Mallory Park not sold to a property developer - end of the beginning?

[Tim Falce]

The only person that's ever helped me is Gregor Marshall but I can't expect him to be there every time I go to MP, not that I intend going again if I can help it.

[vjay48]

I did have a look at the live streaming from MP,i did notice the weeds and plants growing through the Armco,nowever no tumbleweed yet! I noticed that the 2013 calender for cars only shows 5 car meetings,only two for BARC,they cant rent it to themselves! Surely since clubs are planning for 2014 now,will it improve,can not see why the facilities are becoming even more run down. When JP took over circuits one of the first things he did was cut grass,sweep paddock and clean toilets etc.

[midgetman]

Originally Posted by Tim Falce

As Sam says, scrutineering is early so how are we expected to get the car there without starting it up? Not one bit of the paddock is level and I for one can't and wouldn't be able to push my car to scrutineering.

I had the same problem there once. They said I could tow it up, but once I'd got my old York diesel Transit running it was decided by all concerned that my race car was quieter and I could drive that!

It's strange when noise regulations are adhered to so obsessively on race days, but flaunted so much by running outside the allowed number of days.

[Gerryc]

Originally Posted by midgetman

It's strange when noise regulations are adhered to so obsessively on race days, but flaunted so much by running outside the allowed number of days.

I guess the current "obsession" with the former is partially to appease people upset by the latter!

[vjay48]

A lot of the track days which have replaced racing are run to 95db limit,more likely to have hassle with tyre noise.I think track days start after 9.15?

[The Fat Clerk]

Originally Posted by Gerryc

I guess the current "obsession" with the former is partially to appease people upset by the latter!

Correct answer

[The Fat Clerk]

Practice always starts @ 09-30am (or later)

[Al Weyman]

Originally Posted by Tim Falce

The only person that's ever helped me is Gregor Marshall but I can't expect him to be there every time I go to MP, not that I intend going again if I can help it.

Your loss Tim its not a bad circuit in many ways and if they did do away with the hairpin and replace it with something better would be way up on my list.

[JimW]

Originally Posted by Gerryc

I guess the current "obsession" with the former is partially to appease people upset by the latter!

And equally the flouting of the former by some people may perhaps have been part of the climate which made the latest complaints fall on fertile ground; both local residents and in the Local Authority?

Jim

[Pescara Productions]

Court Case result:
http://www.itv.com/news/central/stor...ircuit-owners/

[Al Weyman]

Erm so its down to Mallory Park management what happens next. As a matter of interest when they say the figure of around 80 'noisy' days does this include events with say less than 98db or would they be OK to add as extra days and maybe even all electric car and motorbike meetings or even cycle events would they be acceptable or is any event concidered noisy?

[Al Weyman]

Just read this on Facebook from Mallory Park which seems to suggest quieter days would be acceptable, as they say not all doom and gloom.

It was confirmed in court that the circuit could run three noisy days mid week - or five road silenced days. The court case has reduced Saturdays to four per year. Far from doom and gloom, I think this is a positive and a much better position than what we believed before the court case when only one midweek noisy day was touted. All to be clarified but looking quietly hopeful! Thanks for the ongoing support!

[Pescara Productions]

Apparently there's a growing rumor that the BARC are out of the place at the end of the year. No word on any replacements yet. They say they can't work with the rules and also this has been said:

Simon Clarke one of the Directors at MP states that they still believe "192 noisy days ! and will continue at that until they go into administration " he then goes on to state I quote " To be honest I am past caring " He did state however that if we were willing to give a proposal nearer to the 195 noisy days they require then they were willing to listen ! "IF NOT ! IF they have to work at 92 noisy days then they WILL WALK AWAY AND CLOSE !"

So apparently they don't care. Top management there BARC.

[andy97]

Doesn't mean it's the end for Mallory. The lease will return to Chris Meek and he will have to decide what to with it. (similar to the situation with Donington a couple or 3 years ago). Either he will find someone else to run it within the correct planning rules or run it himself.

If neither of those options are possible then that's another matter, but let's hope that someone takes it on who can run it properly.

