Should Townsville be a street circuit or permanent circuit?

[pete55]

This has been discussed in another thread but i think it deserves it's own.
I feel Townsville and North Queensland as a whole deserve a permanent circuit as they have nothing up there to enable a motorsport industry. A street circuit may bring a few thousand tourists to the area for a race but after the race there is not benefit to the community at all. If they had a permanent circuit there could be a viable industry up there. Classes such as Improved Production, Sports Sedans, HQ's, Saloon Cars would be some suitable viable classes, Aussie Racing Cars could be another. Open Wheelers such as FF and F/Vee could also be successful. A permanent circuit could be used for open meets maybe six times a year and car clubs could have events there as well. Police, Fire and Ambulance services could use the venue for training which i guess is now all held in Brisbane and industries such as driver training and advanced driver training could be held at the circuit. Overall i feel a permanent circuit would be much more beneficial to North Qld than a street circuit. A V8 Supercar race at that permanent circuit would still pack the place out as they would come from all over the north and tourists would still come as well.

[racer69]

A permanent circuit definatly, but we shouldn't hold our breath

[RotorFan]

Does the question have to be asked? Of course a permanent circuit would be better.

[William Dale Jr]

PERMANENT!!!

There, I don't think I can make it any clearer than that...

[bazil]

Personally I would like to see both. The permanent track to encourage clubs and provide an alterative to Q.R and the Street race to bring "Motorracing" up north to the widest audience possible.

[Chatters]

I think a street circuit has a better atmosphere about it, but I always like to see Governments putting a serious effort into their racing and building dedicated race tracks.

[DAVID PATERSON]

Without question, a permanent circuit would be far better for the sport and far, far better for North Queenlsand. That said, I'm not confident that the people at the the top of the tree can see this, or care for that matter.

[peckstar]

wouldn't it be good if every town had a permanent circuit. it would be, but who would fund it?

We cant expect local councils to support it as they have limited resources and would get minimal return and they have more pressing needs(i guess we could put up every ones rates.

State governments could afford it, but what do they get back, alot of cost for little gain

Federal governments could afford it, but its not really what the federal government is meant to do

I guess the people that use it could build one, but they are spendinga ll their money on cars, so they cant afford it.

Any ideas anyone?

[D.R.T.]

Originally Posted by peckstar

State governments could afford it, but what do they get back, alot of cost for little gain

Federal governments could afford it, but its not really what the federal government is meant to do

Federal Government has poured money into a wide range of sporting infrastructure.

Bathurst, NRL stadiums etc.

They didnt get alot back but they can see the bigger picture.

[peckstar]

NRL staidums are in city centres and are multi purpose and can be used for many differnt sports and other functions

the federal govt put 10 mil into bathurst and we didnt get a track out of it, just some updated facilities and that was because AVESCO fought very hard using the iconic nature of bathurst using figures tv and crowd figures to support their case. They dont tend to stick much more money into otehr sporting facilities especially out in the boon dooks

[D.R.T.]

Originally Posted by peckstar

NRL staidums are in city centres and are multi purpose and can be used for many differnt sports and other functions

A race circuit can be used for many different activities aswell.

[peckstar]

thats what road are for though

at any point it is unlikey the federal government will committ money to a race tracks ( hopefully they will, but it is unlikely)

a race tracks in country towns is not big pictyre enough, there is minimal pay back for the large investment, they may be prepared to kick in as a side by side with state governments, but heck we only got ten mill for bathurst and it only updated facilities

[F J Nedos]

Its probably a mute point because a circuit up there will be a street circuit - why? because thats all that V8 supercars seem to be interested in. Its that hook which townsville would have used to secure a race up there.

I'd prefer to see a permanent circuit. recreate an outlook like phillip island (you could call it terrence island haha) where the cars fang it down a straight and you see the ocean in the shot. niiiiice. even combine the palm tree image as used in albert park.

[275 GTB-4]

Geomographically speaking....wouldn't Rocky be better for a lot more people in FNQ???

[pete55]

There was talk of a circuit being built on the Yeppoon- Rockhampton Rd at one stage. They had Peter Brock backing it being built (I think Peter Champion may have had something to do with it) but nothing seemed to come of it. Gladstone also had an idea of building a street circuit around the Marina precinct but nothing come of that either. Townsville is a very fast growing and lively city and with it's reasonably central location to the whole of North Qld it would be ideal to build a circuit at. As i said previously there would be many uses for a circuit up there.

[Chatters]

I think a happy medium like Albert Park would be a good idea.

[peckstar]

as i have said previously rockhampton and gladstone are closer to brisbane than townsville. why include them in you north QLD example when they alreafy have a closer track. that will be better resourced

[sizzle]

If the governments of Aus ever pulled their fingers out of the arses and got serious about driver education and a learner drivers capability to actually drive, not just pass a driving test, a permanent circuit in every major and semi major centre of each state and territory would be a possibility and welcome.

[pete55]

If you were talking to me Peckstar i did not include them in my Nth. Qld example, i was just saying that both Rockhampton and Gladstone have mooted the idea of having circuits. I know very well where the places are as i have lived in all 3 of them.

[Chatters]

How about we rebuild Surfer's Paradise! That's only just being redeveloped.

[peckstar]

sizzle every semi major rural centre has a paddock, what else do you need to teach car control

pete yes i was referring to it. understand i am not anti permanent circuit, but the government is not going to fund them. if there was a local track in my rural town and yes 150,000 people live with 30 minutes each way, so its matches your townsville example then that would be great (i guess we will just have to live with out go karts speedways and hill climb tracks and dedicated driver training track and a few back roads)

wheer does the money come from. townsville street race is build around atracting tens of thousands of tourists. that would not happen to a permanent course (although it would attract a large number)

[emjaya]

Originally Posted by peckstar

wheer does the money come from. townsville street race is build around atracting tens of thousands of tourists. that would not happen to a permanent course (although it would attract a large number)

I don't think it would make any difference in Townsville, street or permanent, it would still be a V8 race once a year.People don't go just because it's a street race, they go for the racing.
Townsville would be like Darwin.

[pete55]

I think you are missing my point Peckstar. Where you live there is a three or four circuits within a couple of hours drive. In North Qld. (Townsville in this case) there is not another circuit for over 1200km's. My point is also that major capital cities and their near neighbours have plenty of places to have advanced driver training etc but Townsville and places like it don't. Why don't you think they don't deserve this.
About the money side of things, i think that if the Qld. Government sat down and looked at what a permanent circuit could provide over what a street circuit does then i think that they would view it more favourably. As for your tourist figures i find them a bit unbelievable in this case. There maybe a couple of thousand that would come from places over 400km's away. Darwin is a good example of how a permanent circuit can benefit an area, especially one that is a thousand or so kilometres away from a capital city.

[mountainstar]

I don't see how a city the size of townsville and surrounding environs could support a permanent circuit. You'd have to present a pretty good business model to show how that would work. The idea sounds good, but lets see some numbers.

[Robert Ryan]

think that if the Qld. Government sat down and looked at what a permanent circuit could provide over what a street circuit does then i think that they would view it more favourably

Something the Queensland Govt has not attempted at Surfers Paradise and it has had over 10 yrs to make it happen.