Pennington Field for 2011 & Soundl level issue

Seasons greetings, Coneheads!

As we get closer to the 2011 season, there’s a very serious issue that I want to make you aware of. For over 22 years, autocross groups have been using Pennington Field. While the site is limited in the configuration of courses, it’s always been a great spot for our sport due to proximity in the metroplex area & the site’s surface.

As the 2011 calendar was being setup & it came time to reserve event sites, bad news came. We (SCCA, ER, NTAXS, BMW, Porsche Club) were all told that HEB ISD would not be taking reservations for Pennington Field for 2011 due to several issues with past motorsports being held at the location. This took all of us by surprise as site management has never communicated any issues to any of the clubs having events at the site in the past.

SCCA, ER & NTAXS representatives immediately all made presentations to the HEB school board at their last meeting. While the presentations were well received by the school board, no decision was made as to the future use of Pennington Field. However, clubs have been granted initial dates for January & February but no further into 2011. We have been told that a decision might be made in March of 2011.

Along the path of discussions with HEB ISD, the issue of sound level complaints from the sites local neighbors has come up recently. In response to this new issue, SCCA, ER, NTAXS & BMW have all agreed to use the current sound level policy used at National SCCA Solo events when using Pennington Field. The policy uses the standard of 100dB at 50 feet. While this is the current “sound rule” for National SCCA events, most SCCA regions using lots in close proximity to neighborhoods like Pennington Field are using 93dB at 50 feet. This very well might be the next step if the 100dB level is not satisfactory for HEB!

None of the clubs want to take this step & believe me, it’s a real headache for all of the club administrators. But this step must be taken! Does this assure that we will all be able to continue using Pennington Field for 2011?? No, unfortunately we are all still at the mercy of the HEB school board on that issue!

So, consider this your “official notification” that all cars attending Pennington Field autocrosses will have to meet the 100dB @ 50 feet requirement! And yes, that means while your car is under full throttle!

Policies of how the new sound rules are enforced & what the ramifications are will be determined by each club. So make sure you are clear on this issue when you attend that club’s event at Pennington Field! Additional rules in regard to noise in the Paddock area lot might be coming too.

Texas Region SCCA will be working out its own policy at the January Solo BOD meeting & adding it to the 2011 Region Supplementals.

At present, the idea of doing a “Test-N-Tune” has been suggested to help folks determine if their cars are compliant with the sound policy. Date/location specifics have not been determined, so please stay tuned for more information.

If any news concerning this issue changes, we’ll make sure to pass it along to you.

Brad

It is good to hear that several clubs banded together to try to keep the site.

And I hope all clubs can adopt the same sound policy and the same approach to measuring, otherwise any SCCA only effort is wasted.

What I mean by the same approach is some stuff I saw at Lincoln at the Solo Nationals. I was hanging out with some FL buddies in STX (Merediths) and they blew too loud. The sound guy said they had to do something, so they whipped out a turn down piece of pipe and made the direction of the outlet be opposite the measurement side. Sound guy returned and said they were OK, no further action needed.

That did nothing to reduce the sound level, it just tricked the measurement device.

I hope all clubs can make enforcement some positive, sound reduction effort, rather than just turn the same noise a different direction.

After Nationals, I put a Burns muffler (look at the latest Grassroots magazine, low sound without loss of power) and new cat on my car, because I knew stricter requirements were coming at national SCCA events. Not cheap, but worth it to me to help keep sites and to avoid not being allowed all my runs.

I hope everyone shares my thought on this.

I'll wager the excessive noise level in the paddock starting before 8am right next to the apartments contributes as much as noise levels from the course. Air horns, music, PA announcements and loud warm-ups from already loud karts and cars before the event starts has to be controlled, too.

Would moving our paddock/grid to the lot south of the course (away from the apartments) and leaving the west lot to the stadium crowd help?

There are houses on the south side of that other lot, behind the pool.

