at the same time and place as regular Magic Kingdom theme park guests, overflow parking was required. In 1996–1997, Disney officials reacted by parking all race spectators in the Magic Kingdom parking lot, and diverting all Magic Kingdom guests to the Epcot parking lot. Race spectators would walk to the nearby Speedway, while all guests to the Magic Kingdom were required to take the monorail or a bus from Epcot to the Transportation and Ticket Center. There, they would transfer to a monorail on the Magic Kingdom loop, a somewhat circuitous trip which resulted in numerous guest complaints. In 1997, the IRL race was shortened by a sudden rainstorm, causing fans to hurry to their cars and resulting in severe traffic gridlock on World Drive and surrounding roads which lasted for several hours. Starting in 1998, race spectators were diverted to park at Epcot, and were taken by shuttle bus to the Speedway while guests to the Magic Kingdom were directed to park, as usual, in the Magic Kingdom parking lot. While this eased many theme park guest complaints, it was now inconvenient for race spectators as it necessitated them to arrive earlier to account for the additional travel time. It additionally resulted in a significant cost increase in race operations, as the Disney Transport bus fleet was not big enough to accommodate the race shuttle operation. As a result, outside bus companies had to be hired to run the race shuttle service. End of professional racing In its first few years of operation, the track was used frequently as a year-round test facility, due to the warm winter weather in Orlando. However, the track suffered three major accidents. During a week of preseason testing, on January 11, 1997, IRL driver Eliseo Salazar crashed in turn one. He suffered a fracture of his lower back, and missed two races. Two weeks later, on January 23, 1997, IRL driver Davy Jones broke his neck after a practice crash in turn three. On January 6, 2000, IRL driver Sam Schmidt was paralyzed after a crash in preseason testing. The track was built before the SAFER barrier was introduced, which many feel may have lessened the injuries in all three cases. After the 2000 IRL season, series officials and Walt Disney World were not able to come to an agreement for a race date for 2001. IRL officials were dissatisfied with the January