Raymond Reborn - Post 1: Background, Land, and Routing

Hello! Thank you for reading the Lateral Hazard, my blog around all things golf, but mostly golf course architecture. This post is the justification for me starting this blog, which is the first of in a series of me reimagining one of my local munis.

Background

Columbus Golf Scene

I live in Columbus, Ohio, and while it is known for some great private courses (Scioto, The Golf Club, Double Eagle, Muirfield Village GC, Ohio State), the public tracks are lacking on interesting design and play (yes, I have played Denison, yes I like it, its 40 minutes away, I love the Ross holes, not so much on holes 15-17).

To add to this public golf course monotony, Columbus is one of the fastest growing cities in the past couple of decades. Below is an excerpt from a McKinsey Study summarizing some US government entity statistics:

"From 2000 to 2021, the Columbus Region’s population increased by a third, adding more than 500,000 people and becoming the fastest-growing metropolitan statistical area (MSA) in the Midwest. In September 2022, Columbus was named the fifth-hottest housing market in the United States, driven by the speed of home sales and demand."

A growing population means more land competition, as more land is needed for businesses, housing, schools, etc. If you have ever been to Central Ohio, you wouldn't say it is landlocked or land scarce, but as land is becoming more valuable, some golf courses are being sold to developer XYZ to build housing communities. The areas that were once remote are becoming engulfed as urban sprawl, and golf courses are not being replaced. Take an increased population, coupled with a decrease in public golf courses, then you get an imbalance for the Central Ohio golfing community. Let's also add the COVID golf boom, Columbus public golf has become lord of the flies, where golfers are looking 7-10 days in advance to try and play golf at the semi desirable golf courses to fit in a round.

Raymond Memorial

Raymond Memorial Golf Course is a public 18 hole facility that sits in the inner loop just west of the Scioto River, and less than 2 miles from Scioto Country Club (Scioto CC is just east of the river). Designed by Robert Trent Jones Sr. and opened July 31, 1954, this classic Open Doctor venue was founded during his heyday from the accolades of his Oakland Hills redesign for the 1951 U.S. Open. This Par 72 (shocker) has also hosted an LPGA event from 1968-1972, being called the Pabst Ladies Classic and Len Immke Buick Open while being played at Raymond (it eventually moved to the private clubs in Columbus until no longer being an event in 2007).

The location of Raymond is great. The muni of the west side, it is close to downtown and near all of the west side affluent suburbs, along with being near some areas with lower socioeconomic status such as the Columbus neighborhoods of Hilltop and Franklinton. It also sits a mile off of I-70 and I-270, making it easy to get to from most parts of Columbus. North of Raymond, sharing a boundary is the nine hole executive course Wilson Road. Wilson is a fun little track to play for those times that 18 holes is too much (it also could be improved as well, but that's a blog for another time). Of all the public courses in Columbus, this is the closest to downtown and also still easily reachable for suburban golfers to play.

The positive reviews of Raymond will include remarks on the greens and green surrounds. The green contours are a little more severe than a classic parkland municipal golf course, with great ridges and great shelves that can require a precise shot and make some (SOME) angles matter. The bunkering around the green is challenging but can at times be quite repetitive as your make your way into the round (bunker left, bunker right - literally, look below you can see it).

As I do find the greens to require skill and provide some intrigue, I find the routing to be quite underwhelming. The course is decently flat, and the first three holes run parallel to each other over flat land, really lulling you into the round. Then a golfer approaches the 4th hole, which requires two 7 irons to reach the green, unless you are able to hit a drastic hook/fade to get past the dogleg (similar to 17th at Pine Needles, 9th at Waialae (18th for the tournament). I do think that one of these doglegs could be interesting, given the enticement of cutting the dogleg, but with the overgrown trees the overly responsible decision is to just play the same shot twice (12 does this as well because of overgrown trees, but its more like a 200 yard shot then a 220 yard shot). The routing does get a bit better as the round goes on, but this course sputters off the start line.

Note: 100 is the Driving Range

Another gripe I have with the routing is that the 9th hole and the 18th hole are very similar, preventing unique ending 9s as you finish with a similar par 3 into a similar Par 4. The immature trees inside the dogleg on 18 enable most players the opportunity to go for the green (which is a great way to end a round), but in a couple of years the growth of this mini forest planted a couple of years ago will deter that shot from all but the ultra-aggressive golfer, creating a mimicked end to your round whether you start off the front or the back. Speaking of trees, as you can tell there is a large cluster of trees throughout the course, preventing sight lines and also wasting some playing and practice area (chalk one up for the tree management crowd!).

Talking about practice, the Raymond driving range is about 200 yards long, and wedged between the second 8th hole (more on that later), and the 18th tee. Although this doesn't affect the golf course as a test, it does limit the potential of the golf course as a community gathering place as a place where people can practice effectively through the bag. Although it may be an afterthought for GCA nerds, improving the driving range and practice area will increase foot traffic and revenue.

