Fremont Dragstrip

Coordinates: 37°30′14″N 121°58′21″W / 37.503768°N 121.972511°W / 37.503768; -121.972511

The Fremont Dragstrip was a racing venue for dragster automobiles that was located in Fremont, California, operating from 1959 until the end of 1988. In its final years, it was renamed Baylands Raceway Park. The site lies in the quadrant just south of the intersection of Interstate 880 and Auto Mall Parkway.

History

The track was constructed on land leased from the Southern Pacific Railroad, which had acquired the land from the U.S. Navy after World War II. The Army had constructed a small airfield on the site just prior to the war, which was subsequently taken over by the Navy during the war (Naval Outlying Landing Field Heath). In 1961, after the Fremont Dragstrip was already in operation, another smaller airfield for gliders, Skyways Airport, was constructed on the southern part of the site directly adjacent to the dragstrip, becoming one of the busiest gliderports in the world prior to its closure.[1][2]

By the end of the 1960s and early 1970s, the Fremont Dragstrip was in its heyday. It's booming radio ads were familiar and ubiquitous on all the pop radio stations in the San Francisco Bay Area.

In 1996 the Catellus Development Corporation converted the land to the Pacific Commons complex development.

References

  1. ↑ Abandoned & Little-Known Airfields
  2. ↑ Air Progress: 23. February 1989. Missing or empty |title= (help)


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