As readers will know, after some public effort, Hurst Walk remains open. However it seems from the experience of some park users that the pathway itself is the only part of the new golf course where the public will be allowed to walk. Even when the course is empty.

Stray from the path, and you are likely to meet a man from the NOPD - on a golf cart.

The letter below is one that we have received from a local resident. We are sure there are other stories since this writer had a similiar experience while actually standing on Hurst Path.

If you have a story of unwelcome security-guard or police attention while minding your own business in Audubon Park we would be happy to hear it. Send an email to SaveAudubonPark@Yahoo.com.

We realise that while the course is in use it is incumbent upon other users of the park to avoid accident and injury by steering clear of danger. This is how it has always been. The general park-going public has co-existed peacefully and without injury for about 100 years. Although the old Audubon Golf Club was itself a 'private club', there has been no custom in the past 100 years for members of the public to be threatened with arrest or other action for straying onto 'private property' - especially around the edges near the lagoon and in the early morning or evening when the course is fairly lightly in use.

We fear that as part of the new look, 'executive facility', Audubon will enforce the separation of the golf course from the park much more strongly, arguing that it is 'private property'.

A letter to the editor

To the editor:

The new regime at Audubon Park Golf Course defies its customary use. In the evenings it was shared by walkers, who strolled its periphery in a truce with twilight golfers. I personally both golfed and walked there for many years without a problem.

Recently, while walking at 5pm on the nearly deserted course and at the edge of a fairway, I was approached by a police officer in a golf cart. He asserted that, despite the fact that I had been walking there for nearly 30 years, it was now private property and that I would be given a summons for trespassing the next time he saw me.

The Audubon Institute has taken a colossally proprietary approach to this public space. Despite general opposition from walkers and golfers, they built their Disneyland course, with its acres of concrete cart paths, and they got a liability dispensation from the state. Now they should call off their dogs.