Now as you probably are looking at the routing above, you may see that there are four rogue greens sites parallel to all par 3s. When RTJ built this course, he had the idea to build two green sites for each one shotter, so faster groups can bypass slower groups at these holes. In execution this is not achieved, as there is typically only one cup cut per hole, leaving the other green to effectively being an in round practice green for the impatient golfer peeved by slow play. In all of the rounds I have played, never has the southern green on 8 and 17 been used. Great idea, but given golf courses need for labor and land constraints, these areas can be repurposed as and do not need to be meticulously maintained like a green and its surrounds.

In lieu of its shortcomings, the 6,800 yard course plays longer than carded, and is challenging above its 72.3/123 slope. But the question still needs to be asked, is this facility achieving its fullest potential based on location, providing interesting golf, and community centricity? Communities need meeting areas to congregate and golf courses can be that. At least in some municipalities they are starting to be multigenerational gathering places again.

Some of you are probably wondering, what encouraged me to do this experiment and write this blog? With the new renaissance of relatively affordable and interesting public golf within communities, the idea of having a golf course be an asset that brings locals together and also encourage visitors from other areas to visit is an attainable concept. Examples such as the Park in West Palm (which is great but I don't know too many places that can raise $55 Million), Belmont in Richmond, Memorial Park in Houston, and Charleston Muni have become multigenerational meeting locations and tourist attractions alike. If these places can have these, why can't Columbus? Why can't Raymond be redone to enable it to be a community gathering place and have interesting architecture?

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Land and Routing

This idea, fueled with me having conversations with fellow Columbus golfers as armchair architects, embarked me on this mission to theoretically redo Raymond. To start, I did what someone who is a process driven person would do (training from my day job), I asked what would be someone's process if they were evaluating a piece of land from scratch? They would want to look at a topographical map of the land....right? Then drainage, then routing, then figure out the holes. Well, I did that, and when looking at the topography of the land as step 1, I realized a couple of things:

1. The two main features of this course are (1) two streams that merge together right west of the clubhouse, and the (2) hill that sits in the northeast. The streams contain the most contouring that the course has, with that hill proving some interesting elevation (NOT bad for Central Ohio).

2. The land in between these two features is relatively flat and uninteresting.

3. The majority of the greens and green surrounds (yes those circles), if not all, are perched up and have a fall off behind the greens and potentially to the side, which is classic for the 1950s design.

Now when we overlay the current routing, what I found to be most disappointing is that the stream is really only challenged on 2 holes, since on 10, 14, and 15 the stream is nullified by an easy carry of greater than 150 yards or less from the back tees, to which each of these holes driver is the appropriate play.

Note: 100 is the Driving Range

After looking at the raw topo, the other thing I wanted to understand was drainage and slope within and around the property. Now I know I am unable to fully understand the draining of the site without consulting with the superintendent and grounds crew there, but I do think that we can make some hypotheses from some public maps that are available.

This topo map from the county website has 10 foot contour lines (the other Topo is 1 ft lines), along with a FEMA National Flood Hazard Layer (NFHL) overlayed to show any potential flooded areas. The only one that may cause an issue is the joining of the two streams west of the clubhouse. I would want to understand how that area is managed currently since the 2 greens that make up the Par 3 13th are in that space. For sake of the blog and my evaluation I am assuming this is not a large drainage issue or can be solved rather quickly.

Additionally, the property is on a gradual hill going from the west side of the property to the east side (30 feet in elevation change). This is great for drainage as there are little to no low points/bowls in the property. In my opinion, this means the majority of the water runs off the property.

After looking at the land and drainage, now was my take at routing. After mulling through multiple options, I didn't want to "blow up" the current routing, since I do feel that some of the greens sites are good and can be reused. I tried to focus on the two distinguished areas I discussed above, learning from Tom Doak's Anatomy of a Golf Course when he says, "When working with a relatively flat site, I look first to the places where the contour lines are close together, to try and optimize use of the limited natural features."

So ready for the big reveal, what my mid handicap golfing mind came up with as a way to make the classic tired muni more fun? See below...I will break it down in hole groupings later.

With five tee options, this is the layout with total yards for each tee option:

Hole	Cham Tee	Blue Tee	White Tee	Gold Tee	Orange Tee	Par
1	510	491	478	453	398	5
2	200	186	175	142	137	3
3	334	305	283	272	230	4
4	375	358	347	309	262	4
5	474	450	412	380	315	4
6	230	207	191	150	126	3
7	430	411	398	379	347	4
8	559	537	512	469	435	5
9	155	145	130	116	100	3
10	421	409	365	328	273	4
11	224	207	189	174	155	3
12	400	379	344	307	263	4
13	177	158	134	116	92	3
14	420	397	368	339	313	4
15	566	530	503	472	416	5
16	189	170	160	145	123	3
17	538	512	487	455	416	5
18	383	362	337	310	280	4
	Cham Tee	Blue Tee	White Tee	Gold Tee	Orange Tee
Total	6585	6214	5813	5316	4681	70
Front	3267	3090	2926	2670	2350	35
Back	3318	3124	2887	2646	2331	35