What's Your Dream Street Race Location?

Organized racing was born on public roads during the 19th century, and the sport's most prestigious events are still held on temporary circuits with varying degrees of popularity. The Monaco Grand Prix highlights the glamour of Formula One while being a typically boring affair to watch. On the other hand, the 24 Hours of Le Mans spectacularly pushes the endurance of man and machine to its limit on stretches of rural two-lane highway in France. Meanwhile, NASCAR is running a race at a naval base in San Diego this weekend.

Today, we want to know what your dream street race location is. While the street circuits are the venue du jour for modern F1, there are still plenty of cities where the world championship has visited. Imola has frequently hosted F1's second Italian round, but the country's capital attempted to host a race of its own in the early 2010s. According to the Guardian, Rome's then-mayor Gianni Alemanno proposed hosting an F1 race in the city's EUR business district. The bid was shot down because F1 believed its future was in more profitable markets outside of Europe. However, Formula E would eventually race there.

I might be biased as a native New Yorker, but the Big Apple is my dream street location. Formula One nearly visited America's largest cities in the early 1980s. Bernie Ecclestone, the championship's commercial czar, wanted a street circuit around the Twin Towers in Lower Manhattan. However, the municipal government couldn't imagine essentially shutting down the Financial District for the track's construction. For perspective, it's estimated that around 50,000 people worked at the World Trade Center.

The city offered an arguably even better alternative, Flushing Meadows Park. The massive park in Queens hosted the World's Fair in 1939 and 1964 before sprouting an unofficial sports district to its north. Shea Stadium was built there in 1964 for the New York Mets baseball team. This was later followed by the United States Tennis Association's construction of the National Tennis Center in 1978, which served as the home of the US Open. Who wouldn't want to compete in the shadow of the Unisphere?

The temporary F1 circuit would have been constructed around Meadow Lake, similar to today's Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne. It doesn't take much imagination to see how thrilling it would be to see Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost hurtle down long, sweeping stretches in New York. The location was also fantastic for logistics. The park is along a highway between two international airports, LaGuardia and JFK, with direct connections to the subway and the Long Island Rail Road. However, Ecclestone was fixated on Lower Manhattan. It was the Twin Towers or no race at all.

To cut a long story short, please leave your dream street race locations in the comments section below.