Most of my work is behind me now for a rough couple of weeks. Opening day of deer season is tomorrow and tonight I entertain a large crowd of patriotic woodsmen.
There's stew to finish cooking, a bunk house to spruce up a bit.
There's coal to load in the old stove to keep away the chill of the night, and preparations to be made for the carving of meat tomorrow by one hunter after another.
I'd love to sit here and spend more time with you, but the woods are calling me.
And if you want to know why, here are a couple of items for you to maybe, understand. Have a great weekend. See you Monday.
Kentucky's modern gun deer season opens this weekend and I issue this caution to you. Many inexperienced hunters will be sitting inconspicuously in trees and along the edge of fields armed with high powered rifles capable of killing at great distances. By law they are required to wear a certain bright color: hunter orange.
It is highly recommended that those who are not themselves hunting, and might not even be aware of hunting season, be cautious when running, hiking, jogging, walking the dog, horseback riding, riding ATV's or engaging in any other outdoor activities for the next two weeks. It would be advisable for anyone who will be outdoors during daylight hours this weekend and for for the duration of modern gun season to wear at the minimum, a hunter orange hat.
Hunter orange can be seen at long distances and in low light. It is recognizable as a human locator. It is available at almost all sporting goods stores and departments.
I would also advise those with horses and large dogs to keep them close to home.
And for all hunters taking to the woods, please remember these rules of gun and hunting safety:
ALWAYS treat every gun as if it is loaded.
ALWAYS keep you gun pointed in a safe direction.
ALWAYS keep your finger off the trigger and outside the trigger guard (on the frame) until you shoot.
ALWAYS know what is between you and your target, and what is beyond it.
ALWAYS be alert to the presence of humans, pets, livestock, dwellings, farm buildings and vehicles.
ALWAYS remain sober and rested when handling a firearm.
ALWAYS wear an approved safety harness when climbing trees or using a treestand.
Here are a few more tips to help Kentucky's deer herd.
Harvest a doe if possible. Too many hunters think that they must shoot an antlered deer. The ideal ratio of bucks to does is 1 to 1. By shooting only bucks you contribute to an "out of balance" herd, which in turn produces more doe fawns than buck fawns and compounds the problems.
If you choose to harvest an antlered deer, resist shooting any deer "buck" unless his antlers spread "outside the ears". This will give younger, healthy bucks a chance to become trophies.
Process the meat yourself. It is not only rewarding, but will provide you and your family with the highest quality, all natural, low fat food you could bring home.
For more on how to process your venison, see this video I produced a couple of years ago.
Steve Beshear is spending your money on a road to nowhere. He has announced that he will spend $3.6 million to widen exit ramps and add lanes to roadways around the Kentucky Speedway in response to Bruton Smith's criticism that Kentucky should be embarrassed. Well, here's what my fact finding mission turned up.
First, I live less than 3 miles from the Speedway. In the past I could tailgate at home with my friends before an event, and then be in my seat 15 minutes after my last bite of burger. During the recent Sprint Cup race, it took me over 4 hours. Why? Was it the roadways?
No. The problem was all inside the track where four lanes of traffic was being funneled down into a single file procession into various parking lots. That coupled with closed entrances, coned off open parking lots and kids without a clue trying to direct cars into parking spaces. In other words, all of the exits and roads leading to the track handled the traffic just fine. The bottleneck was entirely inside the event.
I taped a number of incidents to back up this observation. That's why I was suspicious when Bruton Smith immediately tried to lay blame on the state. But, considering that Mr. Smith owns other tracks where the crowds are half again the size of those at Sparta, I decided to go see how the traffic situation at one of those venues worked.
So I went to Bristol Motor Speedway in Bristol Tennessee. The Bristol crowd is estimated to be 165,000 race fans and the track is located in the middle of a small mountain town on the border of Tennessee, Virginia and Kentucky. I expected a mess.
Instead there was no traffic jam at all. In fact, the only police presence I saw was at a cross walk helping pedestrians cross 6 lanes of traffic.
We drove right in to the parking lot without the first hold up. We didn't have a parking pass but were able to make a U-turn and exit without any trouble at all. There was plenty of parking on private property literally right up against the track itself.
