CARSTAIRS -- A proposed motorsport facility east of Carstairs has taken another step in the approval process – almost two years after Mountain View County (MVC) council approved the re-designation of the land involved.
Rocky Mountain Motorsports (RMM) officials say they have now completed and submitted the proposal's final detailed engineering plans and required reports along with the development permit application to MVC.
RMM president and CEO Dominick Young said that the develpment permit application submission is a key milestone for the project and keeps it on schedule to commence construction in spring of 2019.
RMM obtained approval in 2017 from MVC council for its motorsports park concept plan and a direct control land use bylaw was passed for the development, which includes a 3.5-kilometre recreational and training racetrack at the southeast corner of Highway 2 and Highway 581.
"The major piece of the process with the county occurred over the course of 2016 and early 2017 when we were successful at obtaining our land use approval and approval of our concept plan," said Young.
"Since then we've really been working with the engineers and design people to get the track redesigned to comply with the existing energy regulations relating to gas wells and pipelines. That's all been accomplished at this stage."
Young said they submitted the development permit in the third week of January.
"At this stage we're working now with the county in going through the review," he said. "We're hoping to have council approve the development permit towards the end of April."
As part of the development permit process, the county will be circulating the designs to various government agencies such as Alberta Transportation.
The project will require a realignment of Rge. Rd. 10A and a rebuild of a half mile of Rge. Rd. 10, he said.
"Those are county roads so they are obviously interesting in seeing those are done according to spec," he said.
As part of the land use bylaw process, studies were done on the future effects of the racetrack on nearby traffic, he said.
RMM expects to create up to 100 new jobs for the Carstairs-Mountain View County region during construction and on an ongoing basis once it's complete, he said.
"A good number of those will be created when we actually create the commercial zone," he said. "There will be a number of new businesses locating within that zone.
"The track itself will create some direct jobs but a lot of the jobs will come from the additional buildup from just after the track."
The track will be operated by RMM on a semi-private basis, he said.
"Our facility is primarily geared towards user groups," he said. "Those user groups will consist of our membership, first off, we expect about half our track time will be dedicated strictly to members.
"The other half would be available and accessible to the public through different avenues."
Young says a local car club could rent the track for a track day.
"So the members of that club, who may not be members of our facility, would share the cost of the track and be able to come out and have a track day," he said.
"Another use would be through performance driving schools. So we do fully expect that there will be a number of performance driving schools that operate throughout the year and use our facility."
Young said they do anticipate having open sessions where members of the public could drive their own vehicles around the track provided their vehicle passes inspection.
Mountain View County reeve Bruce Beattie confirmed that the company’s development application is now in the hands of county staff.
“Basically what they have done is they have made an application through administration and they (administration) is reviewing that application now,” said Beattie.
“At some point that will come forward to council because that is a direct control district. Council will be the body that will make the decision on the development permit.
“When administration feels that the application is complete they will bring it forward to council. They are working with administration.”
Public hearings were held earlier for the property involved when the application was made to change the designation to direct control.
“It went through that process to direct control and that was finally approved. It went through the public hearing process and that was quite a lengthy process,” he said.
“So now there is an application for a development permit. They (the company) have been working with staff to put that together.”
Since council will have to consider whether to approve the development permit, councillors are “staying out of any kind of discussion until it comes forward because we certainly don’t want to have any indication of bias,” he said.
It is not known exactly when the development permit application could come before council, he said.
If and when the development permit is approved, construction could then begin, he said.
Mountain View County council passed a motion approving the change in designation to direct control in April 2017 following a public hearing process. They also passed a second related bylaw.
Bylaw No. 14/16 re-designates a 545.64-acre parcel from agricultural district to direct control, and Bylaw No. 15/16 amends Bylaw No. 12-15 (the Wessex area structure plan) to re-identify SE 12-30-1-5 from low density residential to business park.
The approved re-designations came with a number of conditions, including the following:
- Above-ground sour gas facilities shall be protected by vehicle barrier devices sufficient to prevent impact with said facilities.
- The operator shall be responsible to collect sound data at the boundary of the site, and submit said data to the county, to support compliance with these permitted levels. The noise management plan shall address how the noise levels will be managed to fall within the permitted levels.
- Add to definitions – drag racing – a type of motor racing in which automobiles or motorcycles compete, usually two at a time, to be first to cross the finish line. The race follows a short straight course from a standing start over a measured distance.
- An on-site fire protection plan, including on-site equipment and on-site professionally trained staff, shall be submitted to the local fire department for approval with confirmation provided as part of the development permit application.
- An emergency response plan, including equipment and on-site professionally trained staff, shall be submitted as part of the development permit application.
