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GolfClubAtlas.com => Golf Course Architecture => Topic started by: Jim O’Kane on May 13, 2022, 02:21:57 PM

Title: Atlanta GCA'ers...anyone know what happened to the effort at Durham Lakes?
Post by: Jim O’Kane on May 13, 2022, 02:21:57 PM

Located in Fairburn across from the site of the GA Renaissance Festival, Durham Lakes was a pretty reasonably priced sub-division course that had really good bones, but was always in up and down shape. I had heard the course changed hands many times until it finally shuttered somewhere around 2016.

Then it was put up for auction. Around 2020 or so, this gentleman appeared to have bought it and single handedly cleared out all the overgrowth of weeds and starting rebuilding/revamping the golf course. He got to a point where he had new greens in and new bunkers and had announced he was mere months away from a grand opening this spring. Then suddenly, there was nothing and I can only assume the project has been abandoned.

Looking at the aerials today, you can see that it really does seem like it was close to being finished. I had looked at aerials around 4 years ago, and you could barely make out the hole routings with all the overgrowth.

Anyone know what happened down there? I was looking forward to it opening as it was a short jaunt from my house and a challenging golf course.

Take a look at the current aerial. Looks pretty darn close to me.


Seems like such a shame...to do all that work and be so close to the finish line.
Title: Re: Atlanta GCA'ers...anyone know what happened to the effort at Durham Lakes?
Post by: Jim O’Kane on May 13, 2022, 02:27:42 PM
I can't seem to upload the aerial, but here's the link to it...


https://www.google.com/maps/place/Durham+Lakes+Golf+%26+Country+Club/@33.5587863,-84.6121222,707m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x0:0x4212c9b0460b1497!8m2!3d33.5619601!4d-84.6103841 (https://www.google.com/maps/place/Durham+Lakes+Golf+%26+Country+Club/@33.5587863,-84.6121222,707m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x0:0x4212c9b0460b1497!8m2!3d33.5619601!4d-84.6103841)
Title: Re: Atlanta GCA'ers...anyone know what happened to the effort at Durham Lakes?
Post by: A.G._Crockett on May 13, 2022, 03:24:02 PM
I moved away from ATL in 2015, so I didn't know Durham Lakes had closed.  You are spot on in your assessment; really good layout that was a prisoner of it's conditioning.
Title: Re: Atlanta GCA'ers...anyone know what happened to the effort at Durham Lakes?
Post by: Jim O’Kane on May 13, 2022, 03:42:56 PM
I moved away from ATL in 2015, so I didn't know Durham Lakes had closed.  You are spot on in your assessment; really good layout that was a prisoner of it's conditioning.


Thanks AG. I really liked that golf course and was excited about it opening back up. Just from the aerials, the guy did some incredible heavy lifting and work. Really remarkable it seems.


It really was a pretty fine layout with a good mix of holes. Number 9 and 18 were two particularly good closing par 4's for each nine. Especially 9. Research shows it was built in 2006, designed by Scott Pool. I know nothing of him.


Maybe Mike Young might know something about this. I like his courses and always have wanted to get down to his place The Fields in LaGrange. Maybe I could just go down there, play, and ask.
Title: Re: Atlanta GCA'ers...anyone know what happened to the effort at Durham Lakes?
Post by: A.G._Crockett on May 13, 2022, 09:09:31 PM
I moved away from ATL in 2015, so I didn't know Durham Lakes had closed.  You are spot on in your assessment; really good layout that was a prisoner of it's conditioning.


Thanks AG. I really liked that golf course and was excited about it opening back up. Just from the aerials, the guy did some incredible heavy lifting and work. Really remarkable it seems.


It really was a pretty fine layout with a good mix of holes. Number 9 and 18 were two particularly good closing par 4's for each nine. Especially 9. Research shows it was built in 2006, designed by Scott Pool. I know nothing of him.


