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The future of municipal golf courses?


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In my part of the country along with most others there are more nongolfers than golfers. This has led to some interesting trends or undercurrents regarding the politics of municipal golf courses in some cities. As cities grow, I see more and more proposals from individuals and groups about turning munis into parks and other things. In my city, we already lost one muni to this. The pandemic has helped the muni budgets tremendously and has probably slowed down the conversations about converting golf courses. However, the pressure still remains that publicly owned areas that are used for golf courses be turned into more accessible areas that can be used by anyone. Golf courses are easy targets because they are usually lined with trees and well maintained. For me, the scariest part is that if an influential group latches on to the idea, they really only have to convince three or four city councilmen to vote a certain way.

I'm curious how much this is happening elsewhere and if anyone has seen a good argument in favor of the golf course over something like a park. Do you see this trend going away or picking up steam?

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It will continue as long as these groups get what they want and no one stands up and says NO! The government is not going to say or do anything to them. trying to not get political so I will stop typing. 😬

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At least one developer sued the city of Cincinnati to try to force them to sell him one course they owned, because it wasn't located inside the city limits. His statement, "Undeveloped land is wasted land." The judge dismissed the suit very quickly. Fortunately all of Cincinnati's courses are well in the black, and heavily used, as much as any city park. Every now and then some new politician brings it up, but it usually quickly dies down. I think the recreation commission has good data, and out of the public spotlight they've always been able to turn the sceptics.

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My local muni is involved in a land swap deal since the industrial park is out of space and they're going to build a second park. Rather than just take over the muni and call it quits, the city is going to have the muni redesigned and will be paying for upgrades and all of the work that needs to be done to keep it running as a 9 hole during construction, then revamping the layout to make it back to a full 18 hole course once the industrial park construction is complete. Revenues have been way up on the course even before the Covid boom, mostly due to the city ending the contract with the old management company and awarding the contract to a new firm that's really done a lot of great work. 

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In our lovely state it is worse than imaginable. They are trying to remove the zoning protections for all muni's. It will be a nasty fight and not all will close but if it passes there will definitely be some casualties. 

 

https://www.turfnet.com/news.html/are-municipal-golfs-days-numbered-in-california-r1538/

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Almost all of the munis near me are packed all the time now….everybody took up golf during the COVID-19 lockdown.

I used to be able to get a tee time 1 or 2 days in advance….now it’s a full week everywhere 

 

 

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Why can’t we reuse buildings?

 

I wa a driving through North Carolina on my way to Florida, on the way there were HUGE BUILDINGS sitting vacant on the side on the highway.  Brand new for sale…

 

Milwaukee, I wa there a while ago.  I giant beautiful old school three story mall vacant other than a few little shops.

 

We are consuming land and building supplies like they are endless.  
 

The powers that be need to take a long look at condemned buildings, and force these manufacturers and commercial places to tear down and rebuild on the existing sites.

 

you could tear down 95% of Detroit and rebuild an entire city on the land and not much would be missed.

 

It is terrible.  

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40 minutes ago, THEZIPR23 said:

In our lovely state it is worse than imaginable. They are trying to remove the zoning protections for all muni's. It will be a nasty fight and not all will close but if it passes there will definitely be some casualties. 

 

https://www.turfnet.com/news.html/are-municipal-golfs-days-numbered-in-california-r1538/

I didn't specifically bring up places like California because I know the munis out there are under constant pressure due to population density issues which generally is only a problem in a select few dense areas in the country. I've always wondered how long courses in SoCal, San Francisco, and Seattle amongst other densely populated places have to live. It doesn't surprise me that California is trying to pass zoning measures against golf courses as they really are some of the last open tracts of land in the cities that could easily be developed that maybe wouldn't get as much backlash as rezoning single family residence areas. With the issues California is having with housing, I even wonder if places like Harding Park and Torrey Pines will be impacted. It's such a pressure cooker out there, it wouldn't surprise me that we see places like Harding and Balboa slip away. I don't actually see anything happening to Torrey Pines as it is located out North of San Diego but I wouldn't be surprised to see the cities devour the inner munis depending on the make up of the city council. 

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48 minutes ago, Shankster said:

Why can’t we reuse buildings?

