SITES!

[bdr]

A fellow driving a yellow Bug Eye Sprite told me of a possible site in Oseola Wisconsin.
The Polaris parking lot. Anyone living close to that please check it out. Others have looked at it, and say it would work.
But, we need to contact Polaris. Anyone?
Otherwise, there is 'my dream'
DCM

[fitz]

Originally posted by bdr


A fellow driving a yellow Bug Eye Sprite told me of a possible site in Oseola Wisconsin.
The Polaris parking lot. Anyone living close to that please check it out. Others have looked at it, and say it would work.
But, we need to contact Polaris. Anyone?
Otherwise, there is 'my dream'
DCM

I have seen the lot and it is good.

Pavement is good. Size is adequate (at least as big, probably a bit bigger than Midway). Light poles are present but widely spaced. Residential areas are reasonably far away.

On the down side paddock and marshalling would have to be done on public roads which may be a problem.

[phile]

Originally posted by bdr


A fellow driving a yellow Bug Eye Sprite told me of a possible site in Oseola Wisconsin.
The Polaris parking lot. Anyone living close to that please check it out. Others have looked at it, and say it would work.
But, we need to contact Polaris. Anyone?
Otherwise, there is 'my dream'
DCM

Is this the building next to Classic Motorbooks, or is there someplace else?

Phil Ethier

[fitz]

Originally posted by phile



Originally posted by bdr


A fellow driving a yellow Bug Eye Sprite told me of a possible site in Oseola Wisconsin.
The Polaris parking lot. Anyone living close to that please check it out. Others have looked at it, and say it would work.
But, we need to contact Polaris. Anyone?
Otherwise, there is 'my dream'
DCM

Is this the building next to Classic Motorbooks, or is there someplace else?

Phil Ethier



It's down the street from Motorbooks, maybe two blocks away.

[Bill Owen]

Heres the only contact phone number I could find.. Its in Mn, but maybe they can send you to right person to ask in Wi.


Polaris Industries Inc.
2100 Highway 55
Medina, MN 55340
Phone: 763-417-8650

[Dan Nguyen]

How far is this site from the Twin Cities area? Thanks:)

[Bill Owen]

From Mpls, its about a 45 - 50 min drive

btw: Nice pic of you car! :D

[Dan Nguyen]

Thanks for the compliment:)

If its only a 45-50 Minute drive from Minneapolis. Then it would be an even closer drive for me since I am right on the Border of MN and WI! Sweet, lets make this SITE happen!:D

[Bill Owen]

Im glad you like the photo! :D

If I had time between jobs Id call Polaris... If Im not mistaken, you land a site deal, you dont have to pay registration for all of next year's MAC events.

If anyone calls them, let us know what their response was.

[washburn]

Keep in mind before you all go out calling everyone that it may be better to have the club representative do the call. Having all the insurance and other club information handy is important, as is the proper approach. I think you will get the credit if you bring a site to the commitee guys, but unless you have an inside contact you know it's probably best to let them make the call.

[Drew]

Good points, Pat.

If we're going to make a contact "cold", without already having a personal contact in the company, then particularly when dealing with a large company like Polaris, you should sound like you know what you're talking about when you inquire about renting part of their facility. That means having your ducks lined up and having done some homework first. Not exactly fun sounding, but it's reality.

One thing Fitz mentioned was that paddocking and marshalling may have to be done on a public street. I'm sure that would require some local municipal approval. Quite likely, the use of the parking lot itself would require approval. If you haven't already checked into that stuff when you contact Polaris, they probably won't want to talk to you seriously. They sure aren't going to take care of those things for us. (I don't mean already having approval. But we ought to have a clue about what hoops we're going to have to jump through before we decide to contact Polaris.)

I personally haven't seen the Polaris parking lot. I think when a potential site like this comes up, the smart thing to do is to have some people who have checked it out come to a club meeting, bring some kind of a drawing, and discuss the pros and cons. We can decide if we really think it's doable, and come up with some idea of how we'd approach having an autocross there. In this case, I'd also expect that Polaris would want to hear what our plans are.

Now is a good time to start figuring out some plans and looking into this. We'll probably be trying to firm up next season's schedule of sites and dates by early February. If you're interested in this as a possible new site, come to the club meeting on Oct 30.

Drew Baumbach

[fitz]

Originally posted by Drew Baumbach


Good points, Pat.

If we're going to make a contact "cold", without already having a personal contact in the company, then particularly when dealing with a large company like Polaris, you should sound like you know what you're talking about when you inquire about renting part of their facility. That means having your ducks lined up and having done some homework first. Not exactly fun sounding, but it's reality.

One thing Fitz mentioned was that paddocking and marshalling may have to be done on a public street. I'm sure that would require some local municipal approval. Quite likely, the use of the parking lot itself would require approval. If you haven't already checked into that stuff when you contact Polaris, they probably won't want to talk to you seriously. They sure aren't going to take care of those things for us. (I don't mean already having approval. But we ought to have a clue about what hoops we're going to have to jump through before we decide to contact Polaris.)

I personally haven't seen the Polaris parking lot. I think when a potential site like this comes up, the smart thing to do is to have some people who have checked it out come to a club meeting, bring some kind of a drawing, and discuss the pros and cons. We can decide if we really think it's doable, and come up with some idea of how we'd approach having an autocross there. In this case, I'd also expect that Polaris would want to hear what our plans are.

