Western Boundary

Holes 17 and 18 were originally included in this plan, and approved in a vote by the membership.  However, a subsequent petition and vote by the members removed holes 17 and 18 from the plan.  Below is the plan that was originally approved, but has been shelved.

With the land sale our 17th and 18th holes have been compromised.  Where we once had no fear of going out of bounds or hitting a house, we now have OB 15 feet from the right edge of the fairway on 18, 80 feet from the center of the fairway, backyards are only 130 feet away and homes 150 feet.  The standard safety margin for golf courses is 250 feet from the center of the fairway, which is what we have on #4 and #12.  We are now well below that on 18.  Although hitting a house may not be an issue, hitting someone in their backyard could be tragic and we believe worth trying to avoid.

The 2nd factor impacting the need for changes to our closing holes is the visual impact of the homes.  For the first 16 holes of our course we experience a lovely isolated feel where the neighbors do not come into play nor are they even seen.  We now have 30 backyards within 120 feet of our 18th hole alone, with an other 20 along the 17th hole.  By simply shifting the 17th and 18th fairways east, away from the homes, we will have space to add ridges, trees and other vegetation to help hide the homes.

Lastly, our 18th hole is not a great hole.  The original layout had it as a par 4 with the green near the 14th green, in the middle of the current fairway.  Ed Sawyer selected this location as the slope of the land past the original green location doesn't work well with the shot.  The hole was stretched out to a par 5 in the 1950s and our former upper practice green was the second location for the 18th green.  Sometime in the 1970s the 18th green was moved to it's third and current location and introduced a blind 2nd shot as well as a hill slope that works against the shot.  

We believe we can make significant improvements to our 17th and 18th holes and make the course better as well as safer.

Our Western Boundary plan is not radical and far more elegant than the plans and ideas we got from other architects.  Our plan from Bob Vincent, a member and former architect who is doing this work for free, is simple - we simply shift #17 and #18 a bit away from the new property line and switch the pars.  So 17 becomes a par 5 and the 18th hole becomes a par 4.  Shifting these two holes east has some impact on #14 and #15, hence us presenting these 4 holes as the 'Western Boundary'.   

Here is the conceptual plan:

And here is an image of the proposed conceptual plans overlaid on aerial imagery from 2023.  As you can see the center of the 18th fairway is simply where the cart path is today and the center of the 17th fairway on the drive is left of the left fairway bunker.  We keep the 18th green as is and the biggest change is a new green for the 17th hole.

Related to the above changes will be new longer tees on #9, #12 and #13 to more than offset the loss of yardage on # 15.  In fact, total yardage from the longest tees should go up from our current 6,512 to 6,681, an increase of 169 yards.

Here is a video that shows virtualizations of the closing 5 holes with the proposed enhancements.

Click here for Hole 18