Golf courses on common land - your experiences

[Marshy77]

My old course is a moorland course - walkers, dogs and horses are frequently on the course but none cause any problems - that I've ever had.

The horse riders know the course and stick to the paths and only 1 hole is really affected by hove marks etc. Walkers are fine, normally wait for you to play and generally no problems at all.

Ooh sheep too occassionally

 

[mister v]

Painswick in Gloucestershire is nutty...shared fairways and walkers, horses dogs everywhere..... not been for a while, assume still like that

it is mate.....

 

[Britishshooting]

My earliest golf memories were on common land, my grandad would take me with my junior set of regal clubs and we'd knock our way around. I think back then people were more courteous as I played it a dozen times with no issues.

Said golf course nowadays I wouldn't bother with, drove past it the other day and there were chavs everywhere loitering around and flying about on pit bikes as many estates have since been built in the area. Obviously this ranges dependent on area but common courtesy in general is on the decline.

One of the clubs I'm a member of is a private club however has rights of way which provide dog walkers and ramblers etc. with a route through.

One of the holes was subjected to an enormous amount of wear and tear as a dog walker was coming on with a bag of balls and an iron, smashing balls for his dogs to fetch as it was out of view. The land which provided a right of way access to this hole is owned by my partners parents. They were fine with the land being used as a right of way but people increasingly used it as their playground and picnic stop. This resulted in two highland heifers being purchased and left to graze the land. Strange how the amount of litter reduced as at most they were making a quick pass through rather than loitering about. The amount of hacking to the tee boxes that the dog walker was often accused of also ceased.

 

[Pathetic Shark]

Wimbledon Common is a joke and the rangers are as bad as the public for the way they treat the golfers there. Epsom Downs has a few fairway campers at times and the members of the travelling community use one of the fairways to park during Derby week which means balls/clubs allegedly go missing on some nearby holes.

I've played courses with footpaths nearby and it's always the "professional ramblers" who cause the trouble because they think they know best about what they can do and cannot.

 

[Tongo]

My course is built on the New Forest (not that you would guess from its name...) so is not open just to humans, but ponies, deer, foxes and various other types of wildlife depending on the season. The local dog walkers/ramblers are pretty good and try to stay out of the way, most are happy to stop and pass the time of day if someone is waiting to play a shot. There are a few of the 'its my right of way so I'll use it' brigade though. I've seen a couple of them very nearly hit from walking out from behind a bush without bothering to look first as its their 'right of way'. They don't seem to understand its a bit tricky stopping a ball thats already airborne. Stupid is as stupid does...

There always seems to be at least one when me and the old man play there who appear from nowhere and arent paying any attention to where they are walking.