By Air, Land & Sea
Perched on San Francisco Bay, Metropolitan Golf Links Sports Picture-Perfect Approachability
by Andrew Hidas
Taking up substantial swaths of precious land as they do, golf courses are judged on a very basic level under the real estate industry’s guiding mantra Location! Location! Location! On that score, Metropolitan Golf Links, set down amidst the natural cathedral of San Francisco Bay, is the type of property that is always coveted, in good times and bad, fair weather or foul. Completed in 2003 on land just to the south of Oakland International Airport, “Metro”, as insiders quickly come to call it, shows designers Johnny Miller and Fred Bliss at their most approachable and natural. A straight-ahead pure links layout means virtually no trees and thus unobstructed bay breezes that distinctively shape every round you play. Fast and true greens won’t mess with your mental game. The setting calls for solid fundamentals and attunement with the time of day, the season, and how your own performance is shaping up on any given outing.
Metro’s oft-noted approachability also includes the purely geographic element of easy access from all over the East Bay, San Francisco, and even the North- and South Bay. The course enjoys one of those “no more than 45 minutes from everywhere” reputations. Once you arrive, you’ll behold such an abundance of bay, sky, mountain and bridge that you’ll be tempted to pat yourself on the back for your supreme good sense in choosing this day, in this place, to be pursuing the ancient ritual of a damn good game of golf. (Truth be told, being bayside on the links in wintry overcast with the incredibly tame temperatures of the prevailing Mediterranean climate can be pretty darn wonderful as well.)
At 6,959 yards from the tips (down to 5,099 on the last of the five tee placements), Metro will give you a workout on a merry quartet of par-5s. Nos. 3, 6, 10 and 17 all go in excess of 500 yards, and 10 par-4s will also stretch your game. Two exquisitely balanced 9s both finish at the clubhouse, with the back nine slightly more challenging in both length and shotmaking requirements. The course launches you kindly enough through the first three holes, with No. 1 a short par-4 that should give you plentiful landing room as long as you avoid the swale at the back of the green. No. 4 will challenge your grit at 469 yards, with an open landing area and no bunkers perhaps deluding you into dreams of an easy par. Not so. A dogleg left and then a wavy green will place your ball in peril from beginning to end on this difficult hole.
No. 14 is regarded as the signature hole, a 428-yard beauty that sees a bunker left and native grasses right requiring a true tee shot, then a crucial choice of irons that will carry you (or not) over an estuary fronting the green. Negotiate that and you’ll confront another seriously contoured green to help you finish this hole with all your senses engaged. With an estuary running through half a dozen holes late in the course, two sizable lakes and a pond accompanying four holes, water is a factor, right in tune with the surrounding bay. On days that water dumps from the sky, a state-ofthe-art drainage system includes two feet of sand that keep the course highly playable. Metro is a certified Audubon course featuring recycled water use,native plants and animal-friendly habitats that befit its Bay Area identity. Vistas stretch to the San Francisco and Oakland skylines, the Oakland hills, Mt. Tamalpais, the Peninsula and the Bay Bridge.
This is a superb and inviting walking course for those so inclined, with very few hills to get you out of your rhythm. Disabled, injured or elderly players enjoy a single person cart option for a mere 10 bucks ($6 for nine holes), reservations required. Course fees top out at $40 weekdays, $50 on Fridays and $62 weekends, with steep discounts for Oakland residents, seniors, juniors and off-hour play. It is not for nothing that Metropolitan is one of only two Bay Area courses to earn a Golf Digest rating of 4.5 out of 5 stars. Some of the allure is in what accompanies the course: an all-grass driving range, a fully fleshed out short game area with a main green and two hole locations, a practice bunker, and two target greens. A large new banquet facility accommodates up to 250 people for weddings and other parties, business meetings and more.
The Metropolitan Golf Academy offers lessons from half a dozen teaching professionals at varying prices, some with half-hour options. A women’s club, junior club, and the premier offerings from the ‘Membership Links Club’ help keep the calendar full. It’s also the home course of the Cal Bears, with notable alums and other Bay Area sports figures helping to liven up the proceedings. Five years after its debut, Metro is living up to its name as a kind of centralized urban golfing hub, the buzz of activity as relentless as the breezes that have helped shape it from its very first day.