 

I wa a driving through North Carolina on my way to Florida, on the way there were HUGE BUILDINGS sitting vacant on the side on the highway.  Brand new for sale…

 

Milwaukee, I wa there a while ago.  I giant beautiful old school three story mall vacant other than a few little shops.

 

We are consuming land and building supplies like they are endless.  
 

The powers that be need to take a long look at condemned buildings, and force these manufacturers and commercial places to tear down and rebuild on the existing sites.

 

you could tear down 95% of Detroit and rebuild an entire city on the land and not much would be missed.

 

It is terrible.  

This is such a good point. Land itself in general is not scarce. The usage of the land leaves a lot to be desired. 

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1 hour ago, Shankster said:

Why can’t we reuse buildings?

 

I wa a driving through North Carolina on my way to Florida, on the way there were HUGE BUILDINGS sitting vacant on the side on the highway.  Brand new for sale…

 

Milwaukee, I wa there a while ago.  I giant beautiful old school three story mall vacant other than a few little shops.

 

We are consuming land and building supplies like they are endless.  
 

The powers that be need to take a long look at condemned buildings, and force these manufacturers and commercial places to tear down and rebuild on the existing sites.

 

you could tear down 95% of Detroit and rebuild an entire city on the land and not much would be missed.

 

It is terrible.  

No common sense.....

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1 minute ago, GaDawg said:

No common sense.....

Sense is not common...

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1 hour ago, Shankster said:

 

Milwaukee, I wa there a while ago.  I giant beautiful old school three story mall vacant other than a few little shops.

 

23 minutes ago, Kansas King said:

It doesn't surprise me that California is trying to pass zoning measures against golf courses as they really are some of the last open tracts of land in the cities that could easily be developed that maybe wouldn't get as much backlash as rezoning single family residence areas.

Doesn't surprise me either, but is all the commercial real estate in densely populated areas of CA being used?  Serious question... I don't know.  In Richmond, VA, we have dead malls and empty big-box retail stores that, I would hope, could be retro-fitted or redeveloped into housing.  Like @Shankster says, let's look at this before looking at golf courses.  But maybe CA doesn't have these problems with distressed commercial real estate.

 

 

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7 minutes ago, HardcoreLooper said:

 

Doesn't surprise me either, but is all the commercial real estate in densely populated areas of CA being used?  Serious question... I don't know.  In Richmond, VA, we have dead malls and empty big-box retail stores that, I would hope, could be retro-fitted or redeveloped into housing.  Like @Shankster says, let's look at this before looking at golf courses.  But maybe CA doesn't have these problems with distressed commercial real estate.

 

 

hahaha no way!!!! Housing maybe but there are plenty of commercial buildings available. 

There are a lot of other options vs removing golf courses, however you would have to take a step back to look at everything as a whole. Unfortunately the chances of that happening are slim. 

The real problem in CA is water, it is going to get to the point that either we are buying water from other states (not likely), like we do power now. Or the population is going to shrink...

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In Cleveland, munis ARE the future. We already have 2 of the best in the country, and 3 other quality 18s and a number of 9s in our metro parks. The city itself runs 36 holes in the eastside suburbs which caters to a majority of young and minority golfers (the course itself has a number of detractors, given the clientele, you can guess who they are). A bunch of cities on the southeast suburbs and Summit county operate their local course as munis, and Akron Elyria, and Youngstown, operate them as well.

New courses weren't being opened around here, I think less than a handful since 2000. So if we get a "new" course, it's a CC opening doors for public play. On the other hand, we've had about 15 courses closed since 2017, with another turning into an Amazon warehouse after labor day (Stanley Thompson designed Skyland Pines). Most of those courses were in the hands of kids or grandkids that has no interest in running grandpa's course so now it's a housing development. Munis are how we're going to protect and keep golf public.

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It isn’t munis where I live it’s public courses in the bottom tier that are being sold for development. They bought when stock was low at a good price and now the land development is through the roof and they are looking to cash in 

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15 minutes ago, HardcoreLooper said:

 

Doesn't surprise me either, but is all the commercial real estate in densely populated areas of CA being used?  Serious question... I don't know.  In Richmond, VA, we have dead malls and empty big-box retail stores that, I would hope, could be retro-fitted or redeveloped into housing.  Like @Shankster says, let's look at this before looking at golf courses.  But maybe CA doesn't have these problems with distressed commercial real estate.

