Plans for Carson’s Porsche Experience Center Approved

Image: parkerb for dailybreeze.com

The Carson City Council approved a Porsche Experience Center this week and work will start on the 53-acre project by the end of 2012.

According the Daily Breeze, the construction will conclude in fall 2013 and the Porsche Experience Center will feature a “museum displaying historical vehicles, a business center, driving simulators, a high-end parts and service area, a restaurant and a ‘human performance center’ designed to train people like race car drivers.” Porsche will also be vacating its Santa Ana North American offices to the new Carson site.

This will be the second Porsche Experience Center in the U.S. and fifth worldwide and it will be located adjacent to the Boulevards at South Bay Project, a massive retail, entertainment and office space development.

The approval comes just shortly after a review was done on environmental impacts, including significant air quality problems during construction. City Council members held a public hearing on necessary land-use changes so the proposed driving courses could replace the existing golf course, land fill and recently vacated Don Dominguez Apartment complex. Much of the site will be located on top of a closed landfill, so massive underground soil remediation will need to be done prior to the above-ground construction.

The Daily Breeze also notes that the Porsche Experience Center will additionally include “six planned courses [that] include two tracks replicating challenging country roads – one about 2,500 feet long and one twice as long,” among other tracks.

Overall, city officials were enthusiastic about the project because of the tourist, jobs and revenue potential for the area. A city staff wrote in the environmental report, “The city finds that the benefits of the project outweigh its unavoidable adverse environmental effects, and furthermore, finds that such adverse environmental effects are acceptable.” 

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