With the Wakefield Park Raceway sale being completed, new owner Steve Shelley celebrated the sale with his family, as well as sharing the occasion with some of the tracks neighbours.
Shelley, who now owns two circuits in NSW – Pheasant Wood Circuit and now Wakefield Park – set about mending the strained relationship with the local residents in the surrounding area.
Since the sale from the Benalla Auto Club (BAC) was proposed with the assistance of Liberal MP Wendy Tuckerman and the wheels were set in motion, the near untenable relationship with the tracks neighbours was the first thing Shelley set about mending; recognising it as the key step in order for Wakefield to have any chance of re-opening.
The affirmation of that approach was affirmed yesterday, when after the sale was finalised with the BAC’s Stephen Whyte, the celebrations involved Shelley and his family sharing the occasion with the local residents.
Shelley (centre) and his family celebrate the finalisation of the Wakefield Park sale from the Benalla Auto Club
“It felt really good for a couple of reasons, I had my family all around me: my wife and my son drove down, and my two brothers Greg and Cameron were there with me too,” Shelley told AUTO ACTION.
“But then we celebrated into the night with the neighbours! They came along, and a lot of these people that had a lot of issues with the track historically, they actually came in and celebrated with us.
“That’s a pretty big turnaround compared to where we were when we started this journey, it was very symbolic.”
The new owner gave AA an insight into what mending that relationship actually looked like, where he essentially began with a situation where the residents’ voices had been either ignored or demonised.
“We had numerous occasions with the surrounding residents where we enjoyed sitting together in their living rooms or on a porch with a coffee and some cake.
“We’ve genuinely discussed the process of moving forward with them and building that relationship back. Essentially re-establishing a bond and a mutual trust of each other.
New Wakefield owner (L) Steve Shelley and the BAC’s Stephen Whyte make the sale official
“And that has culminated in feeling comfortable for them to come across the road, and celebrate the fact that there’s new owners here at Wakefield Park.
“Now that’s been very important as the relationship with the old owner was truly broken, and it just wasn’t reconcilable.
“So we’ve started that new dialogue and fresh relationship. It’s a new slate that we’re going to start with. It is one of those ‘from the ground up’ processes.”
In terms of the track reopening for operation and competition, that will be about striking a balance between the activities that happen at Raceway.
Shelley told AA that they are aiming for track days by September, and for competition, they will plan to re-open for 2024, using the track as it is before any big planning work is considered so as to not complicate any matters concerning the 1993 DA (development approval) that is still in place.
“We very much have a master plan, and the council is very supportive of that plan, but because it’s such a comprehensive deviation from what’s there, we’ll re-open with the current format, with some modifications.
“We don’t want to stonewall a new DA with any complications, so we’ll look to reopen through the current 1993 DA which is still operative, and we’re in deep conversation with council about how to work under that, as well as being in consultation with the neighbours.
“Currently, we’re in the the final stages of completing a schedule, which will involve various types of racing or meets, ranging from very low noise, medium noise, and through to street type levels of noise, and then competition noise.
“We’ll consult the neighbours about what our exact intentions are, because it’s our job to honour that side of the agreement to continue having a trusting relationship.
“We need to strike a balance of where racing and motorsport activities will be at, and what that looks like exactly, in the future of Wakefield Park.
“It’s about a balance, which is something we all talked about last night, and we’ll be looking at controlling the noise from the source, and through a combination of careful planning, we think we can reach a point where everybody’s expectations can be met fairly, and with co-operation.”
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