On Sundays, EV battery suppliers SK Innovation and LG Energy Solution reached a settlement in their long-running litigation, saving SK from a ban that would have barred the company from the US market for the next 10 years.
The ban also threatened the futuree of the SK factory in Commerce, Georgia, which has been under development since 2019. Two weeks ago, SK went public on the stock exchange leave the plant completely probably a move to fooling local politicians. The hint to leave the plant may have been intended as well put a fire under the federal government, which provides a insist on the companies to achieve an agreementement between self – or to encourage President Biden to veto the 10-year slotfrom
However, with news of this settlement, none of that will be necessary. And everyone is seemingly happy! LG receives a hefty feeout, SK can go ahead with its plan and not lose a decade in business in the US, and Georgia may celebrate thousands of them new jobs. Everyone wins!
Well, everyone except drag racing fans – they lose quite a lot here.
The Atlanta Dragway is located a few miles above I-85 from the SK factory site and went up for sale in January. The NHRA has announced that the 2021 Southern Nationals – the 40th annual edition of the event, scheduled for the weekend of April 30 – will be the last to be held on the strip, although the weekly schedule continues into the fall.
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Performance Racing Industry reported on March 23 that the track was “currently in the sales process”, but at the time “a buyer [had] not announced. “We’ve contacted the NHRA to confirm
Regardless, with that battery factory now finally underway, the last remaining light of hope is that the Atlanta Dragway would continue – or at least be sold to a buyer who would like to run it for a racetrack – is now definitely gone.
At first it seemed that the site could land with another rail operator. JLL Capital Markets, the real estate broker representing the NHRA, said in January that some had expressed interest in “ keeping it as a racing venue, ” the Atlanta Journal Constitution, to add:
“We’re going to market this based on what the Banks County community there wants to see, and we’re going to let the market determine how it’s used,” [JLL Capital Markets senior director Jamie] Smithson said.
It was a beautiful dream, although the list on the JLL site conveyed other ideas. The brokerage firm committed to “a major mixed-use industrial, residential and commercial use program” for the country.
The problem – as it always is – is that the residential, industrial and retail markets are consistently stronger than motorsport, even without the opportunity presented by 2,600 new jobs flooding into the region. Add that factory, however, and the NHRA could commit a murder here, which it says will “reinvest” in other drag strips. From PRI:
Speaking of the sale of the circuit, NHRA Vice President of Marketing and Communications Jeffrey Young said the sanctioning body plans to send money from the sale to the remaining facilities. “Our plan is to use that money and reinvest it in our own tracks. We have Lucas Oil Raceway in Indy, Gainesville Raceway and Auto Club Speedway in Pomona. So we are going to see some improvements, also to those tracks and facilities. “
Founded in 1975 on the grounds of an airport, the Atlanta Dragway became an NHRA-sanctioned runway in 1980. Over the next decade, it underwent extensive renovations, including resurfacing and construction of new amenities, seating, and business and press equipment, and was sold to NHRA in 1993. But today it is just another victim of the times.