Even the most diehard New Yorkers haven’t heard of Ferry Point, a little bit of the Bronx that sticks into the East River under the Whitestone Bridge. That anonymity is about to change.
This month, a public golf course—called Trump Golf Links at Ferry Point —opens on that reclaimed piece of landfill sandwiched between warehouses, a cemetery, and an urban neighborhood of shops and homes. But unlike the city’s dozen other munis, this one is as big and brassy as New York itself, thanks to the two men who made it happen—Jack Nicklaus and Donald Trump.
After years of municipal muddling, The Donald got involved and had the Nicklaus design built in about 18 months. The result is a wind-whipped pseudo-links—plenty of earth was moved—that plays up, down, and through rippling mounds and distinctive dunes to big, undulating greens surrounded by cunningly sculpted collection areas. There are wispy grasses and not too much sand, the holes coming in all sizes and running in all directions. In some of the low spots, when it suddenly gets quiet and you feel very much alone, it is possible to imagine being across the sea—until climbing back up into markedly metropolitan surroundings. Of course, the irrepressible Trump sees it hosting a significant tournament, but he’s got a case: It’s that good.
While the course is special, the views from it are outstanding, especially the entireManhattan skyline, stretching triumphantly across the horizon. On holes like the tough 7th—a short par four along a pond that dares one to be bold (and have precise control of yardage)—the cityscape, barely 10 miles away, is nothing less than breathtaking. The final holes play down to and along the East River while cars roar across the bridge overhead and planes fly in and out of nearby LaGuardia Airport, a tableaux of the world on the go.
There’s nothing else like it. Just like New York.
