USGP 2012, Austin, TX

[WorkingOnIt]

The Austin Business Journal  has set up a consolidated link to F1 news on its home page.

More utility issues on the critical path:
http://austin.bizjournals.com/austin/st ... bits2.html
"The [electric] utility isn’t sure what capacity exists in Southeast Travis County, [Austin Energy CEO Cheryl Mele] said, and will take about three months to find out.
If the track requires something like a transformer substation, there could be a photo finish at the deadline. Such infrastructure, which costs about $1 million, takes 12 to 18 months to order and install, Mele said."

[WorkingOnIt]

The Korean experience might be telling for what will be happening 20 months from now in Texas.

FIA delays Korea inspection
"It is being reported the FIA will not undertake a final inspection of the Korean International Circuit until September 28, less than four weeks before the scheduled grand prix on October 24.
It was planned Charlie Whiting would visit on September 21, breaking his journey to the Singapore Grand Prix, but it is claimed that has put back a week because of local holidays. The FIA's own regulations state such an inspection should take place 90 days before the race."

This sets a precedent that the Austin team will surely invoke (unless of course the Korean track condition turns out to be such a disaster that FIA declares 'never again').

Some excuses, and some short and long term concerns here:
http://en.espnf1.com/f1/motorsport/story/28461.html
"Cho is also ready with reasons why things are so behind. "There's been a lot of rain compared to most years and all this land was all wetland and we had to take all the water out first … 70% of the work was because of hardening the land. If it was just regular land, we could have done it in a year. That made it more technical.
"We don't have experience in Korea of building tracks up to F1 standard. If there had been a manual of guidelines to follow, it would have made our work much easier and we would have finished sooner." "

[Driver]

I call BS. They KNOW what capacity exists. It was less than 10 years ago they had to upgrade for the airport and theirs been all sorts of growth out that way because of it, all the businesses that congragte around a airport and the new toll road going in as well. Sounds like somebody wants to get paid to perform a "study'.

[curt]

http://jalopnik.com/5640308/county-comm ... rix-lawyer

A few days ago, a USGP attorney was woefully short on details before the county board.  Hard to see this thing getting done on time without throwing an absolute ton of cash around to get through the logistics and administrative red tape.

[RyanD]

http://formula1unitedstates.com/track.html

Looks like fun to me! 

[WorkingOnIt]

[quote="WorkingOnIt"]
...
And the county transportation director offered a guess of 12 hour access and exit times last week...
http://www.statesman.com/news/local/roa ... 12166.html

Right - cuz improving three 1 to 3 mile stretches of county road is the impossible goal in this project...
[/quote]

oops, maybe it is
Study: Road work can't be finished before F1 race
The additional article cited below states: "for the first Grand Prix races “We’re looking at minor improvements to the existing system” and “intensive traffic management” ... said Joe Gieselman, manager of Travis County’s Transportation and Natural Resources Department. "  That statement at least seems to indicate an atmosphere of cooperation by the county.

[quote="curt"]
http://jalopnik.com/5640308/county-comm ... rix-lawyer

A few days ago, a USGP attorney was woefully short on details before the county board.  Hard to see this thing getting done on time without throwing an absolute ton of cash around to get through the logistics and administrative red tape.
[/quote]

The lawyer's second appearance is chronicled in the road article above and in this one:
Promoters offer more details about planned Formula One site

The promoters seem to have figured out that they can't just get their grading plan stamped in isolation and proceed - and have released a "Conceptual Master Plan"
They also announced hiring 2 "international transportation and traffic-engineering experts, Kimley-Horn and Associates, Inc. and Graham Lake-Grange".  Throwing a ton of cash, indeed.  I'm not familiar with the second, but Kimley-Horn has a sterling resume and reputation.

[img width=655 height=600]http://wheelnutsjournal.typepad.com/.a/ ... 970c-800wi[/img]
large scale PDF version here:
http://formula1unitedstates.com/images/ ... r_Plan.pdf

[WorkingOnIt]

Now that there's a site plan, we can see that the track itself is pretty much outside the 100 year flood plain, but they were not able to avoid the 2 pipelines crossing the property.

This level of detail probably does not interest a lot of people, but I follow it casually because it increases my appreciation for what a monumental task this is.

There is a concise and optimistic blog about potential pipeline issues by a fan of the track here.