Maybe Mike Young might know something about this. I like his courses and always have wanted to get down to his place The Fields in LaGrange. Maybe I could just go down there, play, and ask.
I don't think Scott Pool has done but a handful of courses, but at least one other one is quite notable.  Waterfall in Clayton, GA on Lake Burton is a pretty unique golf course; huge elevation changes and spectacular conditions.  Waterfall used to be bent grass tee to green, but it tended to stay terribly soft, and I think it's been regrassed.  Bill Bergin just completed a large renovation project.

Two other notes about Waterfall:  The current ownership includes, among others, Nick Saban, who also has a house there.  And the course is named after a par 3 that drops over 200' from the tee to the green, so it typically plays about 9 clubs less than the measured yardage; I've never seen anything to match it. (It used to be #10, but I think Bill Bergin has altered Pool's original routing.)  The membership had, at least in the bent grass days, a local rule that if the entire group agrees on where a ball landed but the ball cannot be found, the player drops with no penalty.  The reason is that golf balls at more or less terminal velocity would plug so deep they just couldn't be found.  I know that sounds like a tall tale; it isn't.

Also, that hole gives the course it's name; there is a waterfall from the top all the way to the bottom 200' below.  It's spectacular, and completely fake; the water comes out of a retention pond at the top, and then is captured and pumped back up to the pond.  As soon as the last group of the day finishes and takes their pictures, they cut off the waterfall and the pumps for the night.  I have a picture of me taken on the tee looking toward the green, and from the green looking toward the waterfall and up at the tee; good pictures, but they don't really convey the scale.
Title: Re: Atlanta GCA'ers...anyone know what happened to the effort at Durham Lakes?
Post by: Anthony_Nysse on May 14, 2022, 09:54:16 AM
I moved away from ATL in 2015, so I didn't know Durham Lakes had closed.  You are spot on in your assessment; really good layout that was a prisoner of it's conditioning.


Thanks AG. I really liked that golf course and was excited about it opening back up. Just from the aerials, the guy did some incredible heavy lifting and work. Really remarkable it seems.


It really was a pretty fine layout with a good mix of holes. Number 9 and 18 were two particularly good closing par 4's for each nine. Especially 9. Research shows it was built in 2006, designed by Scott Pool. I know nothing of him.


Maybe Mike Young might know something about this. I like his courses and always have wanted to get down to his place The Fields in LaGrange. Maybe I could just go down there, play, and ask.
I don't think Scott Pool has done but a handful of courses, but at least one other one is quite notable.  Waterfall in Clayton, GA on Lake Burton is a pretty unique golf course; huge elevation changes and spectacular conditions.  Waterfall used to be bent grass tee to green, but it tended to stay terribly soft, and I think it's been regrassed.  Bill Bergin just completed a large renovation project.

Two other notes about Waterfall:  The current ownership includes, among others, Nick Saban, who also has a house there.  And the course is named after a par 3 that drops over 200' from the tee to the green, so it typically plays about 9 clubs less than the measured yardage; I've never seen anything to match it. (It used to be #10, but I think Bill Bergin has altered Pool's original routing.)  The membership had, at least in the bent grass days, a local rule that if the entire group agrees on where a ball landed but the ball cannot be found, the player drops with no penalty.  The reason is that golf balls at more or less terminal velocity would plug so deep they just couldn't be found.  I know that sounds like a tall tale; it isn't.

Also, that hole gives the course it's name; there is a waterfall from the top all the way to the bottom 200' below.  It's spectacular, and completely fake; the water comes out of a retention pond at the top, and then is captured and pumped back up to the pond.  As soon as the last group of the day finishes and takes their pictures, they cut off the waterfall and the pumps for the night.  I have a picture of me taken on the tee looking toward the green, and from the green looking toward the waterfall and up at the tee; good pictures, but they don't really convey the scale.


Scott worked for Pete Dye in the 1980's.


He now is focus on his business, [size=78%]Home (greenscan3d.com) (http://www.greenscan3d.com/)[/size]. We used him to GPS the entire course at Old Marsh. Does a great job.