Now is a good time to start figuring out some plans and looking into this. We'll probably be trying to firm up next season's schedule of sites and dates by early February. If you're interested in this as a possible new site, come to the club meeting on Oct 30.

Drew Baumbach


The obvious "hook" would be the "Wings and Wheels" weekend. Book sale and classic car show on Saturday, autocross on Sunday. The lot will work for autocross. No question. Paddocking needs to be worked out though, which would be part of the permit process, followed naturally by approval from Polaris for use of the site.

[StevenMosley]

Drew,

I went last night and checked out the site I mentioned to you earlier this summer.

It would be a great place for our events. If we cross our fingers it will all workout.

The surface is 2-3 year old black top. The lot is shaped like a triangle with the narrowest part
being about 30 yards wide and the widest about 100 yards wide and it is over a quarter mile long.

The lot does have light poles , but it is in an industrial area next to an airport, the river, and a railroad track.The lot is raised from street level with 2 ramps going up to the surface which would allow us to
have control of the people entering the site. The other big plus is that it is empty on weekends and rented by "All Right Parking" during the week. The location is in on Kellog Blvd under the highway 52 bridge. If you have a chance check it out .

Email me for a number to contact them.

StevenMosley@yahoo.com

[StevenMosley]

Update on the All Right Parking Site.

I talked to the party that owns the site and they are interested in discussing it further.
Drew plans to check out the site and then call our contact.

If anyone else has time please feel free to check it out.

Here is a map of where it is. It is the area under the Lafayette bridge in
downtown St. Paul. It is right off Kellog blvd before the 3rd street bridge.

The All Right Parking Site (http://maps.yahoo.com/py/maps.py?Pyt=Tmap&addr=&city=Minneapolis&am p;state=MN&csz=Minneapolis,+MN&slt=44.9801 18&sln=-93.263924&zip=&country=us&BFKey=&B FCat=&BFClient=&cs=7&name=&desc=&a mp;poititle=&poi=&ds=n&mag=9&mlt=4 4.942279&mln=-93.075470&off=nw)

[fitz]

Speaking of sites, I was driving past the Mall of America today and could not help but notice the Autocross-style track that was set up in the NW corner of the old Met Center lot.

Looks like it was probably set up for an auto manufacturers "Ride and Drive" program or something of that sort.

Makes one wonder if....

[washburn]

What is the pavement like? I heard it was pretty bad with grass growing everywhere and chunks missing. Is it good enough to look at?

[fitz]

Originally posted by washburn


What is the pavement like? I heard it was pretty bad with grass growing everywhere and chunks missing. Is it good enough to look at?

I didn't get that close. There are areas of that lot which seem to be much better than others. This section seems to be one of the better areas.

There are other issues of course - managing access, figuring out who owns it, then getting permission etc. But at least it's big!

[fitz]

Originally posted by washburn


What is the pavement like? I heard it was pretty bad with grass growing everywhere and chunks missing. Is it good enough to look at?

OK, I drove around the old Met Center lot tonight.

Interestingly, the "autocross-like" track I mentioned the other night is permanently painted out - and there are two, not just one. Definately looks like a ride-and-drive course so some manufacturer has been able to rent the place out and probably more than once.

The fencing that used to split the lot up into tiny parcels is all gone now. The pavement ranges from quite good to truly crappy to nearly non-existent. There is however, more than enough good pavement to easily host a nice 60-second course and plentty of crappy pavement for paddocking a couple zillion competitors.

Crowd-control may not be quite as much of a problem as I at first thought. It could be accomplished by copious amounts of police tape. There are light poles situated in such a way that we should be easily able to set aside our portion of the lot and tape it off.

[washburn]

Wow, thanks for going out and looking at it. Who wants to volunteer Drew to call them? ;)

Seriously, let's find out who is using it, or make a few exploritory calls to find out who to speak to. Sounds like it could be just what we're looking for.

[Josh S #771]

Thanks Fitz! It sounds good.

[fitz]

Originally posted by washburn


Wow, thanks for going out and looking at it. Who wants to volunteer Drew to call them? ;)

Seriously, let's find out who is using it, or make a few exploritory calls to find out who to speak to. Sounds like it could be just what we're looking for.

OK, I went to look at it a second time, this time in daylight. I drove the entire lot. 75% of the pavement is truly garbage. However, there is a section of good fairly new pavement that is probably at least twice the size of the Midway lot (I presume this is where the building used to sit - the bad pavement being the original lot).

As I discovered on my nocturnal visit there are very few obstructions and partitioning off the part of the lot we need is aided by some very well sited light poles. Paddocking is of course virtually unlimited.

Oh if somebody would just repave the whole thing!!!!!

"OK folks, the bad news is we get only 3 runs each. The good news is that each run is 5-minutes long."

[Drew]

I have no objection if one of you guys wants to make some inquiries on potentially renting the lot.

Drew

[phile]

Since this is all one thread, and we are discussing several sites, I suggest that nobody post to this thread referring to the site as "it". Please either quote something that tells to which site you are referring or come right out and tell us.

Phil "my life is confused enough" Ethier