Ya know how you tell 2 friends about some great road and then they tell 2 friends and the next thing you know that delightful Saturday afternoon drive is now a traffic jam... The Ring is now suffering the same fate. To counter the traffic the owners have increased the rates. Wonder if it will help. Look for the 997 at about the 1:30 mark almost collect a Boxster... [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYINRvTIBl8&hd=1]Traffic Jam on the Nürburgring Nordschleife! - YouTube[/ame]
This also has a lot to do with the new owners reducing the hours the track is open to the public. It's to bad, cause it sure is a great place to run fast. Don't know if anyone else was aware of the pile-up accident that happened a month or so ago. Collected a rare 911 Carrera. Cars came up and around a bend to see a mobile warning sign flashing about construction and caught a fair number of cars out.
That's really a shame to see. I suppose that's just the nature of the beast with a track as famous as the Nurburgring. Somehow I doubt it. There were some expensive cars driven by expensive people in that video. I'd be surprised if they let a few extra dollars come between them and their track fix. Besides, I'm not sure traffic is the only reason they've increased fees. Has anyone else seen savethering.org? If STR is to be believed, it seems to me an excess of people on the track are the least of the owner's problems.
Yup, I'd bet the "increase rates to decrease traffic" bit is PR, an excuse to take advantage of popularity and avoid admitting "we're increasing rates just because we can...demand is high and we know you'll pay more...and we want more money."
I'd be pissed if my track day was spent worrying about blind corners and stopped traffic... That was a LOT of traffic!!!
Here are the stories on Jalopnik about the crashes that happened earlier. Rented Corvette and 'Ring Taxi crash at Nürburgring, cause $130,000 in damage What would have prevented yesterday's Nürburgring crash?