On December 17, TMS held the grand opening of “CITY CIRCUIT TOKYO BAY,” an urban mobility entertainment facility.
The facility is a circuit where drivers can enjoy driving EV karts. It is operated by TMS, which operates a top-class racing team in Japan, and was pre-opened on October 28, but has now officially opened.
According to Goro Tamura, General Producer of CITY CIRCUIT, General Manager of the Corporate Strategy Office, after the grand opening, the company has listened to users’ feedback and updated several issues that were raised during the pre-opening.
At the pre-opening, admission slots were set in two-hour increments, and visitors stood in line and waited for the next run. At the grand opening, however, the outdoor course has seven-minute and the indoor course has five-minute slots, which can be reserved online to avoid long wait times before the next run.
The fee structure for the outdoor course is 3,500 yen per ride on weekdays and 4,000 yen on weekends (with an additional 500 yen after 18:00), and 2,000 yen for the indoor course (3,000 yen with projection mapping after 18:00).
A new lap time display has been installed on the outdoor course, and a starting grid has been painted on the road surface. According to Takaya Inoue, General Director of Mobility Business Division and General Director of CITY CIRCUIT, the company plans to start offering race and charter plans from January 2024.
According to him, the current issue is the lack of food and beverage services other than the weekend kitchen car service, and they are working to coordinate with nearby commercial facilities such as DiverCity Tokyo and Aqua City Odaiba to offer discount coupons for mutual customer traffic. Nevertheless, in terms of facilities, the comfort level has improved with the installation of new beverage vending machines and water servers, which were not available at the time of the pre-opening, and the company intends to constantly work on service improvements.
During the pre-opening period, a total of 5,000 people visited the event, 30-40% of whom were experienced kart racers, half of the remaining 60-70% were first-time visitors, and the rest were inbound (foreign tourists). The company has not done any PR for inbound visitors, but they will gradually prepare a system to accept them.
The company aims to open 100 stores in Japan and overseas by 2030. Citing operations in the “Hiroshima Mobility World” scheduled to open in 2027 as a specific example, Tamura said, “We have received inquiries from various places since the pre-opening,” adding that the company is considering opening stores in large and small formats. He added, “We have received inquiries from a variety of places since the pre-opening,” and is considering opening stores of various sizes.
© Source travel watch
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