Drive-in movies, soccer, NASCAR? West Richland shifts gears on raceway vision

It’s been 16 years since the last NASCAR-style competitive car race was held at Tri-City Raceway in West Richland.

Since then, the site has stood vacant, passed from one public organization to another with various plans and dreams.

But this week, people passing by the track on West Van Giesen Street must have been doing double takes, as six late-model race cars were driving laps around the half-mile asphalt track.

It was a chance to test the track, said Eric Van Winkle, a long-time Tri-Citian who owns the Van Winkle Firm and is board chairman for the Gesa Carousel of Dreams.

Now he’s part of the Friends of Red Mountain Events Center. That’s what Van Winkle, Greg Walden, Jesse Brown and others hope to call the facility that would include the race track, as well as land surrounding it.

But the plan doesn’t just involve auto racing.

“That’s the beautiful part of it,” said Van Winkle. “There’s so much you can do out there. Bicycle racing, electric car racing, a wine festival — anything involving wine, a thrill show, drifting competitions, swap meets, soccer fields, lacrosse fields. We can grow the grass out for those last two. But we see this as an event center, and we’d be committed to do other events.”

West Richland Mayor Brent Gerry shares the group’s vision for the project.

“I knew there’s a potential for this place to be a multi-use facility,” said Gerry, a former racer himself at the track in the 1980s. “I want to be clear that the city is not going to spend any money on it. Never did I have any intention to fund it with West Richland taxpayer money.”

The idea was to find a nonprofit group to possibly take charge of putting the project together and running with it.

That’s where the Friends of Red Mountain Event Center come in.

“But there is no contract with anyone,” said Gerry. “Everything right now is strictly exploratory.”

Testing the track

That’s what Wednesday’s shakedown was about.

Among those drivers out on the track was Garrett Evans, a long-time race car driver from the Wenatchee area.

Evans is a legend in motorsports, especially around the Northwest. He’s won close to 400 races at different levels of racing cars in his career.

He loved the track. Always has.

“Garrett told us to don’t do a thing to it,” said Gerry. “You get 20 cars out there and that will take care of all of that dust on the track.”

Evans agreed.

“It was awesome,” Evans said of Wednesday’s run. “At first it was pretty dusty, but I can see a ton of potential. It was pretty smooth. Whoever did that asphalt did an amazing job.”

Walden, who owns Atomic Screenprinting & Embroidery in Kennewick and runs Hermiston Raceway, agrees.

“The asphalt is better than what we have in Hermiston,” said Walden. “The people layered the track thick, and it’s so banked. The sand underneath promotes drainage.”

Evans started his racing career in 1977, and an event at Tri-City Raceway was his fourth competition ever. He placed second.

“I raced there from 1977 to 2004,” said Evans. “It’s always sad when one of the tracks close. But I consider that track to be an old friend.”

Raceway history

The old Tri-City Raceway had been part of the communities’ way of life since the 1960s.

But back around 2004, then-track owner Paul Alderman sold the facility to the Port of Kennewick, which had plans to do something with the land related to the wine industry.

Last October, West Richland bought the track and its surrounding area, totaling 92 acres off Highway 224 near Keene Road, from the Port of Kennewick for about $1.87 million.

The sale included 18-acre water rights, with the port still retaining additional water rights.

And West Richland voters approved a $12.5 million bond in April 2019 to build a new police station at the site.

Part of the 92 acres includes 5 acres just north of the race track, where the 22,500-square-foot police station is to be built.

“I needed 5 acres for a police station,” said Gerry. “The only thing I could find in the middle of the city of West Richland would cost $800,000.”

“This is a growing community, and I told the port they could help us by selling us the entire 92 acres,” he said.

Sports fields

Gerry said the city needs more recreation fields, and he can see two soccer/lacrosse fields could be built just east of the race track, and another field inside the middle of the track.

“We’ve outgrown the Bombing Range Road facility for Hogs & Dogs,” he said. “We’ve outgrown Flat Top Park for other events.”

But the city wouldn’t need all 92 acres.

“I’ve had my planning department take a look at the acreage, at things that can be done excluding to what is being farmed. As we go through this exercise, I don’t want to upset the local farmers,” he said.

The raceway is within West Richland’s urban growth boundary, and was incorporated into the city in 2015.

The frustrating part for racing fans is that all of the light standards have been taken down, as well as the seating in the grandstands.

“I think, at the time the port bought the track property, it had plans out here,” said Gerry. “They had no Columbia Drive project. They had no Vista Field project. Before any of these things took off they had a master plan. The commission changed, the direction changed, and it lessened the priority of the race track property.”

What’s next

Van Winkle approached the city council July 7 to present the idea.

“I needed their permission to do this,” he said. “I told the council you have 50 acres out here and it’s just sitting there. And you also happen to have in the middle of it one of the fastest half-mile tri-oval race tracks in the Northwest.”

The council gave him the approval to bring out the drivers, and Van Winkle was able to put something together the following week.

“Now our challenge is to do something out there that isn’t auto racing,” said Van Winkle. “We want to try a drive-in movie on the pavement. We’d like to try a bicycle race, maybe with electric bikes. Maybe a swap meet, or a car show.”

Van Winkle would like to try the drive-in movie within the next month.

Walden said now the group has to go back to the council and ask to hold a few more events.

Gerry said the Friends of Red Mountain Events Center — if they were to get a contract with the city —must work with the local Sand & Sage Sports Car Club, which has had a contract with the city to hold their events at the track for 12 years.

“The Sand & Sage Sports Car Club, they have rights to the facility on said dates,” said Gerry. “But there could be many more events out there. The money that is made from these events can help build the facility. They would help build the property and improve it.”

Van Winkle understands that most people might be interested in the race track part of the vision.

“It’s 50 acres. It’s got fencing, restrooms, parking,” said Van Winkle. “All that stuff that was torn down is still rebuildable.”

The videos posted on Facebook of Wednesday’s track session have gone out far and wide, and the group has been getting phone calls.

Understandable. No one is building new tracks anymore.

Van Winkle said he wouldn’t even think about possibly running the event center without Greg Walden and his family.

“I wouldn’t do that part without Greg, and Wayne has always been there in the background. They’ve got 30 years of experience running races,” said Van Winkle.

In fact, the Waldens ran Tri-City Raceway in the 1990s.

Greg Walden is already formulating ideas — one that includes four to six races.

“We see it as an event center first, and run possibly four races out there. I could see it hold two major stock-car races there,” Walden said. “Maybe one K&N West race (a higher NASCAR level). And maybe one Open Wheels race. There are plans in place. It just takes a whole bunch of money.”

That last part he said with a chuckle, then was cautious.

“We used to have 4,000 seats. We’ve got to be able to generate income out here or forget it,” he said.

“We wanted to see what was there,” he said about Wednesday’s test run.

He said young race car driver Kaiden Anderson took his car out on the track for the first time ever since he was too young when the track closed.

He came out of his car with big eyes,” laughed Walden.

“The whole day, that was a neat deal. Probably the highlight of the year for many of us out there. It was a fun day. It was my best day of the year. People walked away jazzed.”