Golf Course Architecture - Issue 60, April 2020

48 T hese days most of our work in Europe consists of remodelling older golf courses. Fortunately, we still design and supervise the construction of new courses, although mostly outside Europe. There is nothing more frustrating than the remodelling of a golf course, as most clubs have 600 members that all think they are golf architects. I always ask them: why did you hire me if you can do it better yourselves? The reason is simple: they must have somebody to blame for all the unavoidable criticism that will follow the remodelling! The first thing I tell them is that they should stop altering the course at the whim of every successive president, captain, or course committee. Especially as many presidents, captains, and golf course committees want to be remembered, so they install a monument to themselves on the course during their tenure. And what is the easiest monument to construct? A bunker! And it does not matter where! Just install a great big bunker! In fact, the more incongruous and misplaced it is, the more they will be remembered! Especially as most often these bunkers are installed without any precise purpose or strategic value whatsoever, except “to give the line”, “to enhance the course aesthetically” or “for the eye”. I never really understood such logic, but it seems to be a favourite reasoning. We must never forget that the players we should be catering to are the 18-54 handicappers and they are all extremely attracted to that great fantastic white sand (silica of course) as they think that they are on holiday in the Caribbean. And why not a nice pot bunker? Which fits into the Central European golf course landscape like an igloo in the Sahara Peter Harradine rages about the presence of unnecessary bunkers on golf courses PETER HARRADINE Useless monuments: the scourge of golf OP INION