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  • It turns out people have even mapped individual greens, fairways, bunkers, etc on OpenStreetMap! So you can use that data to generate a yardage book for each course: https://npilk.github.io/openyardage-web/
    by npilk
  • As I recall, OSM already tends to have many golf courses mapped in extreme detail, because there’s a game that lets you play OSM golf courses on your golf simulator.

    This sometimes leads to conflict between the game’s passionate users and OSM, when they map every road around a golf course as a cart path, because that’s the only thing the game imports.

    by mikeocool
  • course details are not that great on OSM. typically just some polygons labeled 'golf course' and maybe a number of holes
    by rickmf
  • Golf courses in USA use half a trillion gallons of fresh water annually.

    All data centers use less than 0.2 (of which only less than 0.02 is used for cooling the servers, the rest is just electricity generation, which can and should be replaced with solar).

    There's no replacement for water usage for golf courses and even half a trillion number is after recent 30% reduction of usage from what it was before.

    by scotty79
  • Good thing water replaces itself!
    by rickmf
  • Missed one: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Elizabeth+Lyle+Robbie+Stad...
    by postalrat
  • that's the University of Minnesota Les Bolstad golf course

    https://www.uofmgolf.com/teetime

    by fsckboy
  • This is fascinating not because I’m interested in visiting any of these. But to see the communities in Alaska with courses, or to look at the most concentrated places and wonder what so many people in Florida get out of having a fairway and one hole right in their backyard..
    by totetsu
  • retirement communities in florida have a lot of these weird mini private courses.
    by rickmf
  • In a lot of places, that golf course is the most beautiful piece of land around you, not just well maintained but lot of wildlife, birds, deer etc. so having that right on your backyard whether you golf or do not golf is a great attraction
    by navaed01
  • I was going to say you were missing this one but I'm not sure if it's still open after the county purchased it.

    https://www.pga.com/play/ny/rome/mohawk-glen-golf-course/033...

    Now add mini golf courses.

    by mercurywells
  • yeah mini golf would be a nice add. I'd like to get all practice facilities and indoor/ sim golf as well eventually.
    by rickmf
  • Do you plan to contribute the data back into OSM? That would be the nice way to go to share with the community and allow you to have better data in the future with less maintenance work.
    by flaburgan
  • Not yet but i'd like to port it back somehow eventually. I've definitely named a lot of their unnamed courses on OSM
    by rickmf
  • Golf is a sport I never tried but really want to. Also from the outside it looks both fun and relaxing to be outside in the nature. But I’m in the wrong country for that currently lol, golf is a niche here in Eastern Europe
    by haunter
  • Try VR golf to get started!
    by rickmf
  • It definitely can be enjoyed, but does it beat a walk in the forest? Not necessarily.

    Golf is a social marker in Anglo-Saxon countries. Only the highest classes used to be able to afford it. In America they built a lot of courses because they have the space, and there was demand, obviously because lower classes wanted to feel like they’ve made it. Kind of like wearing tuxedos (or owning a Mercedes Benz in Eastern Europe).

    Obviously the higher classes just got more exclusive markers (particular clubs, private jets, islands, etc.), but America is left with all that land converted into courses which apparently aren’t even used that much nowadays. Turns out it can get boring quickly.

    by kubb
  • This is supercool. But I have a tangential question. I see projects like this built on top of OSM for different use cases. Does this data gets contributed back to OSM. A lot of them seems hobby projects, so it's hard to maintain long term, but the data is quite useful and could be used beyond the lifetime of these projects if they can be contributed back to OSM somehow.
    by wanderingmind
  • OSM probably has the best data on golf courses because for many courses, people have mapped each 'golf=hole' as a way, and mapped other golf course features such as 'golf=bunker', 'golf=green', etc.

    OSM knows of almost 40k golf courses around the world.[2] This compares to 38k golf courses known to the R&A Golf Around the World Fourth Edition (2021) report and 37.6k courses listed in the NGF course database as of July 2024. It's likely OSM knows of 99.99..% of all active golf courses and also still retains tags for closed/unused golf courses too. So if OSM were to be inaccurate, it'd likely be inaccurate for whether a golf course is open or closed, rather than OSM not knowing about a golf course existing.

    I wonder whether an OSM tile server / custom style sheet for golfers would be easiest and most useful/comprehensive way to keep track of golf courses?

    [1] https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:golf%3Dhole

    [2] https://taginfo.openstreetmap.org/tags/leisure=golf_course#o...

    [3] https://assets.randa.org/c42c7bf4-dca7-00ea-4f2e-373223f80f7...

    [4] https://thegolfwire.com/worldwide-golf-course-development-re...

    by dhx
  • Nice job! When I zoom in on Google earth you can easily see if it’s actually a golf course or not, would been interesting to use this to draw up the areas with polygons and some more details.

    Then you could start providing a lot more details about each one automatically.

    by punnerud
  • This would surely be helpful!
    by nirali-shekhwa
  • yeah i am pulling from OSM. I can probably draw those polygons. It;s been an OK source for number of holes etc but I need to cross reference to get other detailed info
    by rickmf
  • So, I started https://golfcourse.wiki in 2020, and I see courses that basically only I’ve mapped.

    It’s cool, I want it to be public, if you want to work together, do reach out.

    I would also say what you are doing is almost certainly opening you up to liability if you are just scraping other sites and republishing their data. One paper town that you published and you might have a lawsuit on your hands.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phantom_settlement

    by scoofy
  • There's already one club I can see on there that doesn't actually exist.

    Is a running gag in the area where I grew up, and made it on this list somehow. So that's weird.

    by Loughla
  • Nice! Someone shared thAT wiki with me recently on reddit. I had not been aware of it before. Great stuff!

    I'm not a lawyer but my stack is clean. My base layer is OSM, which is licensed for exactly this stuff (and attributed). On top of that I used golfcourseapi.com which i also recommend (affordable, and fairly reliable so far, but not always current). Then community notes etc.

    I cross reference against other sources but I am only publishing facts, which are not copyrightable in the US.

    Would love to touch base one day and compare notes. I work in the golf industry so mostly just made this for myself. But after sharing with some friends and co workers i thought the wider golf community might appreciate it

    by rickmf
  • I am not sure how it is in USA but in my country golf courses are abuse of public resources for (almost) private use. For a very few who can lobby enough for renewal of these leases and these are kept out of reach of the normal public, either by rule or by cost, sometimes both. Golf courses are lungs of many of the growing cities, across the world, but I do believe they should not be kept exclusive. Also, this comes directly from feudal/colonial times here. Those also require too much of other natural and public resources to be maintained.
    by crossroadsguy
  • Why don't the "In my country" posters ever name the country
    by fluorinerocket
  • Are you saying your country's government, for some reason, spends its money on private golf courses?
    by philip-b
  • In Toronto, I think golf courses are built on flood plains along rivers (Don, Humber, etc.). Some other flood plains are public parks. Houses are generally not built on flood plains.
    by nayuki
  • Yeah, I could imagine golf being a sore spot for Indians. I never imagined India would even be a hotspot for golf, but given the amount of corruption going on, it would make sense that golf courses would be foisted upon the public. It’s always discouraging to see the amount of upper class Indians who, despite colonial times being long gone, are still very willing to sell out their countrymen to appease whites or to fit a British/white ideal. I hope I’m wrong about this impression, and I’m just seeing cherry picked news articles, but your reaction makes me think otherwise….
    by topato