WHY COURSES FAIL Poor management policies and entrenched attitudes by golf course officials, combined with public need and private profiteering, usually force the end of a golf course by DOUGLAS LUTZ Envious eyes view golf's open green spreads as territory fertile for acquisition. As seen by the public sector, those prime lands that green the urban landscape unjustifiably support the sporting activities of only a handful of people. Better use could be made of these acreages. They could produce the much-needed income to help fill local govern- ment coffers; help ease the housing shortage; expand crowded college facilities or provide more macadam rib- bons to relieve traffic clogged highways. Private needs give way to public concerns; the few must move over for the many. Again and again the same story is told. The vulnerability of the golfing community lies in the inherent conflict between the private and public sectors. Ex- pansion is an American obsession, belied by hypocritical sentiment. Educational institutions extol the ideal of an edu- cation for everyone while unceremoniously acquiring pre- cious greenswards. The corporation, with a little help from industrial park promoters, dangles the lure of more jobs and less taxes, and ends the life of yet another golf course. Housing contractors, mindful of the housing shortage, bull- doze a once-venerable course, and build houses too expen- sive for most Americans. Highway departments insist more roads are needed to ease traffic-choked highways; slash across a fairway, thus creating more traffic. To all these special interest groups, the golf course repre- lasted two years, and Orchard Hills was gone forever. Land acquired to build Overpeck All the courses GC at the other end of the county in pictured here Teaneck, N.J., is traversed by Over- have failed, due peck Creek. Heavy spring rains, to public apathy, always a hazard in this part of the industrial state, cause serious flooding and ulti- expansion, mate damage to the new course. Why academic the county did not acquire Orchard encroachment or Hills as a public course and have the high-rise school built at the Overpeck site re- building. Lake mains a mystery. Hopatcong Orchard Hills was an excellent hilly (bottom, opposite course, one of the best in northern page; photo 4), New Jersey. Overpeck, by compari- closed two years Z son, is flat, dull, almost devoid of ago. Valley View trees. Following heavy rains, it is vir- LUT (photo 1) has S tually unplayable, causing many days become of uncollectable green fees. headquarters site A principal villain contributing to of the National the demise of golf courses has always DOUGLA Biscuit Y been the educational sector. In New Company. B York City's borough of Queens, the S Ferncliffe 78-year-old fairways of the former (photos 2, 6) fell Oakland CC are hidden under the victim to Queensborough Community College industrial park campus. Any reminder of its past glory acquisition. as a truly unique example of old- Glen Oaks PHOTOGRAPH fashioned design and topography can (photo 3) fell only be found in the clubhouse, which to luxury housing. Queensborough Community College (photo 5) now occupies still remains. That, too, is an alteration the former site of Oakland CC. Unique architectural features built into all these courses of its former self; it was rebuilt after a can never be duplicated. fire in 1912. Currently used for special functions, faculty dining and student club activities, this once-proud Dutch sents an easy solution to pressing, strong a protest might be expected if Colonial style mansion now looks public needs. the local government begins condem- down on masses of students who tramp Who supports a golf course when it nation proceedings against a commer- unknowingly across the plateau of is threatened by an expressway of cial golf course that may be barely Oakland's highest hill, a hill that once doubtful routing? Why doesn't the holding its own? Its position in the supported the incomparable ninth and community appreciate the value of a community as a fine example of an 18th greens. These were majestic golf course enough to fight for its sur- outmoded style of architecture does uphill finishing holes that terminated vival? Perhaps officials are short- not sway those determined to secure in terraced layers below the beckoning sighted. That the golf course has stood the land for education. Interests of the umbrella-decorated outdoor refresh- on its superb landscape for 50 years or very youth for whom a scholastic at- ment area. more has no bearing on their thinking. mosphere will be created, as surely as The acquisition of the property re- But the public doesn't attempt to alter the plans are announced, are soon to ceived an assist from another, larger official