Remote control racetrack would be a draw, resident says

• Seeking big track for little cars

Justin Durrant (shown with his daughter, Lauren, 7) said he hopes Cottage Grove city officials will consider allowing him to construct a track for remote control cars on city property. Durrant lives near Ideal Park and said it would make a great spot for the dirt track. (Bulletin photo by Jon Avise)

Talk about it

Last summer, while many couldn’t wait for construction to finish on the new Cottage Grove Culver’s burger restaurant, Justin Durrant was loving it just how it was: a mostly empty lot full of dirt pile after dirt pile.

No burgers? No problem. The 30-year-old Cottage Grove man finally had a decent spot for his favorite hobby: driving remote control — also known as R/C — cars.

“It was nice when they were building it last summer. We were over there jumping the cars off dirt piles,” Durrant said of himself and his daughter.

It’s not just Cottage Grove that’s without a track for R/C car enthusiasts, he says, but the whole east metro. That’s why Durrant is trying to get Cottage Grove officials interested in allowing his group, Radio Control Fanatics, to build and maintain a small dirt track on a portion of the city’s acres of open space.

He says a track would draw other fanatics from all over the Twin Cities — and could benefit Cottage Grove restaurants when those remote control racers get hungry after an afternoon at the track.

Durrant said the group would cover the costs of construction and manage all maintenance and upkeep.

“I’m thinking just like a simple dirt oval track or something with some figure eights,” he said. “Nothing that would require heavy machinery … We’re just looking for a small piece of land to do it on.”

Durrant first got interested in the battery- or gas-powered, model cars six years ago, and purchased his first for about $300.

He said the hobby “isn’t mainstream.” But there’s enough interest in the area, he said, to make a track worthwhile.

Cottage Grove parks and recreation director Zac Dockter said there’s never been a remote control car track like the one Durrant has proposed in a Cottage Grove public space. Durrant contacted Dockter and Mayor Myron Bailey about the track, and will lay out his plan for city officials at a Parks, Recreation and Natural Resources Commission meeting.

There are a number of details that would have to be worked out, Dockter said.

Residents would have to have input into where the track would be located, he said.

Durrant hopes city officials will be receptive. The track, he said, would be another recreational amenity for the city’s residents.

“It’s fun to run them wherever,” he said. “But to have a track to get together with other people would be nice.”

Tags: cottage grove, remote control, parks, hobbies