Is a motorsport complex too big for Ballarat?

LETTER TO THE EDITOR

Dear Editor,

WHY don’t we have a motorsport complex in the Ballarat region, considering all the planning, presenting, support from C.A.M.S, head nodding, “don’t blame me,” and “I was all for it last time it was put on the agenda.”

Where is The Agenda and can someone please email it to me for review?

I have spent the last month seeking out the stakeholders of the stalled motorsport complex from the car club community of Ballarat and from the City of Ballarat councillors and here’s what I have found so far.

To the credit of all I contacted, I was given plenty of information both verbal and in email responses without delay or questioning my motives.

Please take note; the councillors that responded to me are not against the concept of motorsport and car club events in the city and for the region.

We need to ask new candidates this same question.

Car based festival organisers and clubs who actively seek destination towns to hold state and national concourse meetings need to hear they are welcome.

In my opinion three issues need to be discussed:

1 – Is this project too big for the City of Ballarat and its strategic partners to project manage and deliver?

2 – Is there no appropriate parcel of land within the city?

3 – Are the car people not well represented in this discussion at the appropriate level of late?

How can we explain all the goodwill and agreement for a project that the people of Ballarat want and need to find that it is not in the planning for 2020 through 2024?

Attending car racing at Sandown Park Raceway was huge when I was a teenager and throughout my formative years behind the wheel and out on the roads.

Drag racing at Calder Park was a regular attended event with local (Springvale) cars represented and real people providing us ‘young boys and girls’ with positive peer groups, without preaching and judgement, but with actions and the real message that street racing is not drag racing.

John Dooley

Candidate for Central Ward