that “people are flocking” to Carrigleade Golf Course to catch a glimpse of “a vision of the Virgin Mary cradling an infant” that appeared, seemingly overnight, on one of the nearby mountains. “We have never noticed it until now,” the course’s owner told a local newspaper, “It’s very strange.” I’ll say it’s strange. I thought Jesus and Moses were the only heavenly beings who were drawn to golf.
Montenegro’s most ambitious golf developer has sold out to one of its minority partners. Boka Group, a Bahamas-based firm led by John Gvozdenovic Kennedy and John James, has acquired the assets of LPGD Company LLC. LPGD, a Dutch entity, had hoped to build 27-hole golf complexes in Kavac, along the Bay of Kotor, and in Danilovgrad, a northwestern suburb of Podgorica, as well as a resort with six courses in of Seljanovo. So far, Boka Group has revealed plans to build just one of the courses, the one in Kavac. (LPGD had named it Tivat National Golf Club.) “This premier region has been crying out for a golf course,” Kennedy said in a press release. The course is scheduled to open in 2016, and Boka Group will use LPGD’s architect, Derbyshire, England-based Steve Marnoch. Depending on how quickly Orascom Development Holding proceeds with its Gary Player-designed course at the Luštica Bay resort community in nearby Tivat, it could be Montenegro’s first golf property.
Some information in this post first appeared in the April 2013 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.
Killarney Golf & Fishing Club, which hosted the Irish Open in 2010 and 2011, continues to sink deeper into a financial hole. Last fall, Killarney was forced to sell one of its three golf courses. Last week, its lines of credit were cut off, and they “will not be restored,” its lenders say. On top of that, according to the Independent, this year the club has lost 220 members and expects its income from greens fees to fall by 20 percent. Add it all up, and you get a club that’s effectively up the river without a paddle. To stave off a complete collapse, Killarney needs to renegotiate the terms of its agreements with its workers. “We need to act now to secure the long-term future of the club, which, as a top-quality tourist attraction, is a great asset for Killarney and Kerry,” the club’s general manager said recently. But how many concessions is labor willing to make? And will they be enough?
Four years ago, while the nation was being suffocated by Great Recession, all of golf’s vital signs had gone negative: sales of golf equipment were down, the number of annual rounds played was falling, and some of the PGA Tour’s biggest corporate benefactors were collecting TARP money from the federal government. “The sport’s bubble seemingly had burst,” writes Patrick Rishe of Forbes. But that was then. Now, Rishe says, golf is experiencing “a financial bounce-back.” Its television ratings are up, its talented young stars are becoming marketable, and the PGA Tour, which is pocketing a record $800 million annually from television contracts, has secured title sponsors for all 42 of its tournaments. Rishe’s conclusion: “Today, PGA Tour officials should be buying Frescas for corporate sponsors in jubilation for the relatively swift financial recovery from trying economic times.” The nagging question: How long before the good times return to the development sector?
The 269 golf properties on Long Island, in New York, are “scrambling for customers,” says Newsday, due to “overbuilding, a weak economy, and shifting leisure pursuits.” The decline is reflected in the number of rounds played at the six state-owned facilities on the island. In 1998, the newspaper says, 576,850 rounds were played at those courses. By 2008, the number had fallen to 466,343, and last year the state rang up just 369,595 rounds. “We’re in the same situation as many places throughout the country,” a real estate appraiser told the newspaper. Given such an unfortunate trend, one might think that Long Island has lost a lot of its golf courses. However, Newsday reports that only 10 golf facilities on the island have closed since 2004, and one of them -- Middle Bay Country Club in Oceanside -- is about to reopen.
Is Escalante Golf ready to resume its spending spree? The Fort Worth, Texas-based company has agreed to buy four prominent golf properties in metropolitan Houston from Redstone Companies, according to the Houston Chronicle. The group consists of Redstone Golf Club, BlackHorse Golf Club, Shadow Hawk Golf Club, and Houstonian Golf & Country Club. With the Redstone collection, Escalante now owns 14 golf properties in six U.S. states. The company went on a buying binge in 2011, when it acquired three properties in Florida (among them, Black Diamond Ranch in Lecanto) and one in Louisiana. In 2012, it added just one course to its portfolio, Golf Club at Dove Mountain in Marana, Arizona. But it’s started off 2013 with a bang, and it’s worth noting that Redstone also owns Vanderbilt Legends Club, a 36-hole facility in Franklin, Tennessee.
The city of Columbus, Ohio has pulled the plug on Walnut Hill Golf Course, a nine-hole track that’s been on the critical list for years. Walnut Hill opened in 1955, as an 18-hole course. Its owners, a group of residential developers, later shrunk it in half and then donated it to the city in 1974. In recent years, the track has been among the worst performers in the city’s seven-course portfolio, and in 2012 it lost almost $113,000. By closing it, the city believes it can return its golf operation to profitability, a goal that’s within plain sight. As a group, says the Columbus Dispatch, the city’s courses lost just over $63,000 last year.
Every day, golf gets a little more popular in India. But Callaway’s salespeople in the world’s second most-populous nation believe that what India really needs is a celebrity endorser who can command attention and instantly turn on millions to the pleasures of golf. “For us, businesswise, two things that could change the face of golf in the country are if it is taken up by a Bollywood star or a cricketer,” the company’s director of marketing told Deutsche Welle. Until that person emerges, Callaway will have to let its products speak for themselves.
Is something divine happening at a golf course in County Carlow, Ireland? An Irish newspaper reports that “people are flocking” to Carrigleade Golf Course to catch a glimpse of “a vision of the Virgin Mary cradling an infant” that appeared, seemingly overnight, on one of the nearby mountains. “We have never noticed it until now,” the course’s owner told a local newspaper, “It’s very strange.” I’ll say it’s strange. I thought Jesus and Moses were the only heavenly beings who were drawn to golf.
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