Rim of the World news

[MOliscous]

My son has been a volunteer at the Rim of the World event. He recieved the following email today:


As a volunteer, you have helped make Rim of the World one of the best
organized and biggest events in U.S. rally history. The Rim of the World
organizing committee wanted you to be among the first to know the challenges
that we have been facing and the plans for our 2007 event. Your time,
talents, and efforts have made the event what it is. National Steward Tom
Burgess said in his review of the 2006 Rim: "This year's Rim was the best
organized rally I have seen since I was the steward at Corona Rally Mexico
some five years ago." For all your help and achievements, we thank you.

We now know that 2006 was the final Rim of the World Rally in the Angeles
National Forest, after 25 events (1976-77, 1984-2006). Two decisions from
the Forest Service have caused this change.

First, the current Forest Supervisor, who took on her job after our
five-year permit was approved, is not comfortable with motorized "speed"
events of any type in the Angeles National Forest, from OHVs, boats or cars
to commercials depicting speed activities filmed in the Angeles. Her
decision is based partly on policy recommendations in Forest Service
directives and partly on liability concerns. In addition, she simply does
not feel that rallying is an appropriate activity for the Angeles National
Forest. As a result, she has rejected our application for a renewal of our
five-year permit. We were told that it had nothing to do with our
performance in complying with the permit.

Second, and equally problematic, is the fact that the stage roads used by
the three rallies on the permit will no longer be graded or smoothed, but
allowed to stay very rough to discourage speeds by motorized vehicles. These
roads have always been designated as Level 2 maintenance but have
traditionally been graded to the higher Level 3 specification that requires
smoothing with a road grader.

There are two reasons for their enforcing the maintenance designations. The
first reason is financial; with less manpower and funding they are not
willing to spend extra money "over-maintaining" the roads. The second reason
is safety, to prevent accidents between OHV vehicles (think of 12 year old
kids on ATV's) and passenger vehicles (think pickup trucks) going at high
speeds on the roads. Our willingness to grade the roads is moot; we would no
longer be allowed to do so. If they are not graded, they will be extremely
rough, real car-breakers, and unacceptable for stage roads.

Let us assure you that Rim is not going away! With only four months we
don't have the time to find and obtain permission for roads to replace the
Forest. Instead we'll be expanding the Super Special Stage at the
fairgrounds to create an all-new stadium style rally event. With Subaru of
America Southwest Region's continued support, we'll be able to continue to
develop our motorsports festival approach while adding new events for Subaru
owners, car enthusiasts and rally fans alike.

These changes will greatly affect the number and variety of volunteer
positions. Some positions will no longer be necessary, others will be
expanded, and some new positions will be created. We sincerely hope you will
consider continuing to support the event as we go through these changes.

We look forward to our future and we wish you a wonderful Holiday Season.

Ray and Donna Hocker
Mike and Paula Gibeault

[GruppoB]

Sh!tty news, at least I got to to do the last "real" Rim.

[sagsert]

Ditto,

At least I have a couple of first place trophies and a third place trophy from Rim plus a whole bunch of great memories.

No matter what, myself and the rest of STC Rally Group will continue supporting NASA, Rim, Gorman and Laughlin.

I have to add one thing though, Angeles Forrest is very prone to burning, lots of wild fires. Rallying on those roads was keeping the roads passable for the emergency crews. I'd hate to think what would happen in case of an emergency when the firefighters can not get through. We had this problem back en Europe many years ago and it was very hard keeping our tongues and not saying "We told you so". Needless to say after 2 years of no rallies on a certain forrest, we were not only allowed to organise events there, we were encouraged to do so aswell, unfortunately it was too late for thousands of trees and a bunch of cabins and vacation homes.

[GruppoB]

Is Gorman being bottled up too? I was planning on driving my first event there in 2007. Shame if it is.

[Jonesi]

Is Gorman being bottled up too? I was planning on driving my first event there in 2007. Shame if it is.

At this point I think the plan is to run it just in Hungry Valley Offroad Park. However I would guess there are still several people looking to find more land for both Rim & Gorman.

[GruppoB]

Well thats the first good news Ive heard even if its just that.