Weekly Rewind 11.7.09

Welcome to NewsPlusNotes' first Weekly Rewind - think of it as our Daily Spin's new little brother, who happens to appear only on Saturday or Sunday. During the week, we here at NPN have found that there's often stories that don't necessitate a full post, but we don't want to skip over them either. With that in mind the Weekly Rewind has been born. Enough chatter, on with the news bits!

Excited about Shanghai Disneyland? We are too. And so is everyone over at MiceChat, who just launched a new discussion board for the now 'greenlighted' Chinese theme park. Plenty of talk already going on!

The Lost Island water park, located in Iowa, continues work on their new Proslide Hydromagnetic Rocket water coaster. The Water Slide Services blog has been keeping the updates coming on the project. Check that out here.

The Big Dipper at the former Geauga Lake amusement park has been honored as an ACE Roller Coaster Landmark. The ride, which closed after the 2007 season, has been SBNO at the site of the park since. ACE awards rides of "historical significance" with the Landmark status.

Earnings news have come out for both Cedar Fair and Six Flags for the third quarter 2009, and neither had very good news to share. Cedar Fair is stopping their quarterly distribution, and Six Flags had to report lower revenues and attendance as well.

Construction of Holiday World's 2010 attraction, Wildebeest, will be the focus of an hour long episode of National Geographic's "World's Toughest Fixes" when it airs next June. The show will send it's host, Sean Riley, to document the construction of the massive water coaster during this winter. Sounds like a great watch!

What are Kieran Burke and Gary Story, formerly top executives at Six Flags during a not so pretty era of the parks, up to these days? Buying a water park, that's what! An investment group, led by the pair, have purchased Nashville Shores, a water park and entertainment center in Tennessee. They say there are no plans for a theme park at the property. Good.

Another coaster for Six Flags Magic Mountain? Yes. As expected, a family coaster will be added to the park next year, around the corner from this year's addition, Terminator Salvation. Get more details from the Funland Blog.

During Cedar Fair's 3rd quarter earnings conference call it was mentioned that three additional parks would receive a Starlight Experience type attraction like that which debuted at Cedar Point in 2009. What parks? A mystery for now...

This is a pretty cool read - the Disney and More blog published photos of the plans for a never built Michael Jackson theme park. Themed to Peter Pan's Neverland, full plans for the park were drawn up by Landmark Entertainment Group. Would have been pretty cool!

Every time Coasters and More publishes a new article on a ride I'm amazed by their stunning photography. Their latest effort, covering Der Fliegende Hollander at Efteling Park in the Netherlands, is no different. Check it out.

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Islands of Adventure's construction has kicked into high gear in the past couple months. Orlando United has done a great job of keeping up with photos of the developments. Recently, the Hogwarts Express arrived on site.