Another "which layout would you prefer" poll

[Lewis]

And this is related to Oregon Park, a course undergoing development in Marietta, GA. The short story is that in the Spring of 2009 the course was expanded from 9 to 18 holes, and we've gotten permission from the park to expand even further, with enough land to install a whole nother 18-hole course beside the existing one. The question is how to lay it out.

Would you rather see two links-style courses side-by-side, so that you'd choose between one of two full-length courses that run out and back, or would you rather see three or four loops of 9 or 10 holes, where you can pick and choose which and how many loops to play depending on your mood?

Keeping in mind that the current 18-hole layout is a super-busy course that attracts hundreds of players a day when the weather is decent, what would be the pros and cons to each design concept?

[optidiscic]

Would the courses have a different feel

I would prefer 2 18 holers with different feels rather than 2 balanced courses.

Like a primarily wooded 18 and a primarily open 18 would be better IMO than 2 equally balanced courses. Id prefer my twins to not be identical.

[mashnut]

My first instinct was that having different loops to mix and match from would make it a fun place to go play any number of holes, and make it more conducive to quick 9 hole rounds. The biggest issue I see is that when you have people wanting to play multiple loops, they're not going to be happy having a big wait after every 9 holes behind people who just got to the course, and that'll really break up the flow of your round. This is only an issue at a popular course, but since that's what you have it could be an issue. I think Optidiscic makes a good point, make two courses with different character, whether that's different types of holes, different skill levels, whatever you can do to make it so that they offer different experiences and are really distinct from one another.

[Lewis]

A little more information:

The "original 9" are moderately open, with individual trees or clumps of trees in the fairways or landing areas, while the newer 9 holes are admittedly squeezed into a very wooded area, and our plan is to keep the second 9 holes in the woods even if we move them to give them more elbow room. It's a beginner-friendly layout as it is but not much of a challenge for pro-quality players. Someone rated 900 or higher would expect to finish under par every time.

The unused land has some woods and a couple of wide open fields that we'll be able to use (the open fields used to be a golf driving range and a pitch&putt), though at least one of the open fields will eventually have walking/running trails through it. We're hesitant to install any big bomb holes there, at least until we know where the trails will be. We've got a good variety of land to work with, though I don't think a primarily wooded 18 or a primarily open 18 are in the mix, at least as distinct 18-hole units.

[optidiscic]

Walking paths and soccer fields are our mortal enemies!

[DavidSauls]

All things being equal, four 9-hole loops would be preferable. The only downside I can think of is the aforementioned issue of suddenly running into a backup of newly-arrived players when you get to your 10th hole (but you'd have a choice of which of the other 3 loops to jump on, yourself).

BUT

All things are rarely equal. Are any design compromises required to make the 4-loop course? I'd rather have two 18-holers which make the best use of the land, than 4 9-holers in which design was altered to get back to the parking lot.

If the 4 loops can be distinctly different, in character or difficulty, that's a definite plus.

*

The only place I've seen this before is Turkey Lake in Orlando, and I played it when it was empty. It has 2 distinct 18 hole courses, with different flavors and difficulties. Both loop back to the parking lot between holes 9 & 10, so you can mix-&-match loops in six different 18-hole combinations. Cool.

[Cgkdisc]

There are five 9-hole loops at the IDGC. The Warner and Jackson courses have holes 1 &10 start at the HQ building. Then you can play the "roller coaster" 9 on the Steady Ed which includes the hilliest holes: 1 thru 5 then 15 thru 18.

[Lewis]

It might be a bit harder to get the 4 9-hole loops in, though we could probably pull it off. The original 9 holes would do fine as a loop the way they are now; we'd just have to re-number them when the new parking lot goes in. What I'm thinking of as the second 9 would be the hardest section to fully loop back to where the parking lot is going to be. The best we could do might be to get you within 100 yards of the parking lot, with an uphill walk between the edge of the original 9 and a tennis court. And if we don't try to make two 9-hole loops out of this first 18, we may only move the 4 baskets that are in the worst positions.

It looks like we have a growing concensus that side-by-side 18s would be preferable to a quad of 4 9's. Ultimately our decision may be to loop back the second 18 between #9 and #10, but this is good food for thought. Keep coming with your thoughts, and maybe a map would help you visualize what I'm talking about.

Here (http://cobbdiscgolf.com/courses.aspx) is our course map as it's currently laid out. The original 9 are 1-6 and 10-12, but the others are candidates for being moved. I estimate the current course sits on maybe about 12 acres, so it's a bit tight for its length.

This (http://cobbdiscgolf.com/images/bullard-stockton-master-plan.png) will show you the entire property that is now owned by the county, though anything to the south of the tennis courts is raw, unfinished land, and the parking lot and walking trails shown in that space are not yet built. The existing Oregon Park is a little league baseball mecca, but the community wants to preserve the newly purchased park land as "passive," undeveloped land, which essentially allows for walking trails and disc golf, but little if anything else. :) The Southern border of where we'll be allowed to install permanent holes is roughly at the latitude of where the notch is cut out of the left side of the map. That notch represents private land, but most of what's between that Southern boundary and the existing park infrastructure, including the woods between the private land and the baseball fields, is available for our use.

[Lewis]

The Southern border of where we'll be allowed to install permanent holes is roughly at the latitude of where the notch is cut out of the left side of the map. That notch represents private land, but most of what's between that Southern boundary and the existing park infrastructure, including the woods between the private land and the baseball fields, is available for our use.

To clarify, I mean the southern edge of that notch roughly describes the latitude of the southern edge of where we can build. So they're something like doubling or more the space we have available. We may not get exactly 36 holes in after all is said and done, but that's our hope and working plan, and I'd be amazed if it weren't more than 27.

[Clark]

I like the idea of two unique 18-holers with multiple tee placements for each.