Don't know if there are fewer potential people to complain in the houses as opposed to the apartments.

I previously told Gerry that working ER courses, the loudest vehicles in the heat I worked corner were the karts. So loud you had to wait for them to finish to make a radio call.

True, there are houses past the pool - but further away. And the south lot is much larger and not so boxed in to amplify the sound??

I agree that the south lot is likely a better area for sound control, but might require us to close the entrance by the stoplight altogether to keep cross-traffic from interfering with grid traffic. Not a huge problem, but something to consider.

I think the biggest issue is simply going to be muffling or eliminating ALL loud vehicles. I think the 93db limit should be the starting point, as 100db is still pretty loud for residential areas on a Sunday morning. I realize that's a challenge for some cars, but access to Pennington really outweighs the effect on the small number of cars that are challenged to drop their volume.

At the last NTAXS event, there were only two cars that stood out as being loud, and both were "street" cars with bolt-on/bolt-off exhaust that could have been changed-out pretty easily. I realize that mod cars have a harder time making quick changes to the exhaust, but the number of cars affected by losing Pennington compared to the number of cars impacted by a 93db limit kinda makes this a simple choice, IMHO.

Oh, and Ken O should be banned no matter what exhaust he is running...

Given the proximity of the homes & apartments, I would say we need to look towards the 93dB limit. People moan & groan about this but in reality they might actually gain some horse power by putting a better muffler on. Everyone should read the latest Grassroots Motorsports magazine. Andy Hollis just did an article about this.

But the paddock situation is certainly a concern too. Just for example; when a CP or Mod car paddocks back by the apartments arriving at 7:30am & starts-up blipping the throttle multiple times. That action doesn't help!

The simple fact is that we are going to have to quiet things down or we won't be able to run at Penn. Field!

There has been multiple reasons given as to why auto-x clubs were denied setting dates at the site for 2011. The sound complaints are just the latest issue given by the HEB school superintendent.

Given the current situation & the fact that HEB administrators will not discuss letting us book dates past February, I've had to schedule/book dates at other venues for the 2011 Texas Region SCCA auto-x series. We couldn't wait until next year to set our calendar!

I would like to encourage everyone with a loud car (you know who you are) to quite them down at all sites not just Penn. If people will quite them down we can avoid a strict sound limit that can be a real pain for everyone. I very much agree that we have a few cars that are way to loud and you don't need a meter to tell. They need to be sent home until they can run a reasonable sound level. I would agree about the other sounds like air horns at 7:30 a.m, that doesn't help keep sites.

Or train horns (you know who you are)

It looks like you should probably count on 93dB.

Should we give the guys on the S2000 forum a heads up?

edit

I posted Brads letter on the S2000 board.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Robert

Should we give the guys on the S2000 forum a heads up?

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I would think all the possible entrants for an event need to know that a sound restriction is most likely to be in place for Pennington Field.

There's a School Board meeting tonight. Jerrett & Andy Cost might know more tomorrow. I'm unable to attend.

We're not the first area to have to deal with this nightmare.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by jrj512

It looks like you should probably count on 93dB.

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It is still being discussed. It might stay at 100 dB @ 50'.

If we voluntarily enforce a limit lower than 100db, we are less-likely to run-up against complaints, and this makes us seem proactive, like the car companies who claim they are already at 2014 CAFE standards, etc...

Except that 93db is significantly quieter than 100db. Considering the acoustics of the Pennington site with buildings/walls on several sides amplifying the sound, I'll bet quite a few bone stock cars would have trouble meeting the 93db requirement.

Who wants to run an electric car spec series next year? ;)

ok...94?

So, what was the outcome of the board meeting last night?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by TxCoyote

So, what was the outcome of the board meeting last night?

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Nothing, really. Nomadtrash just got up and explained possible sound regulations that we could impose on ourselves. We were not expecting any kind of decision from them.

When will we know. I need to start packing fiberglass into my mufflers......