 

 

Right malls are dead, let's start there. Or maybe take a really radical approach and rehabilitate our decaying urban centers Instead of building new houses altogether.

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1 minute ago, Shankster said:

Sorry I derailed your thread, but just imagine how much time and effort could be saved if they turned those giant dead malls into schools too.  More jobs, less kids per teacher… etc.  

 

And we would save golf courses from development… if anything, golf courses should be preserved.  Not built on top of.

You're good. It's all an interconnected issue.

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Lots of interesting conversation on this thread. It seems munis are being threatened for different reasons across the country. Some places they need housing, others just want a public park. Privately owned golf courses getting sold isn't a surprise. Golf course are generally on valuable land and it can cost an absolute fortune to maintain 18 holes if you don't have a strong membership. 

I personally think the bigger issues with places like California is just outdated zoning laws. I don't have any issues with NIMBYism as it's natural to not want an eight-plex multi-family establishment as your neighbor. I don't see any way that converting munis into housing would solve any issues when you look at the big picture. Even if you built the densest affordable housing you could build on an old muni lot, the amount of housing you're building relative to the whole city is still barely a drop in a bucket. 

Regarding converting vacant commercial real estate (CRE) into more housing or for education, you will run into a series of problems. It's not easy to convert empty warehouses into something more useful, especially housing. Warehouses are usually in commercial areas/business parks. They are zoned commercial for a reason. The infrastructure/streets and being around factories and warehouses isn't conducive for living. The best bet for conversion is likely vacant malls and shopping centers. However, even then, you may be better off just dozing those buildings down and starting from scratch. It can be prohibitively expensive trying to retrofit older buildings to accommodate a different use such as a warehouse to multifamily living. The most plausible situation to me is an expanding school taking over a vacant shopping mall.

This thread and comment really got away from discussing the future of munis but it is interesting to hear what you have to say about the state of munis in your area and what factors are impacting their future. With the pandemic really boosting golf, I don't see too many issues for most munis the next couple years. However, I think it's important that we all do what we can now and stay aware of any happenings with your local munis to hopefully not let ideas outside of golf gain traction. Go to city council meetings or at a minimum, send an email to your city councilman if you don't like a proposal floating around. Elected officials only hear and see what they can hear and see. If they don't see or hear any opposition, don't be surprised when they do something you may not like. 

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44 minutes ago, DiscipleofPenick said:

Right malls are dead, let's start there. Or maybe take a really radical approach and rehabilitate our decaying urban centers Instead of building new houses altogether.

It's really not that simple.  A lot goes into city planning and if you just start converting commercial spaces to residential you will very quickly run out of required services.  

If you take a large mall and turn it into 300 homes you may find that you need a new school so where are you going to build that?  Also, roads and other items are designed for a certain amount of traffic, etc and those are usually landlocked so it's hard to expand them as well.   Also, a lot of these commercial spaces may be mostly empty but usually not completely empty so if you remove them altogether, all of a sudden people will find themselves much farther away from whatever service they require.  Your local pizza place or grocery store may become much further away if you lose these spaces.  

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2 hours ago, THEZIPR23 said:

In our lovely state it is worse than imaginable. They are trying to remove the zoning protections for all muni's. It will be a nasty fight and not all will close but if it passes there will definitely be some casualties. 

 

https://www.turfnet.com/news.html/are-municipal-golfs-days-numbered-in-california-r1538/

I'm not at all surprised.  What I don't get is that municipal golf courses, like parks with tennis courts, basketball courts, baseball fields, soccer fields, etc., are their for the enjoyment of the taxpayers who pay for them.  Why aren't the same proponents of closing them down for low income housing, etc., calling for parks to be repurposed?  I think they largely view golf as a "special interest group"... but just not one they favor.  

I'll hopefully have long since earned my wings by the time this grand idea makes its way to Montana.

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3 minutes ago, fixyurdivot said:

I'm not at all surprised.  What I don't get is that municipal golf courses, like parks with tennis courts, basketball courts, baseball fields, soccer fields, etc., are their for the enjoyment of the taxpayers who pay for them.  Why aren't the same proponents of closing them down for low income housing, etc., calling for parks to be repurposed?  I think they largely view golf as a "special interest group"... but just not one they favor.  

I'll hopefully have long since earned my wings by the time this grand idea makes its way to Montana.

