The operators of the lone sanctioned drag strip in the state of Wyoming, the Douglas Motorsports Park, announced this week that, following recent moves by the local city council, they would be closing the track’s gates forever.

The track, located in the town of Douglas, is operated on the former Douglas Municipal Airport, and was converted to a drag strip in the mid-1980s after the nearby Converse County Airport was constructed. According to operators Chris and Nicole Moore in their statement issued to the local racers, the land belongs to the city, and with construction set to begin on the east end of the property, the city council believes that it’s no longer feasible to continue with drag racing activities on the strip and decided not to extend the track’s lease agreement into 2016.

With that, the only active dragstrip in the state (an NHRA-sanctioned one at that), which has served the racers of Wyoming for three decades and given weekend refuge to at least two generations of racers, will be no more.

That the track remained in operation for this long is of particular fortune to the racers, given the track’s proximity to the city of Douglas — it’s starting line is located less than 1,000-feet from a residential neighborhood and both residential and commercial property border it within a 1/4-mile to the north. As recently as the early 2000s, the NHRA contested a Federal Mogul Drag Racing Series event, complete with Top Alcohol Dragsters and Funny Cars, at Douglas.

Below is the full statement, issued by the Moore’s, regarding the closure of this Wymoming mainstay:

After 30+ years Douglas Motorsports Park has had decades of great drag racing, good friends and family fun! We have been truly honored to run this track for a year and unfortunately have to announce that the track is officially closed. After talking to city council they will begin construction at the east end of the track in the spring and have informed us that they believe racing and construction can not safely co-exist. They are going to sell and develop the entire property in which the track is set. We would like to thank everyone for all the support, thank you to all the racers, thank you to everyone that has spent one moment helping out to make this track last as long as it has. We have built amazing friendships with the racing family we have come to love and hope everyone continues to race and be successful. Until we meet again on rubber covered starting lines, a true Christmas tree, and in the fog of an amazing burn out, God bless the road, it’s racers and keep all of us safe a 1/4 mile at a time!