California's Great America recently opened the last piece of their newly rethemed section of the park - called NorCal County Fair - which was the park's expansion for 2023. The project was announced in May of this year, must later than usual for larger parks, and opened in bits since then.
The area's concept art can be seen up top. It was a total retheme of the park's Action Zone area, which was an odd leftover from the Paramount days. The theme is tied directly to the area surrounding the park which is a trend we're seeing more and more from Cedar Fair in the theming department.
The retheme includes one new ride, a renamed and newly themed 2nd ride, upgrades to the picnic area and general thematic upgrades to the games area. "From hiking and rafting amid the redwoods, soaring above the coastline's sandy beaches, cruising along wonderful scenic roadways, to enjoying the great fresh food and wine grown in its vast agriculture fields, Northern California has so much to see and do. NorCal County Fair will be just that: An all-new ride, a retheming of a beloved attraction, a renovated games gallery and a fully upgraded picnic area for more fun in the sun."
Barney's Oldfield Speedway, the park's antique auto ride, was rethemed into Barney Oldfield's Redwood Rally, to match its journey closer to the County Fair vibe. There are a lot of videos out there that show all the theming the park added to the ride path, and it all looks very well done.
Just recently the final piece of the NorCal County Fair came online, and that's the Pacific Gliders flat ride. One of Zamperla's WindstarZ rides, which allows riders to control the up and down movement of their individual gliders while they speed around. It's a family ride, but a fun one that kids enjoy.
For a park that seemed doomed to close after Cedar Fair's announcement last year, it's great that the park got some love in 2023. Nothing was announced for next year, however since this expansion was announced so late you never know!
It is not often that a theme park announces that a classic ride is going to close only to announce later that season a new version of the ride will open next year, but that's exactly what Silver Dollar City has done! We already were given plenty of notice to get our final rides in on Fire In The Hole, the park's classic indoor roller coaster, and now we've got even more to look forward to in 2024 with a new version of Fire In The Hole that will be "the heartland's largest indoor coaster."
The ride is a central part of the theme park's $30 million expansion for next season, which will create a brand new Fire District themed section within the park. Planned to open in Spring of 2024, the new Fire In The Hole will fully double the size of the park that already contains Station No. 3 firehouse and a collection of family rides.
“Signifying our biggest investment in a single attraction, FIRE IN THE HOLE continues Silver Dollar City’s strategic, multi-phased growth plan offering families opportunities to play and stay together in the heart of the Ozarks,” said Brad Thomas, President of the Silver Dollar City Company. “Spurring the creation of The Fire District, the custom-designed FIRE IN THE HOLE makes history as the Heartland’s largest indoor coaster. As the District’s anchor attraction, it will be a favorite rite of passage for families where one generation introduces the next generation to this adventure and where the heroes of today spark the heroes of tomorrow.”
The new ride will be a full coaster experience and is being created in an exciting partnership between Silver Dollar City, Rocky Mountain Construction and Herschend Family Entertainment Creative Sudios. The ride will feature 1,512 feet of track, have three drops including a splashdown, 14 iconic show scenes with updated and modern special effects and will be held in a 5 story temperature controller building (seen above).
The ride's 5 vehicles, a car from which is seen here, will each seat 12 passengers and move at a maximum speed of 26 miles per hour. The train will also feature a custom soundtrack with high-resolution audio. Since the ride is a coaster there will be some thrilling moments, but the attraction is intended for families for sure.
Fire In The Hole's theme will detail "a fictional account of a real night in Ozark Mountain history when the mining town of Marmaros was burned to the ground by notorious vigilantes called the Baldknobbers." Riders will see the inhabitants of Silver Dollar city take action to save their town and battle the fire.
The original Fire In the Hole opened in 1972 at the park and is in its final operating season. The park notes that more than 25 million riders have taken a spin on the original attraction in its history.
A first-of-its-kind roller coaster and water ride combination, coined an Ultra Splash, will be opening at Six Flags Over Georgia next season. The attraction is being designed by Intamin and is the first of its kind to open anywhere - also of note is that the final name of the ride is not Ultra Splash as the theme park will be allowing fans to help pick the name soon.
The new attraction features two 144 foot tall spike and 590 feet of track, though the train travels that track both forward and backward several times. The top speed will be 60 miles per hour.
The attraction will use free spinning, outward facing circular ride seats that in total accommodate 20 riders per cycle. The car will be sent soaring along the track utilizing LSM launches both forward and backward. The air-time hill in the middle of the track means three moments of weightlessness as the train passes over it, but low gravity will also be felt at the top of the two spikes.
