Adelaide councillor campaigns for Parklands Circuit to be torn up

Any possibility of motorsport returning to Adelaide may be reduced to nought as the city's most iconic circuit is on the brink of being demolished.

Backed by Adelaide City Councillor Greg Mackie, a group of local residents are campaigning for the permanent circuit section of the track to be removed, claiming "it has become an 'urban heat island' during hot weather," as reported by The Adelaide Advertiser.

“I am asking that council administration prepares a report outlining the steps to achieve a new landscape solution that will eventually provide natural shade amenity for park users now that horse and car racing has concluded,” Cr Mackie told The Advertiser.

“A new landscape plan need not assume removal of all hard surfaces, but I would hope that a reduction could eventually be achieved.”

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A hybrid circuit, the track was first built for the 1985 Australian Grand Prix – the first official Formula 1 race to be held in Australia – made up of Adelaide's city streets and a dedicated race track to start and finish the lap.

It hosted the annual season-closing Grand Prix from 1985 through to 1995 – the largest ever crowd for a Formula 1 race at the time – before the AGP moved to Melbourne the year after, triggering a three-year period of no racing at the venue.

In 1999, the Supercars Championship made its first visit to the Adelaide circuit on a slightly shorter version of the track, running two races over two days which became the Adelaide 500, one of the series' marquee events.

Other motorsport events have made use of the track facilities in the past, such as the Adelaide Motorsport Festival from 2014 to 2018 as well as the Race of a Thousand Years, an American Le Mans Series round which was held on New Years Eve, 2000.

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Despite being one of the biggest events on the Supercars calendar, the South Australian Government announced last year it would not be renewing the contact for the Adelaide 500 from 2021 onwards, leaving the race off the schedule for the first time since its inception.

With the current length of permanent circuit taking up roughly 1200 metres, the removal of it would add a small amount of land back to the 760 hectare parkland which surrounds it, although it would destroy a tangible piece of Adelaide's motorsport history from the city.