The crowd moved effortlessly through the gates and there were no lines, ever, at the concession stands. Was this the result of wider exit ramps or multi-lane roads or expensive underground tunnels? No, this was the result of having the track parking limited to those with permits, good signage miles from the track, and NO POLICE! I'm not kidding, I saw no police anywhere, inside or outside the track.
You know as well as I do that if there is a traffic hold up at an intersection when you get there more often than not a traffic cop is directing the flow. Inside the Kentucky Speedway you see armed police and even National Guard members in uniform everywhere. At Bristol, the fans can even bring in their own coolers, and yes, they can bring their own beer.
What is the difference? Bristol sells their ticketed fans a parking pass and leaves the rest of the event to the people without government control at every turn. Nothing gums up the works like government intervention.
Will wider exits and more lanes and a tunnel fix the Kentucky Speedway problems? Not if those roads lead to nowhere, such as to a coned off five lane boulevard brought to a halt by a police car directing every one of those cars to stop and proceed single file into helter-skelter dis-organized, un-designated parking.
Here's a plan, put up signs miles from the track directing those with parking passes into certain lanes. Then open up one of the closed entrances to those with the passes. Then put up signs directing the various levels of parking passes into specific lanes on the speedway road system and the funnel those people, lane by lane into the right parking lots, filling them from the outer edges toward the middle in order to keep the cars rolling as long as possible.
Oh, and Steve, if you've got an extra $3.6 million laying around, how about spending it on high speed Internet access in rural areas of the state, or are you afraid that when people start getting their news on blogs like this one that you will no longer have the benefit of a complicit press to help you hide your stupid ideas from the people?
Everybody by now has heard of the incredible cluster of cars and trucks stuck in traffic as the Kentucky Speedway employed teenagers and those with no experience to make miles of traffic go single file into one parking lot at a time. The finger of blame has been pointed in many directions, but one finger raises questions.
Track owner Bruton Smith is a billionaire. You don't become a billionaire without getting your way in the business world. According to the Paulick Report, in order to get his way, Bruton has become a bully.
Octogenarian Bruton Smith apparently spends a lot more money on attorneys than he does on traffic planning and customer service. Just Google “Bruton Smith” and “lawsuit” and you’ll find enough reading material to more than last the six hours or so that thousands of NASCAR fans sat in traffic along Interstate 71 in Northern Kentucky last Saturday, trying to get into the Kentucky Speedway that Smith now owns.
The track was built by a partnership consisting of former Turfway Park owner Jerry Carroll and Arlington Park chairman Richard Duchossois, who eventually sold it to Smith at a significant loss after NASCAR rebuffed their efforts to bring a Sprint Cup race to the facility. Smith, through his ownership of other NASCAR tracks, had the juice with NASCAR to get that piece done, and he expanded Kentucky Speedway’s seating from 60,000 to just over 100,000 – but not before forcing the state of Kentucky to cough up over $20 million in tax breaks to this billionaire bully.
Smith has sued cities, counties, even the federal government with varying degrees of success. He’s strong-armed governments to get tax credits to offset the cost of facilities that help him grow his personal empire. He’s a “take my ball and go home” kind of guy when he doesn’t get his way.
You can also Google “Bruton Smith” and “jerk” to find out what a boor he is. Last week, in advance of the Quaker State 400 at Kentucky Speedway, Smith went out of his way to say his race will draw more fans the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs, which he said pads its attendance figures. It was a backhanded swipe at Duchossois, the largest shareholder of Churchill Downs Inc., which now owns Arlington Park.
Not only was traffic planning shoddy or nonexistent, Smith’s management team failed to ensure enough parking spots, didn’t hire enough shuttle buses and vans, buy enough bottled water and concessions, or even supply enough toilet paper. Helpless fans on Facebook are talking about turning the tables on Smith by filing a class-action lawsuit after spending large sums of money on tickets they could not use. Even Kentucky Senate President and wannabe governor David Williams is all huffy about it, calling for legislative hearings after he was one of the thousands stuck in traffic who couldn't get in.
After reading this account of how Bruton Smith conducts business, I began to wonder; Could the speedway traffic jam been intended?
