Would be interested to get your thoughts on something I have been turning over in my head for a while: Is playing the holes of a course in the correct order essential to experiencing it as intended?Prompted in part by the the Women's PGA, where as we know the final holes of each nine were switched. Does this fundamentally alter the ebb and flow of the course as Hanse intended it? The fact this needed to be done at a course designed for championship golf is, as noted by Meg and others, pretty poor.It also occurred to me when reading Brett Hochstein's piece in the newsletter (which was a delightful change of pace), as to whether for recreational players, playing the holes other than 1 - 18 gives you the appropriate balance of tough and easy holes in the right sequence, or whether it really matters.I guess the practice of pros going off 1 and 10 at the same time is not going to change, but it seems it might present a different test. As a side note, I also think arranging tee times through anything other than a blind draw is an abomination, but that maybe marks me out as a potential cadet for the Fair Police. I seem to remember Andy discussing Shinecock on the US Open pod with Trevor and the extreme difficulty of the start to the back nine there. Whatever about tournament fairness, does this materially impact a player's experience of their round if they get punched in the face in the first half hour rather than the hackneyed 'gentle handshake'?I know some places seem to get away with it (Royal Melbourne composite springs to mind), but would like to hear what you think.

Can't edit! Should say nice semi-private (really public) course

I belong to a 9 hole club in west central Illinois. It's nothing fancy, but it's a pretty good little track for a town of 4,000 and membership in the 150 range. Built in 1957 you can imagine that we are now overgrown with the trees planted over the years, many of which were planted without thinking 30-40 years out. For the sake of our turf and playability how do I convince our membership that significant tree removal is the way to go. Sidenote, we've begun the process naturally with about 50 ash trees succumbing to the Emerald Ash Bore Beetle, 35 of which we removed last winter. I've begun to put together my own 'Master Plan' for the course, but as you can imagine we do most of our work through volunteer efforts. Any suggestions on how to create buy-in would be greatly appreciated.

While I would like more affordable public options (what even is affordable anymore) I am not totally against the premium destination resort. I look at it as a once, maybe twice experience and it's nice to be able to play great courses in cool locations.I do worry however about PE getting involved. As someone who works in an industry with plenty of PE involvement, they have very different goals than Dream Golf or Cabot. Most PE is going to want to pretty it up, jam up the tee sheets with premium tee times, then flip it to someone else to manage long term. Depending on how long they hold a course/resort, I can only see negatives as they begin to cut costs longer term in order to make the return they need.

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?