thinking. Why? What is the be denied on another level: the elimi- villain. The city in its zealous cam- golf course to most people? nation of a recreation facility that for paign to ring itself with new and better In their minds, they see Private, No many years attracted the community's roadways, condemned part of Oakland Trespassing, Keep Out, Members young as players and as caddies. Ironi- in 1958 to make room for housing Only signs. The meaning of these are cally, in the same county and concur- displaced from the path of the then- clear; the public is not wanted. The rently with initial bulldozing opera- building Long Island Expressway golf course is interested only in main- tions at the existing course, ground is (now called the world's largest parking taining its privacy, its elitism. Despite broken for a new 18 hole course. Hy- lot). Doubtless, other open territory in the popularity of golf, the golfing com- pothetical? Not by a long drive. the immediate vicinity should have munity has alienated itself from the In 1968, Bergen County, N.J., con- been the choice for relocation, but the community at large. Its welfare, no demned Orchard Hills in Paramus, and city government at that time was not longer of concern to the public, is easi- Bergen County Community College particularly disposed to any consider- ly sacrificed. began building on nine of the holes. ations of ecology, preservation of a When a county needs a college for The other nine were to be operated golf course or the wishes of the golfing its education-hungry children, how under a five-year lease. The lease fraternity. There was, in fact, a blatant continued COURSES FAIL continued practice green for student golfers. In a five to six mile square of disregard of opinion conflicting with However, any interest on the part of Queens, during a short 20-year stretch, officialdom's road-building fanati- the institution seems remote. six wonderful, old courses were wiped cism. , The section of Queens where St. out—Oakland, Pomonok, Hillcrest, In 1959, Queensborough Communi- Johns and Queensborough are located Bayside and Idlewild, as well as St. ty College took over the remainder of was also home for Pomonok and Bay- Albans, a private club in the communi- Oakland CC, which was in extremely side Golf Clubs. Neither course could ty it was named after, that became a shaky financial condition as a semi- stem the tide of the housing explosion United States Naval hospital during private course. The inevitability of that took place in Queens. Earlier ver- World War II. progress, one supposes, stifled any sions of garden apartments, forerun- The marshy shores of Jamaica Bay resistance to the takeover by Oak- ners of today's condominiums, and were once home for the Idlewild GC. land's management, even though golf one and two family brick homes satu- A few blocks in from the old Sunrise in New York City had begun its popu- rated the landscape in the Fresh Mead- Highway, now part and parcel of the larity swing. ows area squeezing out both Pomonok Belt Parkway, behind scattered rows Clearview, a city-owned course, and Bayside. Additionally, Bayside of frame houses reachable along reed- only three miles north of Oakland, had was in the path of the projected Clear- framed rutted roadways, Idlewild's been establishing records as the most view Expressway, which was ulti- flags fluttered above tall stalks of popular public course in the world. mately to lead traffic arteries to and swamp cattails. In this isolated setting, Oakland should have been the logical from the planned Throggs Neck New York City had a fine example of a candidate for the overflow from Clear- Bridge. seaside links. A goodly share of hy- view. Instead, that distinction went to continued on page 51 infamous Dyker Beach in Brooklyn. Granted, the full impact of public golf had not as yet descended on the CHECK YOUR VULNERABILITY city: the managements at many New Here are some danger signs and est distance betwen two points is a York area clubs were then unaware of some positive actions to consider. straight line. Cutting off the corner the potential income soon to be real- • Know what is happening to land of your course as an expedient path ized, so no effort was made to hold development in your immediate for a roadway is too simple a solu- onto golfing facilities. Clearview, as area. Farms subdivided for small tion, which you should be prepared an example of short-sighted manage- housing complexes usually mean to rebut with creative alternatives— ment, had been sadly neglected; a fac- more of the same. Population assuredly not with anger. tor that drove golfers away. This, plus spreads into your general area • Watch the political arena care- Oakland's crippling tax burdens, fin- should trigger percentage in- fully.