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mud drag pit, and a rodeo arena, all with permanent grandstands, paved parking, restroom facilities, and food pavilions. Four permanent multi vehicle garage buildings are located on the property, mostly around the oval track. The site is long and narrow, with easy access to all of the different facilities from one main road, so multiple events can be held at the same time with little or
no interference from each other. It is to be open 7 days a week and close at
11:00PM to comply with Palm Beach County's noise ordinance.
The article addressed the concerns of the surrounding communities, especially
Jupiter Farms, about excess noise from the Park. I have information from a
very reliable source that when Palm Beach County set up a meeting with
Jupiter Farms to address those concerns before acting on the proposal, only
seven (7) people showed up, and the County had over forty (40) spokespersons
from the different County Agencies there to be able to answer any and all
questions about how Palm Beach Speedworld would impact the community and
ecosystem surrounding it.
The only real gripes voiced were those from Moroso Motorsports Park, who
said they were surprised someone would try and build something that close to
them and be in direct competition with them. This comes from an organization
that has been talking about building a 1/2 (or 3/8 or 3/4?) mile oval on
their property for the last five years or more and have done nothing towards
making it a reality, except continually drawing the ire of Palm Beach County
Code Enforcement officials for flagrant code violations on their property.
The last information I had about the Moroso proposal was they had returned
the grant from the Palm Beach County Tourist Development Board because the
required facility upgrades were going to be too expensive and they were
putting the project on hold until a major sponsor could be located to help
with the costs of construction. My personal opinion is they thought they had
a lock on the building of a stock car track in Palm Beach County and no one
would dare come in to compete with them on their own turf. I guess this
brought them back to reality and showed them that the fans are not willing to
wait forever for a track to be built when they felt like building one,
especially from such an arrogant one as Moroso.
I have seen the blueprints for Palm Beach Speedworld and it is a first class
facility. It makes Moroso's additional track look a little like they were
just trying to build something to get more money from the public. The
Speedworld will definitely treat race fans as first class citizens and show
the public they appreciate their support for racing.
With such little apparent concern about the facility from the surrounding
communities, it would seem the proposal would go through quickly, but we all
know how government processes work, especially when an established business
is against competition. Stay tuned and we shall see how the "worm turns" on
this project.
-Bill Moody Have an opinion on this story? Post a message on our Message Board!
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