[WorkingOnIt]

Track passes a bureaucratic hurdle - Austin Environmental Board grants grading variances.
Next week - the water and wastewater commission and in two weeks, the zoning and planning commission.

http://formula-one.speedtv.com/article/ ... ack-plans/
http://www.news8austin.com/content/head ... la-1-track

Environmentalists are so cute:
"[Chris Lehman, director of the Austin Sierra Club] said the influence of Formula 1 on Austin will be risky.
"Formula 1’s impact goes well beyond one weekend or even 250 days of activity at that racetrack,” Lehman said. “Formula 1 advances the sale of high performance, gas guzzling cars and it's going to affect our air quality." "

[WorkingOnIt]

Two more commissions grant approvals:
Water and Wastewater
Zoning and Platting

The city council gets to weigh in officially for the first time tonight as they debate funding the water infrastructure.
http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/news/ ... water.html

The Austin city council is unusual for a city of it's size in that it's only seven members, and they are elected at large. When I lived there, there were proposals every few years to expand the size and create districts, but residents, in denial that they weren't still a sleepy college town, always voted them down. To add some interest, three members' terms are up in May and all have initiated campaigns to run again. It will be interesting to see how they play to their constituents.

Here's a quite thorough and thoughtful article considering many facets of the project from the Austin Chronicle. The Chronicle is Austin's alternative weekly newspaper.
The article draws several comparisons with Silverstone.
How Do You Formulate a Grand Prix?
"Distilling the Volatile Chemistry of High-Speed Development, Austin, and Formula One Racing"

Here's a bit of the timetable that I hadn't seen stated so specifically before:
"Attorney Suttle said, "We've been told we have to be ready for June 2012.""

[WorkingOnIt]

Austin to reimburse F1 $13.5 million for water, sewer lines
The vote was unanimous, which surprised me. There were two members in particular that I expected would do more grandstanding and perhaps cast symbolic nays. Additonal details of the F1 discussion can be found at the end of this city hall blog entry.

I am quite encouraged by this month's progress, starting with the announcement that $250 million in construction financing is in place. There are still city and county site plan approvals needed, and probably a flood plain review by the Corp of Engineers, and a general contractor hasn't been announced, much less the slew of contracts that need to be signed to actually move dirt (and pipelines) - but - after a shaky start the promoters seem to be displaying a degree of professionalism, and bureaucracies are demonstrating a cooperative spirit.

I particularly like how fast the promoters have been moving to address public and administrative concerns - hiring traffic consultants, hiring a respected minority and small business outreach consultant, environmental announcements regarding such things as LEEDs goals and minimizing impermeable cover. I think it demonstrates that, again after a shaky start, they recognize the importance of perception along with technical expertise.

[WorkingOnIt]

Full Throttle Productions hires an architect - HKS, Inc.
I wonder how Tilke GmbH feels about this. Will dividing the labor speed things up, or cause coordination problems?

http://formula-one.speedtv.com/article/ ... n-project/
http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/news/ ... -team.html

HKS is known for the new Dallas Cowboys stadium, and involvement with many well regarded major and minor league baseball parks, so they should know their way around a grandstand. They also have done a lot of corporate and heathcare buildings.

UK readers may be most familiar with their plans for a new Liverpool Football Club stadium. The design is pretty flashy, but the project has been mired in financial problems and (previous North American) owner ineptitude: The Most Expensive Drawing In History
Would be curious to know if the fans attribute any blame to HKS.

[WorkingOnIt]

Ground Breaks.

http://www.statesman.com/news/local/con ... 54979.html
http://www.kxan.com/dpp/news/local/cons ... s-f1-track

Soil cores, silt fences and the track alignment staked. Not glamourous, but more than the typical ceremonial shovel turning.

There's still a $6M disagreement with the county about traffic improvements, and FEMA will take their own sweet time to approve floodplain grading (promoters have posted a $921K bond to restore the ground if FEMA doesn't sign off). But once again it seems like all the bureaucracies are cooperating as well as their red tape allows.

[WorkingOnIt]

Anyone want a sweet 10 acres near Turns 10 and 11?

From the KXAN link and video above:
"I lived back here by myself for the past 13 years," said Don Haywood, who lives next to the F1 site. "I'm looking forward to moving out of here as soon as possible."

A quick check of tax records reveals his 10 acre parcel:

[WorkingOnIt]

.

[RyanD]

Just received a marketing survey about ticket packages for Austin.  If I understood it correctly, they are going to be offering "season passes" for all events held at the track.  General admission tickets could be in the $200-500 range, and grandstand tickets could be in the $1000-2000 range.  They may also offer multi-year contracts at reduced prices.  Of course, this is just a survey to gauge interest, so all of that could change.

Might be a great deal for people that live near Austin, but I'd only be interested in flying in for the F1 weekend.  It seems to me that they will be adding new events the first few years after the track is open, so a season pass for the first year probably wouldn't get you much more than the F1 race.