Byk's Haw analogy
 

JJ: "I've never been to Hawthorne"
Byk: "Well, you might not want to put it at the top of your list. Its......an....."urban" setting. Let's just say it makes Aqueduct look like Royal Ascot.

ROLMAO
:D

ha! so true. especially after a summer/fall meet at Arlington, the shocking transition in going to the track for live racing is so wildly apparent.

Nothing will ever compare to the lovely Portland Meadows, though. Not even Hawthorne.

Never been to Portland Meadows. Can anything compare to the beautiful "scenery" of Hawthorne with smoke stacks and 18 wheelers in the background?

ha, no nothing can compare with the backdrop. The scenery at Portland Meadows is actually breathtaking on a clear day -- you can see both Mount Hood and Mount St. Helens in the distance when you're looking at the track from ground level.

The inside of the racetrack, however, is unparalleled. Portland Meadows is one big concrete room with a few dividers in it that make up the "bar" and the "simulcast area." That, and the one man who is there literally every day that I was ever there (read: at least 100 in the two years I lived there) whose face and head are covered in bandages and walks around trying to make friends and just rambling incoherent nonsense while redboarding every 8-5 favorite at Bay Meadows.

He's just an added bonus.