Drop zones: optional or not?

My bad, I misread your post.  Golfingdad is correct.

The usual reason for a dropping zone is because the hazard is so situated that some of the usual dropping options are impractical.  It is rare that a course would try to make such use mandatory, but I have heard of such a thing.  This is not per the rules of golf (a dropping zone should be an additional option in the case of an unusual condition like an island green), but some courses mistakenly think that they are the sole authority in the creation of local rules.

A mandatory dropping zone is indeed within the Rules.

If the Committee considers that it is not feasible or practicable to proceed in accordance with a Rule providing relief, it may establish dropping zones in which balls may or must be dropped when taking relief.

[Appendix I Part B]

Even then, you would always have the option of relaying your original shot, under penalty of one stroke though....

Then it's times when I get dirty looks from club members for taking a long second shot on the par 5 18 to the green which sometimes I make, but many times I dunk it in the water, then head immediately to the drop zone rather than to the crappy approach I'd have from where I'd have to drop where it went in. And I have to remind them where the drop zone is located because the course forgets to mark the zone, yet it is there in the rules on the card - a six foot area around a particular sprinkler head. This leads to a lob shot over the water instead of a gap wedge and usually a par on the hole because i didn't lay up. The former club president and I wrote that local rule because the men's club had a two dunk and carry across rule - ours is in keeping with the spirit of the game.

Precisely. Must is the key word.

No disagreement but I didn't suggest otherwise.    The question I was answering clearly excluded stroke and distance.

So it looks like a DZ could be obligatory if the committee decides, apart from retaking the shot from the original spot?

That sounds interesting. What's that?

In the Decisions Book (Appendix 1 B/8)  "Generally such dropping zones should be provided as an additional relief option to those available under the Rule itself rather than being mandatory."  This is followed by a specimen Local Rule.  Essentially the use of a dropping zone should be made clear in the Local rules of the club.

Sounds to me like after the second ball in the water, they drop on the other side of the hazard.

We should golf sometime. I have never been able to make that green in two. I'd love to watch you play. I could learn a bunch I bet.

That only happens if I hit a real bomb off the red tees which leaves me 5 iron or hybrid to the green. I'll lay up if I'm having a good round. If not, it's bombs away because who cares? If I dunk it I'm hitting a lob shot for an up and down.

But in any event we should golf sometime just for fun.