Carts in the Fairways only?

Torrey Pines currently instructs those riding carts to drive in the fairways and keep the carts off the rough as much as possible.  They said to enter the fairway as soon as possible.  So, for the most part you are not on the cart paths either.

What's up with that?

(I walked the course though.)

Carts to far more damage to rough than they do to fairway.

Perhaps "path only" is the best option as far as damage to the course but it slows play down tremendously.  A balance has to be struck between wear & tear on the course and getting people around.

We had that rule at a Fl course one week last winter. Reason was they seeded the fairways and wanted as little of the seeds being carried into the rough. They didn't want fairway grass growing there.

I see carts in fairway only a lot here in the midwest, especially on courses with zoysia fairways and bluegrass or fescue rough.  As we battled with drought conditions for a couple of years, the rough couldn't stand the traffic but the fairways could as fairways were watered but rough, not so much.  As bkuehn1952 stated, it's a balance between pace of play and wear and tear, honestly, zoysia fairways show little if any wear from golf carts.

Path only can result in as much as or more walking than if you didn't take a cart at all and makes for a slow, tedious round.  As far as I'm concerned, if a course is so wet that they can't allow carts off the path, they should just do walking only until conditions improve.  That's how my former home course did it.  They would change the recorded phone message to say that no carts were allowed, and post a sign on the clubhouse door.

Also if they do a little education and encourage carts to scatter they can further minimize wear.  That same home course above does not have cart paths lining every hole, so when you leave the path at the tee, it can create some damage if everyone follows the same track.  They use those low barriers and move them regularly to force people to take different routes off the path at the tees and back onto the paths near the greens.

Quite a few courses here have a 45 degree cart policy. Unfortunately most patrons use carts like ATV's and do whatever they want. The newer courses set up for it well because the path runs to the side of the hole and there are usually mounds that only allow carts to pass through to the fairway at certain points. Some use ropes and stakes to prevent carts from immediately hitting the grass after the boxes. It's easy enough to do. Enter where you can at 45 degrees and stay in the fairway until you get to the signs directing carts off the fairway. The people that struggle with it are the ones chasing balls all over.

We don't do "fairways only" but players are encouraged to stay in them as opposed to the rough. Better for the golf course. Carts can really beat up the rough.

I'm a walker anyway.

There is a course near me (Turtle Creek - Limerick, PA) that has a version of this: they ask you to cross the rough only at 90 degrees, and not to ever park your cart in the rough.

Interestingly, this course's owners have operated a turf (sod) farm since before the course even existed, so I'm guessing they know their stuff.

One of the courses here in KC actually did a really smart thing with entry and exit from cart path to fairway.  They have the zoysia grown from the fairway to the cart path at the points you can enter the fairway and exist, so the rough never gets beat up and no real "wear" spots of entry and exit as the zoysia can handle the traffic.

One course near me (Fair Oaks in Oakland TN) requires that you enter the fairway once, then exit near the green. It's been that way since the course opened years ago. At that time, it was because the fairways were well established but the rough wasn't. After all these years the fairways and rough are still in excellent condition...and it's certainly a LOT quicker than playing cart path only or 90 degrees.