Not sure how it works in the US but here in Oz (where water scarcity is always present in our collective psyche) golf courses are usually placed on flood plains where it would be dangerous/too expensive to build housing. In addition most allow people to walk through them and many even allow dog walkers so they have quite a lot of public amenity.
I would still prefer if they were just designated as public parks rather than having huge swathes of grass that needed frequent watering, but they're not nearly as bad as most make them out to be.
I work at a golf course and I'd rather be doing something meaningful like building homes so this post speaks to me directly.
Unfortunately the big thing lately is we've been dropping a bunch of trees.
But that runs counter to my need as a developer to bulldoze the entire area, build mcmansions 6 inches apart from eachother and at the barest mimimum of code (and perhaps even lower with a $$friendly$$ inspector), and then plant like a grand total of 5 trees that wont survive the first year.
Oh, and also pave everything over. Gotta pave everything over. No one wants green space! /s
When there's no more golf you'll know the rich fucks are gone.
Plus you can live in a pentagon! Just not the Pentagon.
Now add in mixed use zoning, and affordable housing units and this could be a winner
This is Jackson Park golf course, owned by Seattle Parks and Rec. It is one of the cheapest ways to play the game in all of Seattle.
It opened May 12, 1930. That's before the Interstate and the light rail.
There are plenty of places to shit on golf courses. This one is probably a miss. Without mixed use space, this area has been a heavy car use zone with low walkability. The section from the freeway north of the park is also a steep hill, reducing the accessibility of the area.
Additionally, the plans provided do not meet the requirements for development. Specifically, how are you going to get a fire truck to the six story buildings in the middle. Is there enough space for.emergeny services to maneuver and to keep a fire from jumping buildings.
Talk and MS Paint is cheap. Good urban planning in not.
Most suburban streets are 50 feet wide, many suburban front yards are 50 feet deep. That's a wasted space 150 feet wide and however long the street is long. Think of how much housing could be built in that space if you tore up that road, and in its place put a pair of alleyways housing in the middle
Golf courses aren't inherently bad, but I think just about every one out there is weirdly exclusive and definitely wastes water.
Disc golf is a good example of a sport that doesn't monopolize space. It's built into existing trails. Generally speaking the public can't walk on golf cart trails (I'm sure there are exceptions)
Yeah but then rich fucks wouldn’t have a place all to themselves to be rich fucks, so that’s a fuck you, poors, just be rich like us, thanks.
But where would we play golf?
Keeping all of the trees while also building a 40,000 unit apartment building on the same lot is gonna be a bit of a trick. Unless the building is 30 stories high. That might be normal in New York, but that’s not something you’re gonna see very much outside of the city.
I’m all for vertical city building, but keep in mind what is likely to happen in your local community.
🤤
Michael Moore in one of his books suggested we repurpose golf courses into public housing. They tend to be in better school systems to begin with so there’s an added bonus.
