Didnt mean it as to come off as a "thanks for finally reporting". You do a great job! Just happy to hear another public one, especially a public one that may be less than $300. Hopefully a public reno Im personally excited for will be available for discussion soon 😁.

I agree there's a macrotrend toward premium and private, especially in new builds. But just to be fair, I should point out that I keep pretty close tabs on public golf course development week to week in Design Notebook and Chocolate Drops. There's usually at least something in every edition. In the past few weeks we've relayed news about happenings at Portsea (a club that offers public tee times), Wild Horse, Proving Ground/Dunham Hills, Buffalo Dunes, Maggie Hathaway, Downbonnie, etc. I also devoted a DN to public course projects toward the beginning of this year: https://www.thefriedegg.com/articles/design-notebook-2025-public-golf-course-projectsThe overall trends are concerning, but announcements regarding new/renovated public courses are less rare right now than you might think.

Many good public courses started out as private courses.

To expand on the caddie point, my caddies at Lido were a +4 who just regained am status and a young HS kid who qualified for states and trying to qualify for USGA events. I am an 8-10 hcp who does not hit the ball that far. They were giving me lines based on my game to get me the lowest score, but asking them how they would play it with a very different game was really enlightening especially on such a strategic course.

Nice to hear one public announcement. The barrage of hyper private is getting harder to get excited for.

Is there a quick checklist you can give someone learning about golf architecture on how to appreciate a golf course. Do you like Geoff Shackelford's R-E-D system?

Beau Welling is doing something similar in Vermont at Stowe Country Club, taking a nice private course and totally redoing it to turn it fully private (and way more expensive than most other privates in area from what I understand). Not sure if involved with private equity but wouldnt be surprised. Depressing trend.

Love this, thanks for the thoughts!

Some thoughts on this! 1) Buy a yardage guide if available to think about how the hole sets up and provide some thinking of what the hole is trying to do 2) When the hole is finished, try to look at it from behind the green back to the tee and think what different pin positions might do3) Hit some extra putts to different possible pin positions to see different ways slope can play into the green4) If you have a caddie, talk to them how they would play the hole, especially if they are a good player to talk through different slopes and different ideas - I just did this a lot at Lido and elsewhere in Wisconsin and provided a lot of interesting extra insights.

As someone who is newer to appreciating golf architecture, but also wants to simply play good golf, what are some tips you have for blending appreciating the strategy of a course while also just trying to hit your shot. For example, if you're playing a course for the first and potentially only time, I go in trying to just "take it all in," yet when I step up to the first tee, I'm thinking about targets, swing, etc. and not the strategy of the hole, green complexes, etc. Can it be done? Does it get easier to do both over time? Curious your thoughts.