There will be a water feature that the park can control that will be quite interesting. From the park's description:
"Passengers will soar backwards and forwards experiencing four water interaction effects, including a vertical wave wall and low cutting splash combination, an elevated experience for both riders and spectators. Riders will speed through a water vortex tunnel creating a captivating water curtain. Offering a panoramic view, spectators are sure to join in the excitement of the water experience and picturesque presence. While this coaster features refreshing splash moments, during the cooler months it can be disabled, allowing for year-long thrills.
Expect to hear a lot more on Six Flags Over Georgia's new Ultra Splash water coaster in the coming weeks and months!
An exciting new waterslide named Moosehorn Falls has been announced for Canada's Wonderland's 2024 season. The addition to the sprawling 20-acre Splash Works water park will feature a family raft style adventure that includes a "zero-gravity wall summit."
From the concept art released by the theme park, the appears as though Moosehorn Falls will be one of Whitewater West's Boomerango water slides, featuring a six person raft that sends passengers "down a rushing river cascade of twists, turns and drops" leading up to a plunge down a steep drop and up a 42 foot tall zero-gravity wall. As one would expect, at the crest of the wall riders will enjoy a moment of zero gravity before the raft plunges back down to finish the course.
“We’re excited to provide attractions that our guests can enjoy together, and Moosehorn Falls will be a perfect water park adventure for families and friends,” said Phil Liggett, general manager at Canada’s Wonderland.
Moosehorn Falls is "inspired by waterfalls on the Broad River along the Moosehorn Trail in Fundy National Park, New Brunswick within the UNESCO-designated Fundy Biosphere Region." “The new water slide is the park’s latest addition of Canadian-themed attractions, venues and events,” said Liggett. “As Canada’s premier amusement park, we want to celebrate the best this country has to offer including its natural diversity as well as the adventurous spirit of its people.”
A new expansion of the park's award winning children's section, Planet Snoopy, is coming to Kings Island in 2024. Named Camp Snoopy, the area will have a rustic feel and be located on the edge of the existing Snoopy themed area. Featuring an expansive play area and a brand new family roller coaster, Camp Snoopy is sure to keep kids busy for hours!
Camp Snoopy features two attractions: "Snoopy’s Soap Box Racers, a brand-new family roller coaster that races
both forward and backward and Beagle Scout Acres, an area where kids
can run, crawl, play or relax with the family in a shaded comfortable
space." The above aerial shows how the new Camp Snoopy section will fit within Planet Snoopy. The new coaster will be located right next to the park's existing inverted family coaster, in between that and an old amphitheater that will contain Beagle Scout Acres - an active play area for kids.
Snoopy's Soap Box Racers is one of Vekoma's family boomerang roller coasters, which stands 74 feet tall and features 672 feet of track. The train is lifted up the first hill backward, then released to speed through the station, past a themed lookout tower, around an s-curve and up another spike. The train then falls backward through the layout and into the station once more.
Kings Island is well known for their amazing kids area and with this coaster are the self-pronounced "kids coaster capital of the world" with 5 different kid-oriented roller coasters. Camp Snoopy is planned to open at Kings Island in the spring of 2024.
Since Cedar Fair purchased both Schlitterbahn New Braunfels and Galveston in 2019 we've seen the company focus on getting the parks up to their standards and making a lot of cosmetic and infrastructure improvements. Meaning, no new rides and attractions have really shown up under Cedar Fair ownership. At least until now, and while it is not the biggest announcement it is certainly an interesting one and a step in the right direction in the new-attraction department.
Schlitterbahn New Braunfels, the original park, has announced that a new kids area named Schatze's Storybrook Park will open in 2024. For those unaware (i.e. me until a moment ago), Schatze is Schlitterbahn's dog mascot. So that makes more sense now. The park says that the new area will let us see how "Texas’s favorite short-legged hound has reimagined everyone’s favorite
fairy tales into puppy-themed fairy “tails” gushing with splish-splash
fun." Essentially it looks like a total bulldozing and redo most of the kids area seen in the aerial above.
The overall expansion area has small sections to it, here is Schatze's Paw'nd, which features Schatze's Bow Wow Blaster, the first ever water coaster designed for kids. There are also three small water slides "Three Little Pugs" - each slide is named Noodle, Comet and Curly. The section also has a small shallow "paw'nd" for toddlers to splash in.
