Does anyone know how to get the city to ok a street curcuit?

[Jeremy Porter]

Does anyone know how to approach a city to try a street circuit? Who has experience in that area? I would not mind trying it out! Any thoughts?
Jeremy William Porter
God Speed Racing
Cell 770.329.6223
eFax 509.267.5306
Fax 678.380.6006

[Roger Ruthhart]

My advice is this:
1) Make sure you have at least 2 years to plan and organize the first one, line up sponsors, etc.;
2) Make sure you have an organization behind you -- one person cannot do it;
3) Talk to Don Janowski at Don Janowski Insurance, 812-378-0942 about the minimum requirements needed to get a street circuit insured.
4) Hire a qualified race director who has done temp. circuit races to help design the track and run the event. I recommend Tom Argy Jr.
5) Come to our Labor Day Weekend race. It's the best street race in the country and we'll let you tag along and see all the warts up close.

Then you're ready to approach the city and answer the questions they will have. My experience from doing this, and talking with others, is that smaller towns are easier to work with than big cities and have less costs and regulations/ordinances to follow. You can contact me privately if you have additional questions.

Roger Ruthhart
Rock Island Grand Prix
Rock Island, Ill.
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quote:

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Originally posted by Jeremy Porter:
Does anyone know how to approach a city to try a street circuit? Who has experience in that area? I would not mind trying it out! Any thoughts?
Jeremy William Porter
God Speed Racing
Cell 770.329.6223
eFax 509.267.5306
Fax 678.380.6006

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[John Barnum]

Now you have really tackled a problem. Street courses are a very serious effort which requires lots of man hours to setup and teardwon. You will need to find a small community which has a strong rotary group anotherc sommunity social organization. They need to be willing to tackle the ordinaces necessary to obtain the permits. This is a slow process. Here in the Northwest there a few street races. One up near Spokane, WA.,Chamainus Grand Prix on Vancouver Island,BC and I think further North on the Island but can not remember the name.
However, you may want to connect with a large shopping mall or a county fair in your area. Both of these types of places offer a large parking lot. You may be able move forward. Getting a temporay track will be much easier to setup and teardown. You will not be blocking businesses, creating noise in a neighborhood and of course not stopping traffic. Portland Karting Association has held two parking lot races over the past seven years and both were in a large mall. The first one was setup by the club and used large rubber strips to mark the corners. These were brought down form the karting club in Vnacouver, BC which uses TradeEX parking lot at the airport at Abbotsford, BC. The second event was held a new expanded mall in Beaverton, OR. Here the Rotary club worked with Gold's Gym. Hay ballels were used to mark the course. Portlable cyclone fencing was brought in to sparate the spectators from the racers. The event was going to happen again but they ran into several problems and did not happen.
Then years ago I remeber a small community between Portland, Oregon and Salem, OR which has a October festival each year. They have held street races for bicycle races, Autocross and karts. All of this goes back over twenty years or more. Now this festival is very popular and does need a side attraction. ( I remember races my 65'Mustang in the autocross and the only thing that kept me from hitting any spectators was a single row of hay bales. Even back then I was concerned about safety. )
Wish you luck,
John

[Darrin Tebbe]

Jeremy, I see you are in Atlanta, where are you thinking of holding the race? Looking at the turnout at Barnesville lately is pretty depressing. When I raced there in 94-97 we had 20 karts in my class, now they are lucky to have 20 karts total. The dirt tracks have just exploded, however, I just don't get it. I don't want to start all over and learn dirt, but that may be the only option before long.

DT

[Roger Ruthhart]

Darrin: Good point. Something else to investigate before doing a race. We draw racers to Rock Island from all over the country, but a majority of entries are from Midwest. Very few street/asphalt racers from the south, other than from Florida and a some shifters. There used to be a parking lot race in Athens, GA, run I believe by the Chamber of Commerce, but I don't know how well that drew and it's been a few years since I've heard about it. You're going to have to rely on regional racers to build the event and if your regional racers are all on dirt, clay or ovals ... there might be a problem. Something else to investigate.

quote:

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Originally posted by Darrin Tebbe:
Jeremy, I see you are in Atlanta, where are you thinking of holding the race? Looking at the turnout at Barnesville lately is pretty depressing. When I raced there in 94-97 we had 20 karts in my class, now they are lucky to have 20 karts total. The dirt tracks have just exploded, however, I just don't get it. I don't want to start all over and learn dirt, but that may be the only option before long.

DT

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[Darrin Tebbe]

The thing that kills Barnesville (management aside) is that it is 2+ hours from the northern atlanta suburbs. If you could build a facility in the Douglasville area, for example, you could draw from the north metro and Alabama. An arrive and drive class would be key to drawing new karters, and media.

It is very easy to get media coverage if you invite them out to run a "media race". I know most of the gearhead media types (I hit all the junkets with them) and they would all jump all over the opportunity to race anything head to head. My last one was with the IRL at Atlanta Motor Speedway, I took a ride with Davey Hamilton (nice guy) in the 2 seat IRL car. We did about 180 mph, and I think around 3g. It was awesome, the only thing that might ever top it would be a ride with the blue angels, or actually driving of coarse .

DT

[Oscar Aguilera]

quote:

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Originally posted by Jeremy Porter:
Does anyone know how to approach a city to try a street circuit? Who has experience in that area? I would not mind trying it out! Any thoughts?
Jeremy William Porter
God Speed Racing
Cell 770.329.6223
eFax 509.267.5306
Fax 678.380.6006

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Call Bill Dollahite he did it in a month from ground zero. He is a First Kart Dealer, you can find his Number in SKI in the First Kart add.

[Jeremy Porter]

Thanks Darrin, John and Roger!

I agree about Barnesville as well Darrin. I have been meeting with investors for about 1 year now to get finances together to build a first rate facility. I feel that the street circuit could peek some more interest and get the ball rolling quicker! If you guys or anyone else has any more info or ideas please give me a heads up.

God speed,

Jeremy Porter

[Roger Ruthhart]

In a month? In city streets?? THAT is a miracle. Did he pay off the politicians?

quote:

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Originally posted by Oscar Aguilera:


Call Bill Dollahite he did it in a month from ground zero. He is a First Kart Dealer, you can find his Number in SKI in the First Kart add.

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[Sam Cooper]

Yes, He did it in a month!! And he (Bill Dollahite) did a fine job with vendors/consessions - side show (sky divers) - event T-shirts & local TV coverage! He had a great turn out for such a small town! sure, there were some small snags.. but in all, I was a great show!

You can contact Bill Dollohite @ 512-388-2500

I'm sure he can answer any questions you have.

Sam Cooper www.speedwerxracing.com