Trouble in Austin

[KathyAnn]

Read story on Speedtv.com

[lumpulus]

A link would be nice...

[steveoccc]

This maybe?

http://formula-one.speedtv.com/article/ ... thorities/

[stubeck]

I thought everyone knew that the Statesmen has been against this the entire time and shouldn't really be taken seriously?

[Habu12]

It's normal bureaucratic red tape. How is this surprising?

[waxdart]

Having lived in Austin since 75 they used to pride themselves on being "small townish" The old logic was if we don't build roads we will stay small. Austin is really paying for that last 20 years of flawed logic with really bad traffic.

http://austin.bizjournals.com/austin/st ... ily28.html

All of a sudden lack of roads are a major concern and like everywhere there is a lack of funds. If you think that traffic is gonna be "Trouble in Austin" you haven't driven here. Nothing new.

When they built the the Texas Motor Speedway in Forth Worth it was a nightmare to get in and out of for the first few races but over the years the roads have been improved. My guess is it will be the same here. As long as we don't find any salamanders on site we will most likely be alright.

http://www.myfoxaustin.com/dpp/news/loc ... 0610-ktbcw

The city slogan is Keep Austin Weird....it's amazing how accurate it is???

Tim Keily

[Cratecruncher]

Yes! I was going to mention Texas Motor Speedway but Tim beat me to it. I'm no NASCAR fan but when they built a motorsport track in my backyard well, I had to check it out. For the inaugural race I tried to drive from North Dallas where I lived to the track about 30 miles away. I was stuck in an endless creeping procession for over two hours before I finally gave up and made a U-turn for home. I never saw the track that day and never tried after that either.

The Transportation folks here in Austin are just trying to ensure there won't be similar problems at this venue and I think if I were Tavo and company I would be concerned about it too. While everyone reading this post is a hardcore F1 fan, many of the folks that will attend the inaugural race likely aren't. They're casual fans or merely curious, looking for something different to do on a nice weekend. I suspect most will be driving from Houston or Dallas and will be in no mood to sit in extended traffic after traveling three or four hours to get here. So it's important that entry be reasonably smooth or they likely won't come back for race #2.

[stubeck]

I think they'll figure the traffic situation out pretty well. Indy did it really well, make all roads leading out of the track 1 way until you hit the highway. Get everyone out as quickly as possible and you're set. I don't know the local area very well, but all these doomsday stories from the same paper aren't making me too concerned.

[Slowpoke]

I think they'll figure the traffic situation out pretty well. Indy did it really well, make all roads leading out of the track 1 way until you hit the highway. Get everyone out as quickly as possible and you're set. I don't know the local area very well, but all these doomsday stories from the same paper aren't making me too concerned.

Of course Indy has about 100 years of experience with huge crowds...



George

[stubeck]

Well, the first year of the USGP they ran out of food almost immediately and had about 3 booths setup for things too. It was a bit nuts waiting in line for half an hour to get a hotdog.