Golf is easy to target for a few reasons:

1) It generally takes up way more space than any football or baseball field. One par four is going to be four football fields in size on it's own. 

2) It cost money to play. Municipal golf courses are generally one of the few city owned areas that require you to pay a fee before you can go on. Plus, generally speaking, golf isn't cheap. 

3) I don't know the numbers but I would assume there are more people that don't play golf than those that do and probably be a rather wide margin. Most Americans usually grow up playing baseball/softball but the same can't be said for golf. Plus, there is a whole subreddit dedicated to not playing golf called r/nongolfers. They support non-golf living and call it ateeism or anti-teeism. It's kind of funny. It's not a big group of people but golf is the only sport on reddit that I know of to have a contra-sport account. 

I don't know what the best arguments are against the three reasons I gave but I don't think it's hard to fathom why golf would be targeted. 

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My youngest is studying urban planning/development/policy. She's not a fan of golf courses due to the "wasted" space. I've already told her not to touch golf courses when she gets into her career. Especially since it would not surprise me a bit if she ended up in politics.

Ironically, my dad was an avid golfer but insisted on being cremated because he viewed cemeteries as a huge waste of space. Go figure.

In mature, stable areas like NE Ohio (no rapid expansion, perhaps a little contraction at times), I don't see or hear many clamoring for the real estate. As @DiscipleofPenick mentioned, a lot of the closures, at least in the Akron area, were more related to families wanting to get out of the business and many of those lots remain empty. A country club near my house closed a couple seasons ago, but they were bought out and apparently the new business model wasn't effective. They sold to developers and work is ongoing but it is no longer recognizable as a golf course - hundreds of trees gone, fairway sculpting flattened, etc. I'm not sure if it was zoned for business or presidential, but the area doesn't really need more traffic than it has right now - it's already one of the busier areas of Akron, especially during the holidays.

 

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Of for sure golfers are a majority but when you add up the number of parks, and costs associated with their upkeep, I'll bet we'd be surprised to find the total acreage and annual costs aren't that far off.  NYC has more than 30,000 acres of parks which includes 14 golf courses. At ~120 acres/course, that results in <6% of the total. That doesn't seem unreasonable (from a golfers eyes 🙂). I don't know for sure, but I'll bet collectively, the golf courses pay their way more so than the balance of the holdings.  When I see the proponents for closing golf courses suggest, with the same level of interest and reason for the greater good, the same be done for parks, I'll change my position.

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26 minutes ago, fixyurdivot said:

Of for sure golfers are a majority but when you add up the number of parks, and costs associated with their upkeep, I'll bet we'd be surprised to find the total acreage and annual costs aren't that far off.  NYC has more than 30,000 acres of parks which includes 14 golf courses. At ~120 acres/course, that results in <6% of the total. That doesn't seem unreasonable (from a golfers eyes 🙂). I don't know for sure, but I'll bet collectively, the golf courses pay their way more so than the balance of the holdings.  When I see the proponents for closing golf courses suggest, with the same level of interest and reason for the greater good, the same be done for parks, I'll change my position.

Follow the money.  As long as golf courses are turning a good profit, like this past year, munis should be safe.  It's when they don't make money, or very little over expenses that they become targets.  That happened to many courses, both muni and private, after the Tiger boom ended.  

We have three munis, three other public courses, one private CC, and several 9 public hole courses.  All are crowded all the time.  That hasn't changed in 25 years, but our population has tripled in that time frame.  We could use more courses, but people are reluctant to spend money when the looked at the course closures all over the country.  Personally, I think that is a big reason that golf is not more popular; it's not easy to get a tee time.  It's not for a lack of space for us; lots of wide open spaces with the Columbia River running through the middle of our population center.

We don’t stop playing the game because we get old; we get old because we stop playing the game.”

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6 minutes ago, Kenny B said:

Follow the money.  As long as golf courses are turning a good profit, like this past year, munis should be safe.  It's when they don't make money, or very little over expenses that they become targets.  That happened to many courses, both muni and private, after the Tiger boom ended.  

We have three munis, three other public courses, one private CC, and several 9 public hole courses.  All are crowded all the time.  That hasn't changed in 25 years, but our population has tripled in that time frame.  We could use more courses, but people are reluctant to spend money when the looked at the course closures all over the country.  Personally, I think that is a big reason that golf is not more popular; it's not easy to get a tee time.  It's not for a lack of space for us; lots of wide open spaces with the Columbia River running through the middle of our population center.

