Neighbors rally against track

Dust-covered orange Subarus, some valued at $100,000, rip around the 315-acre rally track at the old Weyerhaeuser mill site outside Snoqualmie, swerving through gravel, dirt and mud.

Soon to be annexed to the city, the Old Mill Adventure Park, which is home to the DirtFish Rally School, is a playground for rally-racing enthusiasts.

Snoqualmie's mayor thinks the track will bring prosperity to the city, but neighbors say it erodes the peaceful quality of Snoqualmie, population 10,670.

The owners of the track say the rally school is quiet and doesn't affect wildlife in the area, two complaints by critics. DirtFish officials also say they want to blend in with and contribute to the community.

A year ago, Steve Rimmer, chief executive of Guggenheim Aviation Partners, purchased the mill site for $3.2 million and turned it over to his business partner, Greg Lund, who developed DirtFish, which is used to teach rally racing, a type of fast, all-terrain driving.

DirtFish has been operating since last fall but received little attention until recently when organizers came to Snoqualmie Mayor Matthew Larson seeking his support for a King County temporary-use permit for a nationally televised rallycross. Seeing it as an opportunity for economic growth, Larson endorsed it.

The mayor points out that Snoqualmie is sandwiched between North Bend and Issaquah, one with an outlet mall, the other with big-box stores, while Snoqualmie can barely support one grocery store. DirtFish seemed like a way to boost tourism — the future of the city, he said.

On April 15 and 16, the Global RallyCross, broadcast on ESPN and attended by more than 1,000 people, brought an international set of drivers and their $500,000 cars to Snoqualmie.

"It had an apocalyptic, 'Mad Max' feel to it," said Ross Bentley, DirtFish president. "There was no question it was loud noisy ... ," Larson said.

He also acknowledges the event attracted a "different demographic" than usually comes to the city. But not hosting the event would have killed any hope of bringing the business it generated back to Snoqualmie. Had the go-ahead for the event not been granted, it would have gone to Portland for the next four years.

"I knew the risk was it would alarm some people," Larson said. But it would enhance tourism and the town's economy. Gasoline sales jumped and business at a local sandwich shop increased because of the event, he said.

Even before the April event, neighbors say they were concerned about DirtFish's impact on the elk herd and birds that frequent the site. They also worried about traffic to and from the park and the possibility of rally school's clients leaving "with their racing heads on" and hitting kids on country roads.

But it took the April rally to bring the neighbors together in angry protest.

Some residents, especially those east of the site on Indian Hill, have lived in the area for decades and still recoil from the sound of revving engines and the roars from tailpipes that infiltrated the usually quiet community in the shadow of Mount Si.

For Wes Johnson, it was so loud, "The noise got me out of the house."

"It's sharp. It's staccato. It's not something you want to listen to when you're out gardening," said David Bach.

"I'm hearing what I think are people racing down the highway and I want to call 911," said Rick Grant, who lives in downtown Snoqualmie, several miles away. "This was my introduction to DirtFish."

Despite the image of exhaust-spewing cars — mostly Imprezas — doing tricks seen in James Bond movies, the day-to-day rally school is quiet, DirtFish owners say.

There have been no changes to the actual mill site, which is polluted from years of industrial use, and the wildlife that come to the area is unaffected.

But neighbors, who became accustomed to little activity at the site for years, fear more noisy high-profile motorsports events and point to websites where such things are advertised.

For example, the Stumpjumper Motorcycle Club's website proclaims DirtFish has given them "an open invitation to hold club events there, provided the annexation goes through."

But Bentley posted a comment to the site saying no such motorcycle events are planned. "And we have not offered an open invitation to any club or group to hold events. We're not a racetrack We don't even like the term racetrack, as it's not what we have or plan to have. We are committed to being good community neighbors, and we respect the concerns of the people who live in the area."

But neighbors also point to a website by Subaru of America, proclaiming a July 9 event at the site featuring "hundreds of Subarus: street, race, show, rally, muddin', as long as it's Subie!"

Bentley said the promoter announced the event without DirtFish's authorization and that the event won't happen.

As the DirtFish organizers see it, the biggest issue is neighbors' lack of information. The school makes the average driver a better and more careful driver, they said.

For about 100 years, the track site was used as a lumber mill and some of the buildings — including the one with the brick smokestack — are listed under King County's historic-preservation program.

The area was zoned commercial and using it as a driving school was in keeping with the existing zoning, said John Starbard, director of the county's Department of Development and Environmental Services.

But in March, the county notified the owner and the city that DirtFish's use of the site was more of a "redevelopment" into an entirely new kind of business than something that should be covered under the existing zoning, which allowed for a driving school.

The city and the owners disagreed and the remedy they chose was to annex 600 acres — including the Old Mill Adventure Park — into the city as quickly as possible.

The pre-annexation agreement calls for DirtFish to limit large events to no more than two annually, to not use the site as a racetrack or to promote racing.

Yet, revving engines and speed is the image DirtFish markets. In March, BFGoodrich tires filmed Olympic-medal-winning snowboarder, Shaun White, learning advanced skills in his "thrill ride" at the park.

The adventure park may be the site for filming an upcoming Dirt3 video game, Bentley said.

Even the back of Lund's and Bentley's business cards portrays the kind of image that draws young drivers. It reads, in part: "Enticed by the roar of rally cars tearing up the ground ... "

Recently, at a gazebo on a hill at the site, a group of young men waited for their turn driving.

Learning to drive a rally car was "on the list of things I wanted to do before I turned 30," said Paul Hahto, 25, a mechanical engineer from Vancouver, B.C. "It's like controlled chaos on the road."

Says Bentley: "We're actually in the business of helping people feel alive."

Nancy Bartley: 206-464-8522 or nbartley@seattletimes.com