US GP in Austin Discussion and Speculation...

Received a few hours ago an email from Cota about a "NEW" offsite parking lot called Lot "Q". I bought it, total cost $50 for all three days. Location they say is 3.8 miles from the track. The directions are east on SH 71 to SH 21, then south to FM 812, travel west on 812 until you get tooooo lot "Q". Shuttles will run continuously from 7 to 7 and the ride is included.

 

happily they seem to be trying to iron out all the bugs.
tickets prices were brought into line and now the parking is coming along.
hpoefully in a year or two this thing may be a pleasant experience.

 

i am pretty sure eventually they WILL iron out the bugs. I just decided not to be part of the guinea pig squad the first year. Their tickets are sold out/available/sold out/available so many times at this point and parking is available or not every other week. I just got tired playing their guessing game/lottery and I will just vote NO to their BS this year.
I just rebooked everything for Vegas for the same period of time.
Does anyone know a place (like a sports bar) in Vegas, where fans will gather to watch the race?

 

Going to miss a good BQ at Big Tex's place........

 

Bring me! I want to go home and watch the race!!!

The handshake is actually a dance, do the line dance and you'll get in!

 

Does this mean we all do the hokey pokey?

 

Don't forget to shake it all about!

 

Now now boys.

 

This track is out in the exurbs and they charge $50 for parking 3.8 miles away?!?

I'm pretty sure I live in a different universe....just. don't get. it.

 

Nah, man, the Tree House Italian restaurant is right across Congress, there's an HEB at Oltorf, and the little package store one block north has a Beer Cooler 40' long!!!

Lingerie Store too, right by Lucy's Fried Chicken.
Expose dancers, two blocks south...

The City is all nuts about amplified music without a permit...we are coin tossing how the handle that!!

Stay tuned....

 

SH 21 connects Bastrop to San Marcos, I have said all along it's the major route North/South to the COTA.

That's what makes Lost Pines Resort so choice, IMO.

 

NO line dancing allowed, at the Broken Spoke......although Alvin Crow called a "Ladies Choice" last Saturday might, that got "close"...LOL!

Jesse Dayton will kick it all off on Thursday..he packs 'em in!

 

The real issue is road logistics, they are doing everything possible to get 'flow" on Farm to Market two lanes (4 lanes if you make them one way), so this Satellite Parking with shuttle congregates the entrants and lowers overall vehicle count, as the shuttles from Downtown are doing.....

 

Damn I wish I could afford the one in downtown as it would put me closer as I have volunteered. At this point I am not even sure if I can make the race due to a specific issue with my vehicle but I have already arranged free room/board with a friend who lives in Austin yet he lives on the far westside of Austin.

 

Just received an email saying my seats are obstructed by the overhead walkway near Turn 3, and I have been moved (to turn 6). I specifically selected the seats I had for cars coming out of turn 2, and my wife wouldn't have to walk very far from the overpass to seating as she doesn't get around as well as she used to. Now that has all changed. Can anyone help me with this? I am really upset at this late date, and was coming from Chicago for the race too.

Norbert

 

Tell them you want to stay in your grandstand and hold your ground. There are a lot of people on chat that are going and we could all become squeaky wheels if needed. Let us know if we can do anything?

I would be so pissed if they moved me.........................very sorry.

 

Amazing. COTA just figured this out and is now letting you know? Something smells. But then that is COTA!

 

I got the same email today and not happy about it.
what kind of planning is this that they did not know that they were building a bridge and now they found out....

 

I've been pretty unspoken about COTA's practices, but this latest issue is not so bad to me. Would you guys rather COTA not have notified you and moved your seats? I'd be significantly more pissed if I got there and found out my seats were ****.


Mark

 

I think trying to work out a solution would have been better than just saying 'we had a problem and we fixed it, you are now in Turn 6'.

 

I thought that turn 6 was sold out?

 

Everything COTA touches is subject to change. Class act are they.....not.

 

Don't you mean Bernie and the FIA?

 

http://www.statesman.com/news/news/local/as-austin-short-term-rental-rules-take-effect-hund/nSZbj/

American-Statesman Staff

The vast majority of people renting homes for this weekend’s Austin City Limits Music Festival could be breaking the law, as only four houses out of an estimated 1,500 short-term rental properties had the required license to operate as of Wednesday.

The controversial rules regulating short-term rentals went into effect 10 days ago, including a requirement that properties be registered with the city. Registration opened on the same day the law took effect, but only a small fraction of property owners have started the application process.

City officials say they are currently focused on getting more homes to register rather than on punishing those operating illegally. But enforcement officials stopped short of saying nobody would be penalized if caught running an unauthorized rental.

Some rental property owners — those renting homes they do not live in — are in a more complicated situation: If the properties weren’t used as short-term rentals before June 14, 2011, the owners are barred from registering the proprieties until January.

Some of those property owners already had signed up customers for lucrative weekends — such as the upcoming ACL Fest and next month’s Formula One race — before the City Council passed the rule in August.

“I cancelled my (F1) rental. It was $600 a night for 5 nights,” said Melanie Martinez, who had a group signed up for her 2,500-square-foot historic Victorian cottage in the Travis Heights neighborhood of South Austin. Her guests, she said, “were upset because now they have to stay at a hotel on the outskirts of town.”

Martinez said she asked city officials what she should do — honor an agreement that she made earlier this year, well before the City Council passed the short-term rental rules in August, or follow the new city rules and kill the agreement. Of course, there was a third option: go underground by renting her house and not paying hotel taxes, so the city wouldn’t know she had rented it illegally.

“I don’t have an answer for her. I can’t tell her to do it. And if she does it anyway, she runs the chance of getting caught,” said Jerry Rusthoven, a manager in the city’s planning and development review department who helped oversee the crafting of the short-term rental rules.

For the vast majority of people renting homes short-term, the requirements are straightforward: register in person with the city’s code compliance department on 1520 Rutherford Lane and pay the $476 registration fee.

While only four homes are currently registered with the city, about 50 others had appointments scheduled and are starting to move through the registration process, officials said. The city auditor office said in April that it found about 1,500 short-term rental properties.

City staff members are combing websites such as Craigslist.org looking for short-term renters who have not registered with the city, officials said, so they can send the property owners information about the registration process.

“The more that folks see this ordinance is here and these are the components of it, the more I think we’re going to continue to get folks registered,” said Matthew Christianson, an assistant division manager for the code compliance department that administers the registration program.

If code enforcement officers get a complaint about a home, officials said, property owners operating a short-term rental without a permit could face a $2,000-a-day fine.

“It isn’t our desire to be punitive,” Christianson said. “We just want people to have a safe place to stay when they come to Austin.”

Officials wouldn’t say what would happen if a property owner such as Martinez tries to register in January but is found to have rented illegally in the past three months. And Martinez isn’t alone in fearing that she might be denied a permit if she breaks the rules now, said Joel Rasmussen, president of the Austin Rental Alliance.

He estimated about two dozen of his group’s 180 members cannot register their homes until January.

“I think that’s a very strange position for city staff to put people in,” he said.

Martinez said it seems the city “left out a very important part of the ordinance, which is the grace period of enforcement.”

City officials said grace periods to come into compliance are not typical.

“We knew there would be a three-month window. It’s unfortunate that there are these two major events in this … window. … If it were, maybe, June, July, August, it wouldn’t have been as big an issue,” Rusthoven said.

 

I wonder who had a hand in passing that law - major hotels? Bad news for fans. Another good reason to wait till next year.