That is so true for virtually everything, but in the case of golf course land for low income housing (as and example), where's the monetary carrot?  I get the humanitarian carrot, but there are other options that don't require closing down courses. There is no reason public golf courses should be held to a higher fiscal standard than the rest of the parks and recreation holdings.  They are, but shouldn't be IMO.  It would not surprise me that a number of courses in various cities are actually paying for themselves and the no pay for use holdings.  

I have a handful of other reasons why I think they are viewed/regarded as they are but that takes us down a bumpy, dead end road.  

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8 minutes ago, fixyurdivot said:

That is so true for virtually everything, but in the case of golf course land for low income housing (as and example), where's the monetary carrot?  I get the humanitarian carrot, but there are other options that don't require closing down courses. There is no reason public golf courses should be held to a higher fiscal standard than the rest of the parks and recreation holdings.  They are, but shouldn't be IMO.  It would not surprise me that a number of courses in various cities are actually paying for themselves and the no pay for use holdings.  

I have a handful of other reasons why I think they are viewed/regarded as they are but that takes us down a bumpy, dead end road.  

I think the fair way to look at a muni from a financial standpoint is to assess the cost to the city and compare it to the cost of maintaining it like a comparable park. I think most would find a muni that was even losing some money would be a lower cost to the city than having to maintain a park that doesn't bring in any revenue. With that said, most cities, including mine, have more ambitious desires for 80 - 120 prime acres than just having some grass and trees. So my comparison wouldn't be fair as a real comparison would have to include a discounted cash flow analysis that would look at the income brought in from any sales to developers, event venue income, fee income, etc. I also think you have to have a consideration for the number of jobs a golf course supports and compare it to the alternative. And, ultimately, you have to assess what the needs of the community and if having something other than a golf course would make a real different fitting a need. It's not a decision that is 100% based on dollars and cents.

The other problem with getting rid of munis is the challenge of actually trying to choose what to do with it once it's gone. In my city, they are trying to create a big multi-use park out of the old course. However, they are running into issues of cost and differences in desires for the space. Many are starting to question if getting rid of the golf course was the correct decision at all. I think a big reason they decided to end the golf course was that it was in a low- to moderate-income area that they thought they could revitalize with a big flashy new park. The new park would have a private restaurant or two, plane watching hill, promenade, indoor farmers market, sports fields/courts, etc. Anyone want to guess the estimated price tag? $28 million. 

Yep, $28 million. You can run a near break-even golf course for an eternity on $28 million. That doesn't even include the costs of upkeep on the new park. Even my more progressive urbanite friends grimaced a little when they saw the price tag for the proposed park. In our current environment, it actually wouldn't totally surprise me if the city ditched the whole idea of the park and turned it into a golf course again. They could probably reopen it as a course in great condition with refreshed facilities for under $1 million and have it break even on costs. I don't know of any analysis anywhere that could justify spending $28 million on a park. I would understand it if they could sell half the land to developers and use that money to pay for and maintain the park but that's not the case here.

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16 minutes ago, Kansas King said:

Yep, $28 million. You can run a near break-even golf course for an eternity on $28 million.

Adjusted using the OPM index, $28M looks like a bargain to some.  The bottom-line here is that there will never be a shortage of people who lobby to close down public courses for "better uses" nor the call by some to close all golf courses for their negative environmental impact.  Fortunately, we all still have some opportunities to formally argue against those plans.  I wish them the utmost failure in their endeavor.

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Lobbying to close down golf courses is very much en vogue for some these days.  Hobbs, NM has a better idea.

https://www.rockwindgolfcourse.com/

Henrico County, just north of Richmond, almost repurposed their Tillinghast-designed course into a sports complex, but a determined group of local golfers and neighborhood families banded together to keep that from happening.  It can be done.

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In Utah, the main complaints I've heard regarding golf courses haven't centered around space, but rather around resources. Utah's one of the driest states in the country, and so people complain when two of the highest sources of water usage are sports fields and golf courses. Utah is fortunately a very golfer heavy place, and despite having so many courses, including munis, Salt Lake is always packed. But even then, there seems to be far more kids and soccer/baseball/football parents than golfers, so golf tends to be the sacrificial lamb of the two that gets complained about more. 

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