I cannot tell you how many times I've sent out Raceway Park SOS's....about upcoming meetings between the track, neighbors, township.....

So far, Raceway park has won. However, they still continue to build houses all around the park. The Realtors are required to inform potential buyers about the drag strip, and perhaps have them be in the neighborhood on an Sunday. But still, they band together once in and fight to restrict the drag strip even more.

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Jackee Allen-ProStockJunkie
"The aim of an argument or discussion should not be victory, but progress." -- Joseph Joubert (1754-1824) French Philosopher

I've long asked myself why anyone would move in next to a dragstrip and complain about the noise. Maybe it's financial. What if property is somewhat undervalued when they buy it BECAUSE of the track. If they can get the track closed down, they make a profit when values go up. What if real estate agents are giving them "wink, wink, nod, nod" advice concerning this when showing, selling the house on that angle? If you want to know why anything works, follow the money.

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The faster you drive, the further you have to walk to get back to the road.

I think if I was the owner of Raceway Park in NJ I'd print up the following letter and mail it to all the homeowners and the "association" who is doing all the complaining.

Dear neighbors, we (Raceway Park) are aware of your displeasure with the racing and noise on Sundays. Although we have been here since the mid 1960's we will be closing our doors at the end of this season. To be more "Community Sensitive" we are going to replace the race track with an amusement park... It will be open 7 days a week, and we are going to try to help underprivileged children (especially the 15- 19 yr olds) The "inner city" youths from Newark, Bronx, Bayonne, etc will be invited to come to "Friendly Englishtown Amusement Park" for FREE on Fri. nights.
We also will be trying to have the groups (please note I called them Groups...NOT GANGS) known as the "Crips" and the "Bloods" come and as Rodney King once said..."Can't We All Get Along Better" so in that vein the "Gang Bangers" will be invited to camp out and sleep on the property on Fri night to party and learn to get along with eachother...

Also in the interest of the community "WE" (Raceway Park) will hire between 6-10 security guards from the "Senior Citizen" sector to keep these youths under strict control..

Remember these kids will be "YOUR GUESTS" so please treat them with respect and don't be afraid to invite then into your home for a dinner or a 40 oz bottle of Red Dawg Beer.

We are hoping the homeowners committee will assist in making rules for these kids, and to report any muggings, assaults, or burglary's that may occur during their stays on the weekends.

Also while on the subject of under privileged youth, we plan on helping under privileged family's.. We will be building high rise buildings and permit any non citizen who is in the US legally to live here rent free.. this will help show how "Neighbor Friendly" us people from Englishtown can really be...

Thank you for your cooperation and help in this human endever...

The management.....

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"When I die, I want to die like my grandfather, who died peacefully in his sleep. Not screaming in panic like the passengers in his car."

Perfect letter to those who think they have it bad.

We are fairly fortunate here in Oklahoma, the Tulsa track is surrounded by the airport one mile to the west, a rock quarry east, future road course and oval property north to the road and industrial businesses to the south. And it is still one of the longest tracks in existence today. The biggest threat to losing it was fact it was not maintained in its previous 40 year history. Now it is nearly rebuilt new.

In Noble, outside of Norman, the NHRA facility, Thunder Valley Raceway, is way out amongst farm and farmers. Neither has residential issues and probably never will...

The old Tulsa Speedway was at the Fairgrounds for many years, over time the fairgrounds became smack dab in the middle of town and is now surrounded by neighborhoods with complainers. (didn't seem to matter back in the previous four decades!) Now the fairgrounds has lost a 50 year old amusement park, the circle track shut down...the only racing that goes on there now is horse racing and then of course the Chili Bowl every January inside the Expo building....

Actually, there might be an idea in there. Tracks spend a lot more days of the week idle than they do putting on events. Couldn't their space be used in ways to benefit the local communities so that neighbors might say "Yeah, they make a lot of noise, but we benefit from........during the week." Some kind of good to offset what is bad to them.

That, or like I've said before, drag racers and fans should be buying up the properties around tracks. I still say that'd be my kind of neighborhood. I can see it now. We get together for an intervention, approaching a neighbor with "John, you haven't started anything after 10PM in over six months. What's the problem?"

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The faster you drive, the further you have to walk to get back to the road.