Before the green flag had even dropped, I received a text from one of my correspondents watching the race on television at home, that Bruton Smith was being interviewed about the traffic mess and immediately began pointing fingers at the Commonwealth of Kentucky. I'm told he blamed the road system and said that while he had the kind of money necessary to fix up his track, that it takes states, counties and cities to come up with the kind of money needed to build roads.
While in theory what he says is true, the question is not a theoretical one. The question is what did Bruton do or not do that caused the problems. Might he have set up a mess to get leverage over the state to build him new access roads?
That would seem to be perfectly in keeping with his reputation. And considering all of the tax incentives he got, one would think he could have at least had enough paper towels and toilet paper on hand at the track (which he didn't) and could have kept up with ordinary maintenance (which he didn't). Even the grass between Pit Road and the finish line was a mess. Instead of finely mowed and spruced up for television, it was black and dead looking in places on Thursday night, the logo paintings were blurry and everywhere one saw evidence that buildings were in need of simple repairs.
Maybe David Williams is right. If this guy got millions in tax breaks and couldn't deliver, if this guy insists on leveling criticism at the Kentucky Derby just to get his digs in on the former owners and if this guy manipulated the NASCAR people in order to buy the track at a bargain price, squeezing out the Kentucky guys who had the vision to build it in the first place, maybe Mr. Smith needs to go to Frankfort and answer some questions for the people.
Kentucky Speedway is offering fans with tickets to the July 9th event in Sparta who did not get to attend due to traffic problems, an invitation to attend a race at any of the other tracks owned by Speedway Motorsports Inc this year. But this poses a problem of its own. Who can prove he/she didn't make the race?
I am a season ticket holder. I have attended all but a couple races since the track opened in my backyard. At each race for the last few years, gate agents used a scanner to log each ticket at the time of admittance. But that was not the case on Saturday. I actually know of several people who got through the gate without ever producing a ticket at all.
The scanners were not in use. Therefore, there is no record of which ticket holders got in, and which did not. There are exceptions to this for those in club seats or boxes, but for the many, many fans with grandstand seats, the track has no record.
I thought it was odd when I went through the gate and they didn't scan my ticket. I commented on it at the time. I wonder if the decision to not use the scanners will turn out to be a good one or a bad one in light of the offer to let those claiming to have been turned away by traffic to use their tickets at another event.
As a loyal fan with a significant local knowledge of the track, traffic and how to solve these problems in the future, I'm surprised Mark Simendinger hasn't called me yet.
You had a wonderful weekend. The 20,000 or so people who sat in traffic all day and never got to the track didn't. Want to help make this much more of a success next time? Here's my two cents worth. First, use your considerable influence to change the law that prohibits people from letting campers park in their field.
I've already sent the proposed changes to Damon Thayer. Open up surrounding parking areas, and we will find the buses and trams to get your fans to you.
Second, make use of what you've got. You have two exits off of the Interstate, US 42 and US 127 all feeding into your dreams. Think, Think, Think. These are not just travel routes, they are pipelines. Control the flow of traffic with electronic valves. What do I mean by this? Take a look.
You have southbound I-71 feeding two lanes off of a two lane exit at Ky 35. That opens into a five lane highway leading to the track. Think signage. Put those electric signs up in multiple locations starting about 5 miles from the track, directing those with parking passes into the left lane. Never stop the traffic coming off the ramps. Keep two lanes open for 127, three lanes for I-71. Run the parking passes people up the left lane and into the first entrance. Give them a special lane all the way around the track to the gate and never have them stop.
Have the other two lanes never stop, feeding into the third entrance and the fourth lane coming from US 42 feeding into the track, never stoppping. Your big bottleneck was when all those lanes had to stop and wait to be waived into a single line into the parking lots.
Bring two lanes into one set of lots, the other two into the other lots. Never make them stop. Feed the lots from the middle, sending all incoming traffic to the far ends, building your parking from the outside in toward the middle. This keeps all cars moving the maximum amount of time.
Open up a shoulder for buses and trams. Let your signage tell people which way to turn to take advantage of over flow parking when your lots get about 3/4 full. On your website, identify available parking areas (as you did with extra camping areas). Get special permission for buses and trams to use the shoulders of the roads to transport large numbers of people to the track. Direct traffic into oncoming lanes at pinch points (in city of Sparta for example at the Bridge)
Work to eliminate roadside parking through Sparta opening up two lanes instead of one.
