TMLBK

Do any of you have experience approaching a Georgia government agency about building a track in one of its parks? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Tbone Revo

iTrader: (2)

Dont expect anything to happen quickly and be ready for haters that think you in it for the money.

cptxaggie

iTrader: (9)

There are at least two that I know of:

H.C.R.C.R.
100 Windy Hill Rd
McDonough, GA
http://www.hcrcr.com/

Battlefield On-Road
638 s. main st
Lafayette, Ga 30728
http://www.battlefieldraceway.com/RoadCourse.htm

Maybe Battlefield Off-road too?

Not sure who the contacts are, but I think they are members of this forum. Good luck. Location?

TMLBK

I'm in it for my kids, although I admit I enjoy driving their cars a bit too. I have no interest in making a penny off it. I'm think a small non-profit (or all volunteer) group could handle what financial activity, construction and maintenance would be needed.

I'm surprised there aren't more tracks in public parks. Why is this?

flippz

iTrader: (4)

Look up jp4 and tbone. They run the Henry county track and can tell u a lot about what to expect. Again it won't be fast and will cost a decent penny (out of your pocket).
Scott Ross

modhobby

iTrader: (25)

Depends on certain factors. What county or city?

Robby368

iTrader: (17)

Augusta is also a public park. It seems they are all built on old softball fields for some reason...

A 'leased' park is the way to go...but I'm sure its costly. That way you can fence it in and lock it up. It'll keep the riff-raff from coming out and running the track into the ground (which are the ones that will never come race or help maintain it)

Contact your county parks and recreation supervisor, they should have info on 'abonded' or unused parks. If you can show them pictures of other public tracks they may jump on board. They mainly just want to see that the park gets used and promotes family activities, and in return they (usually) pay for the electricity and water.

mxrich

iTrader: (1)

Hello! I am half of the battlefield raceway, the good looking one. Snoop is the brains of the outfit. In our case we found an unused tennis court at a local rec center. All the fencing had been taken away which was fine for us. We talked to the person in charge and she liked the idea since it was just sitting there doing nothing. We went to the next city meeting and they loved the idea of the spot being used again and they voted us in.

I am sending you a pm.

JP4

iTrader: (1)

Not really sure what you mean by "Georgia government agency". Most of the time local municipalities will do projects like these. State Agencies usually will not get involved in local projects, however I have heard of it before.

There are way to many variables in a projects like this to type out a response. You can contact me direct and I can give you some advice and direction that may help you.

Good Luck!

JP

bgredjeep

I was involved in building the original track at Bayvale. A friend of mine initially approached the county about building a track at another Augusta park where the BMX track is still located. They didn't want to allow anything new at that park, but they did help in searching for an alternate location. Bayvale was a long un-used park with a softball field under waiste high grass, and a basketball court with no goals.

The county didn't offer any assistance with the actual track construction (equipment, materials, etc.). We had pretty much free reign to anything on the old softball field and basketball court. We couldn't alter the parking lot (at one point asked about repaving for on-road) due to something about the Army corp of engineers. The county did help with getting the bathrooms back in working order (1 of which was damaged by vandals a short time later and became a storage room), and they replaced the bulbs on the softball field lights so we could run races at night. Anything else was out of our own pockets. We were lucky that one of the guys worked for an equipment rental business and worked a deal for sponsorship with his boss. We used hundreds of hours worth of bobcats, roller tamps, trenchers, etc. building the track.

So the short answer is, start talking to the local parks dept. in your area about what you want to do and see if they are willing to work with you to find a location for a track. Just know, its going to be a lot more time, money, and effort to complete than whatever you think it will be (unless you have built a track before).

kikcaffine

iTrader: (32)

What part of town, maybe if theres a hobbyshop nearby they would help with the costs somewhat in order to be a sponsor of the track

TMLBK

Thanks for all the input. I'd be looking at doing something in Cobb County.

A few initial questions:

1) Can you tell me more about the actual construction of a track? Hearing of the need for hundreds of hours with a Bobcat makes me think I've underestimated the complexity of the project.

2) Any advice (or cost estimate)for a driver's stand?

3) Ideally, how much space do you need to build a track?

4) I was also thinking it might be good to have two tracks. One for beginners, and one for more advanced drivers. Any thoughts on this?

Tbone Revo

iTrader: (2)

Contact JP4. The drivers stand we built is not like most but he can give you an idea of what your getting into. With county projects you have to do everything by the books/code. The track build is the fun part (if you know how to run a skid steer). Depending on what kind you get, laying the pipe can suck and then watching it get destroyed just so you have to repaire it gets old. Then once you think you have the track ready, you have to have a sound system, computer system, and lap counter, none of which are cheap. Good luck to you but you really need to talk to JP before you take on more than you wanted to.