Ellendale race track delayed

Published 12:00 am Wednesday, January 15, 2003

A proposed race track in Ellendale has been put on hold after the project was unable to gain investors.

&uot;We don’t have all our investors in line,&uot; Curt Oeltjenbruns, the developer for the project, said. &uot;There are still 40 percent of the shares left. Basically the investment climate right now is a bit shaky.&uot;

The $2.5 million plan consists of a dirt-track racing facility outside of Ellendale. Oeltjenbruns plans to include air-conditioned suites, box seating, a children’s playground and seating for almost 5,000 spectators.

Email newsletter signup

The attempt to gain investors had begun in the fall of last year, but Oeltjenbruns says that with the stock market’s woes, people are less willing to invest.

With investments, the track and facilities could have been built this summer and racing would have begun in 2004. Without proper funding it could take longer.

&uot;Hopefully, if we can get our investor base here by mid summer, potentially (construction) can happen in spring 2004 and start racing in 2005,&uot; Oeltjenbruns said.

He describes the project as potentially giving Ellendale a &uot;shot in the arm.&uot;

&uot;We were well on our way toward raising the money we needed to make this thing a reality, but a couple of our larger investors seemed to get cold feet,&uot; Oeltjenbruns said in a press release. &uot;We’ll put it on the back burner for a while and come back to the table when economic conditions improve.&uot;