New York City Public Golf Compared

[boogielicious]

6 hours ago, LICC said:

. You seem to just want to attack my posts for no reason. 

You continually attack other's opinions and even posted facts as faulty and seem to need to get in the last word. This spirals the threads out of control. You've attacked or belittled four staff members doing this and don't even seem to read their posts. Please stop.

[nevets88]

Driving around NYC is not “seamless”. It is a frakking nightmare. The driving times mentioned above are all best case as well. 

This New Yorker says that the courses available within the 5 boroughs are not good. If there is a decent layout, the conditioning is terrible.

The choices available from a typical 2 hour drive of Grand Central Station, traffic and congestion taken into consideration, are not great compared to many other areas of the US. It is my opinion that metropolitan NY would rank somewhere in the lower quarter in a listing of metro areas, public courses only.

I’ve played in a lot of other places. Orlando, Tampa, Fort Lauderdale, Jacksonville, Atlanta, Pinehurst, Chicago, Cleveland, Austin, SF, LV, Phoenix, Portland, Seattle, Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal, etc... and the general feeling I get is the the public golf in NY is very meh. In fact, I’d say I’m in golf jail. That’s fine. I’ve accepted it. 

[iacas]

7 minutes ago, nevets88 said:

This New Yorker says that the courses available within the 5 boroughs are awful. If there is a decent layout, the conditioning is terrible.

Which is all I'd said originally. I was simply mirroring comments I'd heard and read by NBC, etc. There's not much golf within New York City, so the one "good" course nearby is inflated.

A four-hour diameter is a joke. If that's the case, like @Pretzel, I'm taking the Erie metro area, which obviously includes eastern Cleveland, northern Pittsburgh, and all of Erie and Buffalo. Or someone should take Columbus, because that includes Cleveland, Cincinnati, and other great places to play golf.

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Tons of great cities to play golf. Pretending that New York is at the top of the list, absolutely, is silly especially if it includes four hours round trip just to get to and back from a golf course! (I'm not actually claiming Erie with a two-hour drive radius, no.)

[chspeed]

38 minutes ago, nevets88 said:

This New Yorker says that the courses available within the 5 boroughs are not good. If there is a decent layout, the conditioning is terrible.

But on the plus side, you get a nice leisurely round in which you can take in every inch of the course during your 7 hour loop.

[nevets88]

38 minutes ago, chspeed said:

But on the plus side, you get a nice leisurely round in which you can take in every inch of the course during your 7 hour loop.

Ya'll think he's kidding, but I've experienced this IRL. 

[FLOG4]

Two areas which have very good public golf courses...Atlantic City...With ACCC, Twisted Dunes, Shoregate, Ballamor, Scotland Run, Cape May National.....another is Ocean City Maryland with Lighthouse Sound, Rum Pointe, River Run, Bear Trap. Orlando kinda supplanted Myrtle as the go to place for winter golf as they have just as many courses and the weather is so much better. Wisconsin with America Club, Sand Valley and Erin Hills is a great spot. for top level public golf though...Bandon is the champ. And the Sheep Ranch is coming too....

 

Candidly, I play in NYC area more than a little.....but mostly at private courses.

When I think of the best spots to play golf...Metro NY is either first or second....Philly is the co champ IMHO . Inclusive of all courses.   

[hespeler]

Agreed with some of the other posters; mileage-wise, there are plenty of options.  Practically speaking, because of congestion, the radius gets a lot smaller.

Not sure I'm going to head into the boroughs from LI to play when I can play nicer courses closer to me.  Except for the history, Dyker Heights in Bklyn and I believe a course in the Bronx (first public golf course if I'm not mistaken) there's not much reason to golf in NYC. 

Except for a couple of courses here and there, I don't have much experience playing outside LI.

Now if you start to add in private courses, I would think LI would begin to stack up well.  Shinnecock, LI National, Sagaponack, Garden City CC...

[nevets88]

 

5 hours ago, hespeler said:

Agreed with some of the other posters; mileage-wise, there are plenty of options.  Practically speaking, because of congestion, the radius gets a lot smaller.