Use all of the lanes from northbound I-71 off the Belterra exit and feed them, along with two lanes from southbound, into the track. Place signs way ahead of the entrance telling people which lane is for parking passes only, then send that one lane with parking passes onward, and build your parking from the track outward. I saw four lanes of traffic stopped dead in the road waiting to be waived one car at a time onto a one lane driveway to the parking area. 100 yards up the road, there wasn't one car in sight, it was wide open all the way to the gate.
The name of the game is to keep the cars moving. Eliminate the pinch points and one lane entrances to parking lots. Flow 4 or five lanes in at a time. Sell more assigned parking and direct those cars from miles away with signage into the proper lanes so when they enter the track they move ahead and out of the way.
And for PR purposes, form a traffic flow committee and put a couple of fans on it. Include local leaders from the immediate area around the track, Speedway management, a sports writer and a representative of the KYDOT. Make the announcement of the committee splashy showing that you are reaching out to your fans and then hire experts from bigger venues, including places like DisneyWorld, to come in and offer solutions.
Congratulations on a great weekend of racing. Now get back to work and make your fans happy.
I have been a season ticket holder since the beginning of the Kentucky Speedway. Like everyone else, we have been waiting for a Sprint Cup Race. Last night's event was so much of a slap in the face that I can't believe the track owners have the gall to say the problem is the road system.
I live 3 miles from the track. It took me three hours to travel one of those miles. Then I turned out of traffic and headed down secret little roads. They were totally plugged.
What I saw was astounding. I watched people abandon their vehicles 6 miles from the track and take off walking! Six fricking miles!
Every ditch from Owenton to Sparta was filled with abandoned vehicles!
I was able to be in my seat (4 hours later) for the start of the race. I left before the half way point. There were still thousands of people trying to get INTO the track!!!!!!
Some were stuck in traffic, some huffing and puffing along jagged road edges; It was a frightening, lawless, desperate display of human frustration beyond common description.
I saw the traffic plan in action. I saw the parking plan in action. It was pure idiocy. They were taking four lanes of incoming traffic and funneling it down into a one lane entry to the parking areas. COME ON! That is pure stupidity.
They could have let all of the traffic continue flowing, directing individual lanes into separate parking areas, splitting the incoming cars into two streams and keep everybody moving. They could have had signage up showing in advance which lanes were for which level of parking passes, and showing lanes for those without parking passes. Did they do any of that? No.
Yes, I believe that the crowd, estimated to be 150,00 people was probably more like 400,00 people, and like Woodstock, the planners could have done better. But they didn't, and yet the earned tons of money.
The Kentucky Speedway screwed the public on its inaugural race day. What could have been a jewel in Kentucky's crown, instead put a premium on profit, and put the fans on the dung heap.
Barb Schempf at Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport (CVG) says that the Sprint Cup race in Sparta could bring in as many as 200 private planes, and dozens of helicopter flights, adding not only to their revenues, but introducing the general aviation crowd to the benefits of using CVG in the future.
Talk about a private airport nearer the track trailed off after an original environmental study and FAA grant ran out a few years ago. At that time CVG was interested in developing its commercial business and didn't think private aviation fit well into its business model. But now, after a number of changes, including a drop from 22 million passengers a year to 8 million going through CVG annually, they are re-thinking their plans.
The private aircraft on site as of today at CVG related to the race is at about 50 planes. Photos of them and more about the impact the NASCAR race is having at the old Comair terminal can be found on the Airport website and on its Facebook page.
Rumors continue to swirl around Gallatin and Owen counties that the new track owners have not given up on putting in a new general aviation facility nearer to town, thus eliminating the need for the many helicopter flights from Erlanger for the drivers, their spouse and their teams. But, according to sources, those plans no longer turn on building a public facility, rather the talk is all about track owner Bruton Smith building his own private landing strip and facility.
He might have the money to build one, and by the looks of the new track and all of the additional advertising opportunities in place at last nights race, it appears he has his eye on the money alright.
But for all the new seats, advertising and vendor revenue the crowd at the truck race was pretty small. In addition the restrooms have not had any improvement at all. Despite the small crowd they were out of paper towels or the dispensers didn't work. The buildings were in need of repair with rubber curbing around the tile walls hanging off as if it had been that way since last year.
