The college is considering whether to shutter its historic Hanover Country Club.

Even if the college were to close the club, of course, it would never sell off the entire golf course. The golf course has been officially viewed as a “land bank” for future institutional development for at least 15 years (see the 2002 master plan pdf).

This website has proposed that if the south end of the golf course is to be developed, it should be built up with some density using “town” forms rather than as an extension of the grassy campus, irrespective of ownership (see posts of 2008 and 2012).

Whatever form it takes, the development of the south end of the golf course should not require the closure of the Country Club. The Club itself has planned since at least 2000 to move its clubhouse to Lyme Road, and one could imagine new holes being added to the east of the course, near the Rugby Clubhouse, or to the north, in the Fletcher Circle neighborhood, where residents have had concerns about groundwater contamination migrating from CRREL. If the college really needs the land near Dewey Field for more buildings, it should simply shift the golf course instead of destroying it.