Feb30

Rio to make way for housing?

Map showing the Rio redevelopments

The future of the Jacarepaguá circuit in Brazil remains uncertain - although reports of its closure could be premature.

Autosport magazine had reported that 2003 will be the final year for racing at the Rio de Janeiro track, with the combined road and oval courses set to be ploughed under later this year to make way for housing.

Correspondents in Brazil have scotched the report but warn that plans are instead being laid for developments on the site which could put an effective end to racing at the site.

Rio de Janeiro is gearing up to bid for the 2007 PanAmerican Games, but the city needs major infrastructure investment to consolidate its proposal.

Mayor César Maia wants to build some of this infrastructure inside the circuit boundry (see diagram above). However, this would destroy run off zones for the road course, rendering it virtually useless.

The CBA (Brazilian Autoracing Confederation) is negotiating with the COB (Brazilian Olympic Committee) for a peaceful end to the story.

Jacarepaguá, which was built in the 1970s, hosted the Brazilian F1 Grand Prix ten times between 1978 and 1989. The oval circuit was built in the mid-90s and hosted several CART races.

Latterly, however, the circuit has hosted only national-level F3 and touring car races and the Brazilian MotoGP.


 Discuss this news story in the e-Tracks forums.

Back to top Back to top pointer

e-Tracks has been designed to the latest accessibility standards which may mean that some browsers - such as early versions of Netscape or Internet Explorer - will not display these pages exactly as they were designed. However, all of the content will still be fully visible and accessible throughout the site.

e-Tracks recommends upgrading to a standards-compliant browser such us Opera or Mozilla Firefox for anyone in this position. You won't regret it!