This section is named Fur-Bidden Forest, with the main feature being a water fun house that has a giant tipping bucket on the top of it. The area will feature "water-gushing mushrooms,
tree-shaped water slides, and areas to play, crawl, climb and get
soaked." The fairy tale theme continues here as "Prince Hopsalot from
Schatze’s retold story, The Paw Prints and the Frog, sits at the forest
edge."
Finally we have Fairy Tale Trail, a very quiet and unassuming area for kids to relax and toddlers to play in small fountains and appropriately sized slides. Kids can "tiptoe through the trees in Little Red Riding Hound’s forest, make
a daring escape from Houndsel and Petzel’s dog treat house, feel like
royalty at Rapawnzel’s enchanted castle, and hop around water geysers at
Pawed Piper’s Pipes."
The development is interesting because when the Schlitterbahn parks started to build new attractions under Cedar Fair I expected large, soaring slides that would break records. Instead, we're getting a themed kids' area with a rather intricate backstory. I like it! I'm a fan of the chain of parks diving a bit deeper on experiences and theme, so I'm all for it!
With the Iron Menace out of the bag, Dorney Park has made some major changes in the park to promote the new ride, and started heavy work on the attraction as well. Guests will absolutely feel the presence of the ride in the park now, with lots of new signage (like this giant one greeting guests in the parking lot) all over the place. With season passes on sale, the ride is obviously tied to promoting them, as well.
When you arrive at the front gates a new banner advertising Iron Menace and season passes greets you as well. And may I say once more that the new metal detectors are fantastic and so easy to pass through!
Also right inside the main entrance is this very well done themed display showing off Iron Menace to everyone. It has the ride's logo (which I love more each time I see it and I really hope that molten steel pattern shows up more), statistics, layout and even a screen showing the ride's animation. A no trespassing sign features a QR code that takes guests to Dorney's website for the ride.
Halloween Haunt preparations are also underway at Dorney Park. Haunt starts on September 15th this year, which sorta frightenigly-on-its-own is only 5 weeks away!
A big change this year will be that Skeleton Crew - a great live show - and perhaps Port of Call bar and the giant pirate ship props will be back up in Hydra plaza. They lived up here each fall for many years, but with work on Iron Menace going on in the lower park it makes sense to keep that area clear. So far just some of the sets are going up and walled off, so we'll see how much more is added to this area in coming weeks.
Hard to see but Necropolis is also being set up in the empty field next to Steel Force as it has in past years. The facades are still up for Blood on the Bayou, Tourist Trap, Roadside Stop & Chop and Trick or Treat, so I would assume they'll return. I did not see work on The Lair yet, if that is returning I would expect to see work start soon by Thunderhawk! And we know Enigma isn't returning...
Because this new yet-to-be-announced Haunted house that is directly tied to Iron Menace's backstory is taking its place! The theming on just the facade is really, really good and if this is what we can expect from the park with the new coaster's theme.... well then I'm even more excited than I thought I could be! The new haunt will be announced on 9/7/23 and so far we only know that the structure (which is partially in ruins as we can see in the new photos here) is set to be the steel mill's administrative office.
A second major display has gone up on the work walls that now totally hide the Iron Menace worksite from guest view. Another great look at the ride's layout, logo, theming vibe and the preview animations is offered to guests - lots of which stopped in their tacks to check it out. Also the park has confirmed that the Rita's adjacent to the worksite will be coming down as part of this project, though that was clear from the initial plans filed with the township.
The work walls obscure exactly what is going on in the majority of the Iron Menace site, and I'm not one to try to look over or climb anything to see. You can see some of the site from the restrooms past Cedar Creek Flyers and right now the crew has started to rip up blacktop on an access road back there and many trees have already been removed, but that's about the extent of things. I'm sure work on the ride's footings will be starting very soon, like maybe this week.
With the excitement surrounding the ride's announcement Dorney Park has some nice merch for the coaster available already in Good Time Gifts. There are some slick looking shirts, water bottles and drawstring bags that you can pick up when at the park!
That wraps things up for this visit, stay tuned for more as work on Iron Menace continues!
Dorney Park has announced that in 2024 visitors will be able to explore an abandoned steel mill with a sinister history on their way to experience Iron Menace, the park's brand new, custom designed, first of its kind in the Northeast roller coaster. One of Bolliger and Mabillard's exciting Dive Coasters, Iron Menace will be the first totally custom roller coaster to open at the amusement park since Hydra in 2005.
