EarthGolf

The National Golf Foundation reported that more golf courses closed in 2007 than opened, a copy of what happened in 2006. Below is their press release.
CLOSURES OUTPACE OPENINGS IN 2007
NGF has identified 113 golf courses, in 18-hole equivalents, that opened for business in the U.S. in 2007. During the same period, there were 121.5 golf [...]

Popularity: 100% [?]

Orchard Hills Golf Course in Waukegan, Illinois will soon trade its flying golf balls for flying soccer balls after the Park District’s board voted 4-1 to close the course and redevelop it as a sports complex.
District officials spent nearly $1 million studying whether the soccer, baseball and softball fields could be built on a lakefront [...]

Popularity: 97% [?]

It was only a matter of time, and it happened at a course that is getting serious consideration for a U.S. Open. Erin Hills in Erin, Wisconsin held a tournament over the weekend for a group of 38 club pros and amateurs with the course set at 8,400 yards. Now, it was for 19 holes [...]

Popularity: 20% [?]

This is an interesting environmental note. The course had been using gray water to irrigate its fairways.
Sales and marketing director Tiffany Nelson said the root structure on the course has deteriorated since 2000, when it stopped irrigating with Central Arizona Project water and switched to reclaimed water.
The reclaimed water has high salt content, which [...]

Popularity: 16% [?]

The home of golf is becoming not so sweet for both existing and proposed golf courses. A new golf course and proposed junior golf facility were rejected in Cumbrian, which is in northwest England.
Mr Cullingford said there was “no demonstrable deficiency in the provision of golf courses either in the Lake District National Park or [...]

Popularity: 10% [?]

Ray Tennenbaum writes an interesting article for Golf Business Magazine on the sorry state of the golf industry, which has joined the residential real estate industry in the toilet. (Welcome - the water’s @&$#!) In any event, the article is an interesting one and spurred a great discussion at GolfClubAtlas.com on the subject. (There’s too [...]

Popularity: 9% [?]

USA Today with PGA Tour rookie Brandt Snedeker conducted something of a test - Snedeker played consecutive rounds with equipment from the 1980s and modern equipment at Sea Island, Georgia.
He shot 80 with the 1980s era equipment and 75 with modern equipment.
Snedeker broke out in laughter when he saw an age-worn short iron that had [...]

Popularity: 9% [?]

I admit that I love that headline. Geoff Shackelford has been covering this story at length on Walter Driver’s tenure as USGA president, but I want to throw it in here just for the sake of completeness to my own disgruntled feelings for the USGA’s continued lack of sensible technology control and absurd US Open [...]

Popularity: 9% [?]

Golf course architect Graham Marsh recently opened a new course in Australia and gave his thoughts on what some of the problems with the game is as related to design.
“There are probably more golf courses closed here in the United States last year than were actually opened. And the reason is we are pitching golf [...]

Popularity: 6% [?]

Jeff Bass, the head professional at Pebble Lake Golf Course in Fergus Falls, Minnesota, penned an interesting piece on what technology has cost the game of golf.
Oh but what might have been had earlier generations had the foresight to see the dark side of distance in the modern game. Not as it applies to scoring, [...]

Popularity: 5% [?]