Not sure I'm going to head into the boroughs from LI to play when I can play nicer courses closer to me.  Except for the history, Dyker Heights in Bklyn and I believe a course in the Bronx (first public golf course if I'm not mistaken) there's not much reason to golf in NYC. 

Except for a couple of courses here and there, I don't have much experience playing outside LI.

Now if you start to add in private courses, I would think LI would begin to stack up well.  Shinnecock, LI National, Sagaponack, Garden City CC...

There is a thread where we talked about this I think, or maybe it was a limited group chat. If you included the privates, NY metro area would be one of the best, just drive one hour north of Grand Central Terminal, even with congestion, a lot of super exclusive privates.

Even in traffic, you can drive from GCT to Winged Foot in an hour. Deepdale CC is 17 miles from GCT. Wykagyl, Old Oaks, Sleepy Hollow, Apawamis, Westchester CC are 20-25 miles out from GCT. I would say south of 287, there are at least a dozen of these privates, maybe two.

It is an exact mirroring of typical New York City juxtaposition of extreme poverty and extreme wealth. Put a Van Cortland next to Winged Foot, night and day the difference. 

[chspeed]

10 hours ago, iacas said:

A four-hour diameter is a joke.

Using any time radius in and around NYC is a waste of time. As I mentioned in an earlier post, It can take 30 minutes to drive to Bethpage or 2.5 hours. It can take me 12 minutes to get to my regular course (in the Bronx, inside NYC) because I go at 5AM. Heading back almost always takes over an hour, sometimes more.

If you want to play golf in and around NYC, you basically either play at 5AM, or devote the whole day to it because of a mixture of traffic and slow play.

The calculus of whether a course is "in the NYC area" is:

-how long will it take me to get there at that time of day (assuming I'm not completely hosed by some accident)

-what kind of insanely early tee time can i get? How long in advance?

-Unless I tee off first, how long is the round going to take?

-How fu**ed will I get in traffic coming back?

-Will my wife still speak to me the next day?

1 hour ago, nevets88 said:

Deepdale CC is 17 miles from GCT. 

 

I'd rather shoot myself than drive those 17 miles right now. 😉

Oh, and i"m on the UWS, so it's actually 1 hr 35 min for me. 😁🔫

Edited May 29, 2019 by chspeed

[nevets88]

44 minutes ago, chspeed said:

If you want to play golf in and around NYC, you basically either play at 5AM, or devote the whole day to it because of a mixture of traffic and slow play.

That's basically it. Golf jail.

But there's congestion in all the big metro areas in the US though, so anyone in a relatively large city is planning around the traffic. There is no living in city central and popping out for a quick 9 after work generally.

[chspeed]

1 hour ago, nevets88 said:

 

But there's congestion in all the big metro areas in the US though, so anyone in a relatively large city is planning around the traffic. There is no living in city central and popping out for a quick 9 after work generally.

I love how you call it congestion, as if a Sudafed will clear it up. 😂

Yes, everyone has some traffic, but it's usually limited to rush hours and is somewhat predictable in flow. The older big cities, especially NYC, were designed for SO much less traffic than they have. Anything, a lane closure, a broken scooter, a small fender bender, instantly turns into a delay and creates a butterfly effect. It's going to take some serious change for a golf-addict to enjoy golfing around here. Congestion pricing may help a bit, but how about an airbus that takes us to the golf course?

[nevets88]

23 minutes ago, chspeed said:

I love how you call it congestion, as if a Sudafed will clear it up. 😂

Yes, everyone has some traffic, but it's usually limited to rush hours and is somewhat predictable in flow. The older big cities, especially NYC, were designed for SO much less traffic than they have. Anything, a lane closure, a broken scooter, a small fender bender, instantly turns into a delay and creates a butterfly effect. It's going to take some serious change for a golf-addict to enjoy golfing around here. Congestion pricing may help a bit, but how about an airbus that takes us to the golf course?

