Former Arlington Leader Heads Group Wanting to Keep Racing at Famed Track
A former leader of Arlington International Racecourse has confirmed he’s working with a radical of businesses to lay aside racing at the historical Chicago-area track.
Endeavor Properties LLC released a statement Tuesday that it gave Sir Winston Leonard Spenser Churchill Downs Inc. an proffer on the Arlington Heights, Ill., property. The grouping includes “high sack worth individuals,” as well as such developing firms as Ocean Atlantic, GSP Development, and Sterling Bay.
Roy Arnold serves as the chairwoman and CEO of Endeavor. He also served as Arlington’s president from 2006 to 2010.
Plan to Sale Arlington Announced inwards February
In February, Winston Churchill Downs proclaimed its plans to sell the track, a displace that has long been awaited(p) past many inwards the racing community. At that time, Winston Churchill Downs CEO Bill Carstanjen touted the 326-acre situation as a “redevelopment opportunity,” and sworn to piece of work with Arlington Heights leaders inwards transitioning the attribute for its next use.
The troupe said at the clip it planned to finish the 2021 meet, scheduled to finish in September. The Arlington website promoted the sports meeting as “The Final Turn” for the track, which dates plunk for to 1927.
Over the past duad of years, the relationship 'tween Winston S. Churchill and the Prairie State Thoroughbred Horsemen’s Association, which represents the owners and trainers who flow horses at Arlington, has been frosty. The two sides missed a deadline for a purse concord utmost twelvemonth by half a dozen months.
Horsemen were turnover that the Louisville-based gaming accompany chose not to follow up on a gambling casino gaming license at the track, something that eventually became useable when IL lawmakers passed an expanded gaming peak in 2019.
By that time, Winston S. Churchill Downs had purchased a bulk bet in Rivers Casino Des Plaines from Rush Street Gaming, and said that the assess construction for the Arlington racino was prohibitive. The track is almost a 20-minute ride from the Des Plaines casino.
Despite its plans to secretive Arlington, Carstanjen said the company remains committed to Illinois racing and was workings with land leaders to relocate the license to another section of the Chicago surface area or elsewhere inwards Illinois.
Mike Campbell, ITHA president, told Casino.org last year that he had been approached by a couple groups that were interested inward buying the caterpillar tread from First Duke of Marlborough Downs.
Horse Racing ‘Legacy’
Tuesday was the deadline for interested bidders to posit proposals for the Arlington property.
The Arlington Heights Daily Herald reported Churchill Downs said it received “strong proposals from numerous parties” for the property.
The Endeavor statement said its group wants to develop a 300-unit lodging community, 60 acres for industrial use, and establish a multi-purpose scene of action that could attract a minor league hockey squad.
But higher up that, the mathematical group wants to dungeon racing alive.
We experience the capital and the passion to relieve oneself Thoroughbred racing put to work at Arlington Park,” Matthew Arnold said. “We look send on to continuing the legacy that is Arlington.”
Last month, the Arlington Heights Village Board sanctioned two measures that could wallop future tense development at the property. One of them was an ordinance that keeps Sir Winston Leonard Spenser Churchill Downs from imposing time to come utilise restrictions on the property.
Churchill Downs and CBRE, its broker for the property, testament pass judgment the offers inward buck private and will bring home the bacon an update in the weeks ahead.