so what happened to the detroit dragway? Its history?

it'd be nice to see another dragstrip in detroit. the old dragway had an aura that milan could never match. it was an old school track frequented by old school racers. hell, every sat. night was like a no et night, what with all the side-betting going on and such. got some great memories of racing there in 79-80-81, even if high end was almost dark.......:thumbsup:
 
SVT32VDOHC said:
If the dumb ass city council would open their eyes and read the paper and see how many street racing accidents there are or knew as many people as we do, that pertake in this activity, they would see that there is a lot of money to be made in building a strip. People would stay safe, the business itself, and surrounding businesses would make money and so would the city itself.

Wow....that was a long sentence.
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it would have to be brought upon by a black person, if your white, city council will tell you to get bent, im pretty sure a while back someone tryed and they said no
 
My girlfriend lives on the next street over from where motor city is. When we first started going out we went and found it. Not much left, but it's still cool. Someone was trying to open a track in St. Clair, but I think he couldn't get it approved by the county or city or whatever.
 
Shit, here in Milan we love the noise. We are ~6 miles from the track but on weekends we can hear the cars making passes, especially at night. Music to my ears.
 
i play semi pro football in marine city and never knew that place was right there. WOW! i pass it two or three times a week lol
 
DRAG-ULA said:
My girlfriend lives on the next street over from where motor city is. When we first started going out we went and found it. Not much left, but it's still cool. Someone was trying to open a track in St. Clair, but I think he couldn't get it approved by the county or city or whatever.
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I haven't heard anything about this in a long time. I don't think its gonna happen.
 
SVT32VDOHC said:
I saved a couple pics from that thread. I would love to print them and frame them in my garage.
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Yeah, those would make nice prints. Their beautiful but sad at the same time. I believe I posted those two and that they are from a local drag strip here in Indiana. It's really hard to believe that Detroit doesn't have a dragstrip, I was really suprised when I worked up there.
 
I remember Detroit Dragway. Went there a few times as a kid. I remember on the weekends at night I could hear the cars ripping down the track from where I was living at the time. I'd have to dig around but I know I have a few photos somewhere. The closed down and built the business complex there, which is mostly empty. What a waste, but the track was in pretty rough shape. Last time I went my parents took me and my two friends that lived across the street there. We were sitting on the right side oif the track opposite of the tower on the top level of the bleechers, which were really small. I think I was 13 years old at the time. Sitting two my left were two guys smoking weed, and down next tot he track there was a pretty drunk crowd. At one point a drunk woman, who was sitting on the top of a car, fell off the car, squatted down on the ground right in front of everybody, and took a piss. She then walked over to a group of people who kept trying to get away from her, it was pretty humorous and sad.

When we got home my dad apologized to my friend's dad for taking them there and seeing that. His reply was "Well that's life, can't keep them away from that forever. Now if it were you who peed out ther eI would have had a problem".

RIP DD
 
Its too bad that Detroit politicians want nothing more than to destroy the automotive heritage that created it.

down here in NC they just Built Z-max and I couldent find it on the web site but I hear that Piedmont is going to go from 1/8th mile to 1/4 mile.

Piedmont is an old school track with tons of support. the side betting is huge and the Big dog events are every bit as busy as Heads up at milan.

check out the website!

http://www.piedmontdragway.com/
 
SVT32VDOHC said:
x2...that place is a SHIT HOLE!!!!
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its proven not to make money for the state being run like it is now. attendance is WAY down. and it will NEVER go back up. monroe county fair is 10x better anyway.........why? motorsports, they have a demo derby, motorcross, truck pulls......that may not be what we are looking for but it opens the door to other motorsports. they could buy up all the crap south of 7mile too. that hood is near empty or burned anyway. the golf course is right there, easy access to everywhere via woodward. too bad its all just a pipe dream. the city really doesnt need any extra revenue anyway.

there is a ton of vacant, shit holed land on the east side of livernois too. just south of Reikos place.
 
what about city airport. get them to rent the place out between landings. Top gear uses an old airport, so you could have a 1/4 or maybe a 1/2 mile drag and a kick ass cone course.

and then I woke up
 
i miss that place, we were alway out there all the time. even after it closed.


