What caught our eye in reviewing photos of Jack Nicklaus Golf Club Korea, site of this year's President's Cup, was the magnificent bridge looming beyond the par-5 15th (pictured). Unlike other mammoth mechanical structures – high tension power line towers immediately come to mind – a bridge never seems to disturb the scenic panorama of a golf course. Instead, it enhances it, because it's always more than beams and girders. Every bridge is a work of art, with its own grace, beauty and character. Here are a baker's dozen of golf courses with bridge backdrops, more often than not deliberately incorporated into the course design since, in most cases, the bridge was there first.
Trump Golf Links Ferry Point, Bronx, N.Y.
One of America's most exciting new courses finishes with a flourish with its 18th green seemingly underneath the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge (better known simply as the Whitestone Bridge), which opened in 1939 just in time for the New York Worlds Fair in Queens.
Clearview Park Golf Course, Queens, N.Y.
Just a few miles from Trump Links, on the south side of the East River, Clearview (dating from 1925) sits at the base of New York's Throgs Neck Bridge (opened in 1961). Dense trees hide any view of the bridge on most holes, but the hilltop 17th tee provides a great look.
Dyker Beach Golf Course, Brooklyn, N.Y.
Like Clearview, this Depression-era course uses its bridge as its logo. Fairways are lined with mature trees, but on the seventh hole you can spot the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge that links Brooklyn to Staten Island. It opened in 1964, but too late for the World's Fair that year.
Photo By: (C)2012 Dsquared productions inc. Murphy/Scully
Skyway Golf Course, Jersey City, N.J.
A brand-new nine-hole version of Trump Golf Links, designed by Roy Case and Jeff Grossman, this brownfield faux links is named for the ancient Pulaski Skyway that stretches from Newark to Jersey City. Long considered narrow and inefficient, the bridge is presently closed for expansion.
Photo By: Skyway GC
Rum Pointe Seaside Golf Links, Berlin, Md.
A collaboration of Pete Dye and younger son P.B., this marshfront layout overlooks Maryland's Verrazano Bridge, which, like the Brooklyn version, misspells the name of its honoree, the 16th Century Italian explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano.
The Club at Savannah Harbor, Savannah, Ga.
This 1999 Bob Cupp design sits on Hutchinson Island, between the Little Back River to the north and the Savannah River to the south. Spanning the latter is the Talmadge Memorial Bridge, actually a 1991 replacement of an early bridge with the same name.
Photo By: Chris Condon/PGA/Getty Images
St. Ignace Golf and Country Club, St. Ignace, Mich.
A modest 9-hole course dating from 1927, the value of its location rose considerably when the Mackinac Bridge opened in 1957, linking the Upper Peninsula with the rest of Michigan. The bridge was built after the state rejected the idea of a floating tunnel.
Photo By: St. Ignace GC
Austin Country Club, Austin, Texas
Not many things can overshadow a Pete Dye design, but his opening holes along the Colorado River (what locals call Lake Austin) are dwarfed by the rust-colored arches of the Percy V. Pennybacker Jr. Bridge. Named for a famed Texas bridge architect, Pennybacker opened in 1982, two years before Pete completed the course.
Coronado Golf Course, Coronado, Calif.
In the 1960s, when the government decided to build the curvaceous Coronado Bridge from the island to San Diego, they needed two holes of Coronado Golf Course, which had opened in 1957. So architect Billy Bell added new second and third holes on land reclaimed from San Diego Bay.
Lincoln Park Golf Course, San Francisco
Golf at Lincoln Park started in 1909; the full 18 has been in operation for 100 years. So golfers at Lincoln Park were able to view construction of famed Golden Gate Bridge, a short distance up the Pacific Coast, from its start in 1933 to its completion in 1937.
Weston Golf & Country Club, Toronto, Ontario
Most believe that when Willie Park laid out Weston in 1915 along the Humber River, the Canadian Pacific's railroad bridge behind the second green was already there. Arnold Palmer won his first PGA Tour event at Weston in 1955. Decades later, the hole he could clearly remember was "the one with the trestle."
Photo By: Weston Golf & Country Club
Bridge Valley Golf Course, Lethbridge, Alberta
This innocuous 9-hole par-3 course, laid out in a deep valley formed by Old Man River, bases its identity on the dramatic High Level Bridge across the gap to the immediate south. When this railroad viaduct first opened in 1909, it was called by one writer "one of the wonders of the world."
Jack Nicklaus Golf Club Korea, New Songdo City, South Korea
The site of this year's Presidents Cup is surprisingly young, having opened in 2010. At the time Jack Nicklaus and his team were designing and constructing the course, engineers were doing Grand Bridge (the Incheon Daegyo Bridge) connecting the international airport on Yeongjong Island to Incheon on the mainland. It opened in 2009.
