Good news for NYC public golfers: Forest Park Golf Course manager Bob Smith got excellent golf course architect Stephen Kay to give the course a spit-shine and conditions have improved at the Queens Course.
“There’s a reason why they call it Forest Park,” Kay quipped, referring to the thousands of trees that blight the landscape and interfere with play at every turn at the Van Kleek design which is over 100 years old. Before Kay’s arrival the trees were Problem 1 with the course: the roots sucked all the nutrients out of the ground, and the towering leafy canopies prevented air circulation for healthy greens. With Kay’s assistance and some newly hired agronomic stewards, the greens have come back significantly, playing better than they have in decades, even though the insane Parks Department regulations prevent any reasonable chance at removing the trees. “We pruned them significantly, however, and it’s helped the greens a great deal,” finishes Kay.
There is excellent shaping and contour to the greens, which now roll much more true and have significantly more pinnable space. Now they should cut them…they rolled at what? 4 on the stimp? But hey, it’s still a huge improvement. They also need to police players better so that they repair their ball marks.
Speaking of the NYC golfers who patronize the course, Problem 2 was the players taking six and a half hours per round. Happily, that has shrunk to about 5.5 and may lower even more as the course pays greater attention to pace of play.
Still, the greatest enemy of public golf in NYC is the NYC Parks Department, who know so little about running golf courses, that they still enforce archaic rules handcuffing the city’s courses from removing trees – the most pestiferous nuisance on a golf course. With an ancient and arcane either a “1 for 100 rule” left over from the 70s which
requires the planting of 100 trees for every tree cut down, or the “$5,000 rule” which requires a tribute of $5K per tree removed, the Parks Department causes more harm than good. American Golf fled the NYC golf scene after realizing the Parks Department’s absurd folly in enforcing rules designed to frustrate rather than promote the improvement of conditions on the city’s courses.
Later this summer, we’ll have a more comprehensive review of various NYC golf courses. But for now, at least take heart, the pendulum is slowly swinging back in favor of good golf conditions. Now if we can get rid of the misguided tree-huggers who run the Parks Department and the greedy simoniacs who seek to prize $5k per tree, we’ll see much greater improvement still. But for now, Forest Park is making a run at being the best city public golf course. With Bob Smith at the helm, and Stephen Kay drawing the battle plans, they may get there sooner rather than later.