There's the heliport on the West Side pier. But It's crashy. Not a trivial number of dunks into the river recently. No Captain Sully to rescue you.

[boogielicious]

13 hours ago, nevets88 said:

That's basically it. Golf jail.

But there's congestion in all the big metro areas in the US though, so anyone in a relatively large city is planning around the traffic. There is no living in city central and popping out for a quick 9 after work generally.

There are a few good courses on the south side of Boston that I don't even try to play because I would have to go through Boston. Our traffic stinks.

[Vinsk]

11 hours ago, chspeed said:

love how you call it congestion, as if a Sudafed will clear it up. 😂

Lol. I think it’s natural that people like to boast about their area and minimize the hardships. Giving a four hour driving window is ridiculous for NYC, or any time as you said due to the unpredictability of the commute. It’s the same sentiment when people say things like, ‘Colorado has 300 days of sunshine so lots of golf!’ Lol! Yeah ...right. I lived there...yeah no. 

[chspeed]

 

21 hours ago, hespeler said:

Dyker Heights in Bklyn and I believe a course in the Bronx (first public golf course if I'm not mistaken) there's not much reason to golf in NYC. 

The Brooklyn course is called Dyker Beach (Dyker Heights is the neighborhood), even though there is no beach. Except for one relatively attractive hole looking out at the Verrazzano, it's a dog track. In the 80s, there were burned out cars left on the course that you had to play around. Might just be urban legend, but sounds believable.

The Bronx course you refer to is Van Cortland. It opened as a 9-hole course around the turn of the 20th century, and is indeed known as the first public golf course in the US. Supposedly, there were no tee times or rules on the course and it was overcrowded, with little or no golf etiquette. Everyone hated it. As far as I'm concerned, nothing has changed over the past 120 years.

[iacas]

Listened to the first few minutes of the Golfer's Journal podcast (#29) with Paul Gutkowski, who says "there are 12 municipal golf courses within the five boroughs" and who then describes San Diego where he used to live as a golfer's paradise and called Torrey Pines the greatest muni in the country.

FWIW. Just adding his opinion to the mix.

[hespeler]

2 hours ago, Vinsk said:

Lol. I think it’s natural that people like to boast about their area and minimize the hardships. Giving a four hour driving window is ridiculous for NYC, or any time as you said due to the unpredictability of the commute. It’s the same sentiment when people say things like, ‘Colorado has 300 days of sunshine so lots of golf!’ Lol! Yeah ...right. I lived there...yeah no. 

Except NY'ers.  We like to explain how difficult everything is around here.  Completely agree with others; golf really early (or really late) or spend the day committed to it.

I live a little under 40 miles (waaayyy out in Suffolk County) from the City line and when I have to drive in for work (have to drive for various reasons) I have to give myself 4 hours.  4 hours to go roughly 40 miles.  Been doing it for so long but I still get a knot in my stomach every time I have to do it.

Though there are sometimes pleasant surprises.  We got a tee time this past Sunday on Memorial Day wknd for 9 holes at about 845 am so we could play before my kid's afternoon soccer game.  We flew through it and signed up for another 9 and got that in and still made it on time to the game.

[nevets88]

The discussion has just been about courses. The practice facilities here...  are not good. Crowded. Loud. People smoke. Drunk people. Poorly setup. Expensive. If you live in Manhattan, there used to be Randall's Island. That's in flux now, I dunno what the hell is going on with Drive Shack. Now your only recourse is Chelsea Piers and that's a whole other story where tl;dr is golf jail and $$$. If you live in the Bronx or Brooklyn there is I think one big range for each borough. Queens is slim pickings as well. Lets say you find a decent range. Well, you're sharing with a lot of people. Schools and other organizations will pack the range in 2 seconds. Peak hours you can't hear yourself think. Good luck getting a face on view w/a camera.

In golf friendly cities, you have grass ranges with short game areas available to the public, reasonably priced. You want that in NY, you need to be a member of one of the privates. The nearest public grass ranges, and probably only on weekends, available to the NYC area, are Neshanic and Hamlet. And Centennial.