I too, love going to the races. Whether it be a picnic meeting or a Cox Plate, the smell, the colour, the excitement, the money, the maths, the whole thing. I have been a regular participant for over 25 years, a punter, a bookies clerk, a bookie. over this time I have seen the TAB grow & become greedier & greedier with little benefit flowing to the punter. The number of bookies has dropped alarmingly to the point where value has just about disappeared, the numbers attending have dropped, yet TAB turnover has grown. I don't know that closing tracks is the answer but it has been proposed to the TAB's many times over that if they reduced their take it would increase turnover. Have they listened?. Of course not & now they are just about in panic mode, because somebody (wish it was me!) has come up with the idea of betting exchanges & funnily enough people are using them. The TAB's will now have to merge to one Australia wide pool & greatly reduce their take just to stay in business. Unfortunately the money side, for me anyway, and for many others I would guess, outweighs the other attractions of a day at the races.
I had to laugh when I heard someone on the radio say they were expecting a bumper crowd of around 15000? to Rosehill last week. 20 years ago that was the norm, and those older than me can probably remember when that was the norm for a midweek meeting.
The TAB used to provide a service but is now being usurped by Betfair, that's progress.