Parking lot directional signs were not updated and the attendants admitted to me that "nobody knows what we are supposed to be doing. I saw young people parking cars three deep, thus leaving the middle car stranded until one of the other cars decided to move.
New camping areas are barely suitable for anything enjoyable. RV's and tents are packed into those areas leaving very little room, in some instances, for any activity other than getting in or out of the sleeping quarters.
While the track owners might have found a way to cut back on expenses while at the same time increasing revenues enough to consider building their own airport, they should at least pay as much attention to the way the place looks as CVG has with regard to its new general aviation terminal.
They have re-furbished the old Comair concourse C providing not only comfortable surroundings for the passengers, but also for the pilots and crews, many of whom will wait at the airport with their equipment for the returning chop of the helicopters bringing their high profile clients back for the flight to the next destination.
There's plenty of excitement in the air over tomorrow's Sprint Cup race, and obviously a lot is riding on it being successful. For its part the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport has stepped up to the challenge.
Get ready Kentucky, here they come. Over 100,000 racing fans from around the world have begun arriving for the biggest summer sports event in Kentucky history, as NASCAR brings a weekend of racing to the sleepy little town of Sparta capped off by its top tier drivers in the Sprint Cup race Saturday.
Sparta straddles the Gallatin and Owen County lines along the banks of Eagle Creek. The combined population of both counties is a little over 18,000. With more than 20,000 out of towners camping and staying in town from Wednesday through Sunday, and more than 100,000 more expected for the race on Saturday night, life in the valley will change dramatically.
I can see the Speedway from my deck and have been proud to support the racetrack since its inception. No doubt the arrival (finally) of the Sprint Cup race and all of the media attention it will draw, is a feather in the cap of all Kentuckians.
I can't wait to hear those engines roar, to see the colors and the skill of the drivers as they navigate, at 200 mph, the tri-oval track in my back yard.
With names like Dale Earnhardt Jr., Jeff Gordon, Tony Stewart, Michael Waltrip, Kasey Kahne, Mark Martin, Robby Gordon, Jeff Burton, Bobby Labonte, Jimmie Johnson, Kyle Busch, Kevin Harvick, Carl Edward, Casey Mears and Greg Biffle on the field, you know this is the big leagues.
Tonight the Camping World Truck Series goes off at 8 pm. Tomorrow night the Nationwide Series, Feed the Children 300 will run with the crown jewel of the race weekend being the Quaker State 400 Sprint Cup Series speeding to a start when the green flag drops Saturday night.
Oh, and by the way, still need a place to stay? Hotel and Motel rooms are reportedly sold out from Dayton Ohio south through Kentucky. All camping at the track is sold out and most campgrounds within 10 miles are full.
However, I have opened up a number of spaces for any of you still wishing to come and camp. For more information see: Steepleview Farm Camping.
If you've never been to a major NASCAR event, you don't know what you are missing. It has all of the excitement of the Super Bowl, the glitz, the glamour and the kind of activities you'd expect at an event sponsored by Disney and the crowd watching is at its best.
Forget the image of a bunch of toothless drunks in dirty shirts dragging around wallets on chains, the crowds at NASCAR event top tier races are a mix of everything from movie stars to your local mechanic. It's America's love of the automobile at its finest, and I can hardly wait to hear them say:
All original content on this blog is copyrighted to Marcus Carey. All rights to all content on this blog are reserved to Marcus Carey. Any use of the ideas, imagery, analogies, analysis, comments or other content is subject to approval. You may link to any content on this site and approval to use content will be freely granted upon request subject to appropriate attribution.
COMMENT POLICY NOTICE
Vulgar or profane language will not be published. Defamatory language will not be published. Your right to post comments may be revoked at any time without recourse. All comments are moderated. Comments do not necessarily reflect or represent the opinions, attitudes or beliefs of the blogger, but reflect only the opinions of the comment writer. Publishing a comment does not mean that I have either adopted or agree with the comment or support any of its content.
If for some reason you cannot abide by these simple rules, you are invited to read here only.
SUPPORT FOR THIS BLOG:
From time to time this blog will post paid advertisements, and may link to Amazon.com where this blog is participating in a revenue generating program offered by Amazon.com for purchases made of products accessed by the link on this blog.
