About a year ago I went to my first ‘unsanctioned car rally’ in a mall parking lot, after business hours. The GPS led to to the middle of nowhere. Lost, I pulled into an ESSO station to grab a can of NOS Energy and re-read the map. As I opened my door, I heard ‘Gasolina‘ by Daddy Yankee blasting from a car stereo nearby. It was like hearing the song of my people.
Since then, I’ve been to dozens of car meets. Some were epic like the ‘Under Da Bridge’ gathering. I’ve learned that its all about location, location, location.
It really is important to pick a cool location. There’s nothing ‘epic’ about a Tim Horton’s parking lot. It’s not like Arnold’s drive-in where Richie and The Fonz would hang out.
Recently I stumbled across an IG post about un upcoming car meet called Diner Delights with some old school American muscle cars and a neon illuminated ’50s style diner. The details explained that the meet is in the parking lot of a St. Louis Bar & Grill. It looks like a modern strip-mall, not a classic eatery at all.
The worst part was revealed in the comments section, where one person pointed out how small the parking lot in front of the restaurant is. Phantom Meets then explained that there’s a huge parking lot in the back behind the building shared with ‘Wind‘ Japanese restaurant and ‘Bliss‘ Chinese cuisine
A car meet behind a bunch of restaurants. Next to the dumpsters with the rats and the stench.
It’s obvious that the point of hiding behind the buildings is that nobody asked permission, the city didn’t OK it, and as soon as the police see the meet, they’ll kick everyone out. But is a meet really worth having in such an place?
Has the local car scene really come to this?
Sad state of meet and greets when you have to deal with stinking dumpstas and greasy rats.
The only positive thing I can say is those are AI rats in the picture, because I’m not going near this meet. Did it once before at the ChickQueen restaurant. I thought we’d be in the parking lot, feasting on free chicken strips. The meet was next to the garbage.
So stupid. Such a sad state of the scene. And all of this is because some of these hooligans cannot control themselves, and get everyone kicked out of good spots because of revving / burnouts.
You would think the hooligans would figure it out, but I suppose that is why they are hooligans.
This weekend, there was a big car meet at a race track about 100 km from Toronto. All the hooligan behavior (burnouts, donuts, 2-step, loudest stereo, loudest exhaust pops) were encouraged. In fact, they competed and got trophies!
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Why hide by the dumpsters just to do a burnout without getting caught. Just find the right place to do it!