R.I.P detroit dragway


and motor city was a hangout party place till kids started fucking shit up out there then the neighbors would call the cops

was out there last year no one said anything to us
 
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black_bullit said:
It's crazy how much time you have to spend to get a few passes in at Milan. Some of the best times I've had were out at Lapeer racing the other street cars, making 50 passes. Some of the worst were at Lapeer also when you couldn't hook with a top fuel slick. My next built car is going to be a road course car, talk about track time.

I had a few friends that said you had to watch you stuff at DD towards the end. One buddy went out to DD, made a pass, and when he came back to his truck his tool box and other shit was gone!
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I agree with you. Milan hooks and is fun, but the waiting. In 2002 I waited 6 hours for 3 runs. 2 of them sucked because I couldn't even remember how I left and shifted the time before. The 3rd wasn't bad since it was close to the 2nd pass, near the end before they closed. Lapeer everytime I go there....I can run 4 times within 20 minutes. I've made 12 passes there with stock-like cars and could have run 20-30 times easily. Lapeer just doesn't hook for shit though. I can heat tires and pull a 2.4 60ft there. At Milan I don't even have to give them a quick spin and can pull a 2.0.

DannyDodge said:
it would have to be brought upon by a black person, if your white, city council will tell you to get bent, im pretty sure a while back someone tryed and they said no
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You know, you're probably right. I'd hate to admit it, but I have customers...black and white and they've said the same thing to me. Some don't come out and say they need white people, but they've gone as far as saying, "those people" are all useless, and they need a whole new council.

I'll have some politicial stuff on the TV in the office and people of both colors just shake their head and say...."They ain't go do nuttin." Even people that live in Detroit are embarrassed of that council.

Anthony said:
its proven not to make money for the state being run like it is now. attendance is WAY down. and it will NEVER go back up. monroe county fair is 10x better anyway.........why? motorsports, they have a demo derby, motorcross, truck pulls......that may not be what we are looking for but it opens the door to other motorsports. they could buy up all the crap south of 7mile too. that hood is near empty or burned anyway. the golf course is right there, easy access to everywhere via woodward. too bad its all just a pipe dream. the city really doesnt need any extra revenue anyway.

there is a ton of vacant, shit holed land on the east side of livernois too. just south of Reikos place.
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Attendence is down?? I wasn't even aware that shit still takes place there. I drove by that place 3 times two weeks ago and that place is fallin apart. There is so much potential over at the place too because of it's size, but some people still wouldn't go there because of it's location. Some people LOVE Detroit, while others stay far away from the city.

I would like to see Detroit, the largest city around us, that we all live in, make a 180, but that will never happen in our lifetime.
 
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so who owns MOTOR CITY DRAG WAY now? Government? private owners?

It would be nice to rehab it and keep it private as not to piss off too many neighbors.
but seeing what they are going through in onadaga is ridiculous, with the current lawsuit.
 
wikdsvt said:
so who owns MOTOR CITY DRAG WAY now? Government? private owners?

It would be nice to rehab it and keep it private as not to piss off too many neighbors.
but seeing what they are going through in onadaga is ridiculous, with the current lawsuit.
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I was out there a few years ago and the neighbors came over to see what was going on. I explained that I was just there to take photos of the old track and what not plus neighbors from down the road where there looking with us. I was told that a company from New York owns it that they where gonna build or farm there but because of all the toxins in the ground they basically couldn't do shit with it. That's what I was told in 2013. Not sure where it stands now.
 
My father used to race his 1966 Oldsmobile 442 in the Stock Class at Detroit Dragway back in the mid-to-late 1960s. He took me there several times as kid.

My grandfather lived in Southgate near Pennsylvania & McCann, about 2 miles from Detroit Dragway. I remember visiting him on Sunday nights and being able to hear the cars at Detroit Dragway from his yard.

As mentioned previously, it closed in 1998 and was torn down to make room for an industrial park. Tom Haas was a land speed racer from Livonia and had a Christmas Tree from Detroit Dragway in 2001, when I bought a 1994 Buick Roadmaster Estate wagon from him (aka Impala SS wagon).
 
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