[sceptic]

Originally Posted by BertMk2

BTTC gave up on Mondello because the teams didn't want the extra cost of the event - is it the same with bikes? (I have no idea btw - it's just a guess).

The Irish tourism authorities used to subsidise the travel costs for the teams and officials in both BTCC and BSB. Once they stopped, Mondello became prohibitively expensive.

[Al Weyman]

They or more precisely Irish Telecom paid for the Falken ModProds to go there years ago and by all accounts it was a right craic!

[Pescara Productions]

So anyone getting home or has seen Motorsport News this week will have seen the new layout that Mallory intends to build. There are some good points and bad that I'd like to point out when an image of the new layout is up on the web, but apparently the job will be in the millions and Titan Property managing director Brian Robinson has said, 'We have the challenge of cutting noise and also keeping the track popular and attractive for drivers'. Perhaps this means that the track won't look like a tip when they're done. Or they'll screw up similar to what happened at Donington. We'll see.

[JimW]

Titan Property is, I think, the company which is owned by Chris Meek, i.e. the current owner. Does the article say anything about the BARC (the operating lease holders) role in all of this? Do they have one?

Jim

[Pescara Productions]

Originally Posted by JimW

Titan Property is, I think, the company which is owned by Chris Meek, i.e. the current owner. Does the article say anything about the BARC (the operating lease holders) role in all of this? Do they have one?

Jim

There's nothing from Ward in the article and I've not seen anything from him in a while now so I'm not sure what the BARC are up to.

[Lancsbreaker]

Just seen the Motorsport News article....the track as planned looks a bit "busy", but if they build some elevation changes into it, could be interesting. They've reportedly bought a fair amount of land to enable the changes, and it seems the Council are on-board, so lets see how it goes!

[VIVA GT]

I hope these plans are shown in Autosport today, I'm curious...

[VIVA GT]

Well, Autosport obviously read my previous quote, as they have indeed printed details of the proposed changes to Mallory Park.
I'll ignore the totally innaccurate reporting (where on earth is the place known as Hinckley village that they refer to?) and concentrate on the new circuit layout.
As has already been mentioned, the most noise generated into the surrounding villages from the racing has been due to the cars & motorcycles coming up out of the bowl that the rest of the circuit occupies and through Shaws Hairpin, so by re-shaping the circuit to remove that section of the track, should also remove some of the supposed 'noise nuisance' from the racing.
On first glance the new track layout looked a little Mickey-Mouse to me, but with a little more consideration I acept that it will add a few more challenges (and corners) compared to the original layout. There's still a hairpin (but from a spectating point of view, without the excitement of the cars or 'bikes suddenly coming into view as they come up the hill), then a few more 'squiggly bits' before re-joining the start of the original lake Esses, and then looping around onto the start-finish straight like the old club/oval circuit did.
I don't want to be too negative about this as I hope something can be done to enable 'the Friendly Circuit' to survive, but what looks on paper to be a simple alteration, there will be a huge ammount of work (and therefore investment) to complete this. Apart from the actual groundworks necessary to lay the circuit which will also involve the removal of specator banking outsied of The Esses, I wonder if there will be enough run-off between the new hairpin and where the circuit re-joins at The Esses? Also, the long corner (OK, so not as long as Gerards) that eventually rejoins the strat finish straight will be potentially a very fast corner which will presumably require re-siting of the barriers on both sides of the start-finish straight? Finally in this section, the old hump where the circuit re-joins at The Devils Elbow will have to be removed otherwise the barriers on the start-finish straight will be very busy!
Another point which troubles me is that the majority of the noise complains were not from race-generated noise, but outside activities, I hope that the (new?) circuit management will make sure that the like of that never happens again otherwise this will all be a waste of time and money!
I look forward to attending the re-opening meeting of the revised Mallory Park, and hope that they can find a surviving member of Bob Gerards family to drive the opening lap!

[ahobson98]

Well at least Mallory shouldnt shut down now and it could be interesting with the changes, i wonder how long it will take to do?

[paddy]

Can anyone post a diagram of this as I'm finding it hard to picture from the descriptions.

[tim dodwell]

Yuk is my opinion of the proposed new track.