Spent most of Friday and Saturday attending the festivities at the inaugural Baltimore Grand Prix. I ran in the 5k race Friday night, which comprised 1 1/2 laps of the race course (I finished with a personal record in the 5k, so I must have been feeling the speed!) and took in various practices, qualifying sessions, and races Friday and Saturday. Also took in the atmosphere of the event; did my prerequisite eating and drinking, shopping, people watching, andthinking about the entire event.
The Grand Prix was much-maligned over the past several months, and not without good reason. Traffic downtown has been crap for most of the last several months due to track preparations. There's been a lot of talk in Baltimore City if the estimated $7 million the city spent on the race could have been spent better doing other things. Over the weekend there were complaints about the race venue being difficult to get to.
After watching the races downtown Friday and Saturday and on TV today, I think I can safely say: this was worth it. It ought to pay Baltimore handsome dividends.
I totally grant that traffic up to the event was a pain. I am hopeful that for future years, such extensive preparations of the streets comprising the tracks won't be necessary. Going to doubt it, but a guy can hope, right?
About the race venue being difficult to get to: not if you know where to go. I parked where I do for Ravens games (about 4-5 blocks away from the track) and had no problem coming or going. I think a lot of spectators were pointed downtown and that was a mistake.
As to the money invested in the race. I'm going to guess that 150,000 people made it there over the weekend. I'm thinking that if Baltimore City didn't make its $7M investment back in taxes, certainly, the city's economy probably got a bump of at least $15M (assuming each person there spent $100 on parking, food, drink, and other goodies, which, based on my observations, was a good estimate). Not to mention hotel revenues for out of towners. And Baltimore looked great on TV over the weekend; announcers and drivers were effusive of their praise of the event. That's the sort of puiblicity that can't be bought.
Economic investment for sports has always been a touchy issue. I can recall, 20-plus years ago, whether or not the public funds being spent on a baseball stadium and football stadium in Baltimore (especially as Baltimore had no NFL team!) couldn't be better spent elsewhere. No one would argue now that the investment wasn't sound. I think that in the next few years, people will be saying the same thing about the money spent on the Grand Prix.
