03/24/2004
SHORTS TRACKS -
ENDANGERED SPECIES LIST
by Billy Bartley
If short tracks were
animals...they would certainly be on the endangered species
list. It seems as if every year there is a local speedway we
all know or have attended closing for good. The list is not
friendly to any size track... from 1/4 mile bullrings to over
1/2 mile super fast speedways. Nor is it kind to the type
surface whether it be dirt or asphalt. For example, the whole
state of New jersey has only 3 short tracks left and rumor is
one of them is making the list.
The disease which
infects these facilities varies from track to track but the
end result is still the same...it is gone for good and just a
memory. I have compiled the 3 top reasons in my opinion we are
losing our great facilities:
A good percentage are lost to the most dreaded
disease of all...(Money). In some areas
lately, land is in short supply and property values have
skyrocketed. The speedway owners are just plain giving in to
the easy cash. They think, why should I work my butt off
keeping the place open when I could make 20 years of profit or
rent by the sale of it in one easy transaction. It really
makes you think...what would you do if you
had 30 acres worth $100,000 per acre? (That's 3 million bucks
folks).....with the added option of not working the rest
of your life!!! The days of the person taking a lifetime to
make his million are gone. Today it is, "I want to be a
millionaire before I'm 30/40".
I think the second
most ill-fated sickness is (the neighbors).
It seems as if all of a sudden in the last 10 years this new
middle aged generation has a thing for local race tracks. Most
race tracks in the North East are 30-50 years old and some
even older. These people are buying houses next to speedways
then after a while have the audacity to complain about them.
Sure race tracks create noise, traffic, bright lights, and
dust (dirt tracks) on one day a week for a few months etc,
etc... BUT if you don't like to be bothered by these
things...WHY DID YOU BUY THE HOUSE WHEN YOU KNEW THERE WAS A
RACE TRACK NEARBY? ( Remember why you got a good deal on
that house 10 years ago??? because it was
next to a racetrack)!!! Now you want to give them a hard time? Then
it's the old vicious circle...the neighbors complain to the
politicians, the politicians have to act on it if they want to
be elected the next term, then the papers get hold of the
story, then more neighbors read it, and so-on.
Thirdly, The disease that
to me is like cancer; (Bad promotion).
Once it starts...it is hard to get rid of. If you have someone
running a perfectly good facility, good location, good
neighbors...a place that was open for maybe 30+ years and all
of a sudden a new promoter takes over and ruins the
place....it is the worst disease of all because it was
avoidable. It is a sad case to see a speedway slowly die
with low car counts and empty grandstands because of a
promoter that has turned the place into a joke. The panic sets
in and all kind of changes are made, prices are raised, and
bad business decisions are made in haste trying to keep from
drowning. These people do not belong running 100s...even 1000s
of peoples livelihoods, but are too vain or stupid to realize
they are part of the problem.
I will add a fourth
minor flu infection...(the hypocrites). These
are the people that bash the speedways, drivers and fans for
the entire time they attend the speedway on forums, news
columns and websites.... then cry when it finally closes.
You see, I think this infection is curable. Although this disease
does not close a track, it certainly is infectious and spreads
easily. It can be cured in a short time by pin pointing the
germ and quarantining it.
The days of short
tracks are numbered if we don't do something right now to help
them survive. I foresee in 5 years we will lose a good
percentage of the tracks you see open today closing and
housing developments or shopping malls in their place. What do
we need??? We need more people involved with the big picture
and not just within their own little realm of things. We need
to look at the long term and not just this year. We need high
profile spokespersons to lobby for our little patches of
ground we call our weekend hobby. We need to organize...like
the first word of our great country (United), power in numbers
if you may. It has to start now, with you.
On a lighter note,
if all else fails...we can change our name to "RACEBALL".
I think they will leave us alone then....for it will be the
only sport played with "two".
Sources: Billy Bartley
Posted: March 26, 2004