This is an "Age-Old" problem everywhere.
These folks are commonly known as NIMBYs. (Not In My Back Yard)
They show up at rallies, City Council meetings, Town Hall meetings, Community Gatherings and Homeowner's Association meetings and contrive ways to make their personal space better now that they've relocated into this new territory without regard to the "Who Came First" argument.

Our own Air Force Bases are in serious jeopardy in many of the locations where they have been for decades and even a century-plus in many instances. Constant litigation persists in an effort to provide the newly-arrived NIMBYs a better lifestyle. The problem is chronic and it's growing.

Our Government is of the people, by the people, for the people but the pendulum has swung beyond center as it always seems to do for causes that start out worthy and go way overboard.

I sell land and cannot count how many times I've heard residents stand up and say "Now that we've arrived, we want more quite-space-control" or worse yet, "Now that we've arrived,we don't want any more progress around our quiet, pristine neighborhoods which weren't here last year."

Progress is great when it benefits some of these whiners but it's to be forbidden once they've found their place in the sun.

My favorite experience was standing on a lot a decade or so ago in the flight path of Luke AFB when an F-16 flew directly overhead. The prospective buyer asked if that kind of noise was frequent to which his elderly friend replied, "That's the sound of our Freedom!" Frank purchased the lot, built a beautiful home there and still resides there today. We could learn an important lesson from this Good-'ol-Boy. I know, I did!

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"The Doctor"
www.wannaberacing.com

The problem is the developers tell the new homeowners.."just complain a lot,that will close the drag strip".And the dopey city council people who don't know a thing about racing will side with the homeowner,so they can get re-elected.

[quote=Ron Dunlap;74975]Couldn't their space be used in ways to benefit the local communities so that neighbors might say "Yeah, they make a lot of noise, but we benefit from........during the week."

OMG!!! I've solved one of the major issues plagueing America because of your comment!!! We can let all those cyclists out there use the strip to work out!!! Now I don't have to worry (or be tempted to depending on my mood) about hitting them on the street and going 3 MPH around them!!!!

Wow, solving issues like that can be fun... next issue: world hunger! My idea is in alpha phase but it includes using the parking lots and a lot of potatoes... :-)

CJ Curtsinger

You're absolutely right CJ. I was the track announcer at Mid-America Raceway in Wentzville MO (just west of St Louis). The track was built in 1964 and was still owned and operated by the guy who built it. When St Louis kept growing west, the growth eventually surrounded the track. The homeowners took him to court and darn near closed him down. The judge finally allowed him to stay open but with significant restrictions. We dealt with those restrictions for years, but finally gave in and sold out to developers. The end of an awesome era for sure...

John, that was my favorite track when I was road racing. MAR had some challenging corners and was a blast to drive. When I think back on how close the trees were in corners 2 and 3 compared with today's tracks I wonder how most of us made it out of there alive. My single best day of racing took place there and I will always remember MAR with a smile.

Good on you Whit for an entertaining and all-too-true whine... Add the old, much lamented Edmonton International Speedway to the list of tracks killed by noise complaints by "Johnny Come Lately's". EIS had been operating for a long, long time (at least 20 years) before development came to its eastern boundary. Eventually of course, the developers and new residents won out and it had to close, leaving me without a track for 10+ years until visionaries purchased some land near the airport where they now have NO noise restrictions at all...

I grew up about 8 blocks south of it - how cool was that for a 10 year old boy to be able to walk to the dragstrip and see Muldowney vs Garlits match races, Prudhomme and Force in booked-in FC shows, Gordie Bonin, Gary Beck, and Jerry Ruth? My parents grumped about the noise every now and then (especially the road course) but I loved it. Of course, I was a bit biased...

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“One day when I was walking through the pits,” Millican said, “Evan said he wanted to talk to me. ‘Do you know how many millions (of dollars) I’ve spent to beat you?’ he said. ‘Since I couldn’t beat you, I’m going to own you.’ "

[quote=CJ Curtsinger;75048]LOL, actually I'm racking my brain to figure out what kind of community need a track's real estate could be used to fill during the week that wouldn't involved too much liability on it's part. You've already got a concession stand there.

The world hunger part is simple but not easy. Removed the world's socialist and communist dictators, replacing them with individual freedoms and capitalism so that they can have more of what we have here, such as more dragstrips per capita than anywhere on earth.

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The faster you drive, the further you have to walk to get back to the road.