This infographic gives a nice look at the entire layout of Iron Menace, so let us get to know the ride a bit, shall we? The coaster will be located on the former site of Stinger, but then also it will extend back further into currently undeveloped land. The ride's track is described as "Autumn Red" but looks distinctly orange in these renderings. The support color is Umbra Gray. Iron Menace's station will be located in the middle of the ride and will be themed as an abandoned steel mill, but much more on that later.
Directly out of the station the trains - which are three rows deep and 7 seats across - will ascend a lift hill to 160 feet above the park. Then the Menace's first trick takes place - riders will hang over the beyond-vertical first drop for a full 3 seconds before plunging down! That's more than enough time for some real thrills and adrenaline to kick in! The trains will plummet down a 95 degree drop (that's 5 degrees past vertical) that extends 152 feet to the ground. At the base of the drop the trains will be traveling a cool 64 miles per hour.
With no time to spare the trains will race up into a giant Immelmann inversion - sort of like a vertical loop but with a twist at the end. After this element the inversions keep coming - there will be 4 in total - giving the ride a fast pace that will leave riders wondering which way is up. Many Bolliger & Mabillard Dive Coasters pause the 'flow' so to say with a second vertical drop. No harm in that tactic, but Iron Menace will relentlessly keep the thrills coming one after another with its exciting 2,169 feet of track.
The next inversion is a large Zero G-Roll that goes up and over the ride's maintenance area (which also creates a new tunnel of sort for the park's classic Zephyr Train) then into a first-of-its-kind-on-a-B&M-Dive-Coaster element, the Tilted Loop. Like a vertical loop, only tilted on its side some, the element has been done on other B&M rides but never a Dive Coaster before. The rapid fire elements conclude with an extended 360 degree flat spin and into an upward 180 degree turn before the final brake run.
"The Northeast’s first dive roller coaster is one of the largest capital investments in park history," said Jessica Naderman, vice president and general manager of Dorney Park & Wildwater Kingdom. "With an exciting backstory that loosely connects riders to our area’s rich industrial roots, Iron Menace will become the eighth thrilling roller coaster at the park, bolstering what has been an impressive lineup for well over a decade. Our coaster lineup – along with our all-inclusive water park, Planet Snoopy kids’ area, great shows, dining and more – make Dorney Park and Wildwater Kingdom a must-visit family destination in 2024.”
Want to take an animated ride on Iron Menace? Click below then continue reading for more on the ride's creation and theme!
So how about that backstory, though? Dorney Park has put much attention and detail into giving Iron Menace a history that fits with the greater Lehigh Valley - which is well known for the Bethlehem Steel plant that created steel for many of the most important structures in the country. However the specific backstory for how Iron Menace came to be is a bit more sinister.
We go back to the early 1900s when Scottish businessman Hiram S. McTavish opened the McTavish Steel Mill. He led with greed, kept profits above people, and created a giant "Iron Menace" rail transporter machine to move workers and ore at a record pace. One day the steel baron mysteriously disappeared, and soon the mill closed for good.
It still stands, however, though it is just a decrepit shell of its former self. In fact, there are wild tales of the owner's whereabouts and some say at night eerie and bizarre happenings take place at the site. From shadowy figures to sudden temperature changes, visitors know they should run but curiosity always wins...
Once inside the mill visitors will be ushered onto the Iron Menace hauler by shadowy figures, hoping to escape the eeriness that abounds.
A fun and a little bit of a spooky story, right? The park is proud to be adding the Iron Menace, and as Jessica Naderman, the park's vice president and general manager states, they believe it will "fundamentally change how people think about Dorney Park and Wildwater Kingdom." The property started "planning for the ride last May or June," and has been furiously working on it since. It's a large project, and its taken a lot of cooperation between the park and Cedar Fair corporate to get the job done.
Another interesting note from the park's leader, she explained that Iron Menace will "move from element to element" quickly, noting that it is quite dynamic and features "the newest B&M trains" which will allow the dive coaster to be "more agile and a little different than all the other ones that have been manufactured so far."
"The ride for us is a real turning point," explains the park's PR and Communications Manager Ryan Eldredge. "It is a way that Cedar Fair and Dorney Park can show they're invested in this community. Not only are we invested by bringing in a roller coaster - which is certainly a large investment - but we're invested in a way that we want to bring the rich tradition and history of the Lehigh Valley into this ride."
It sounds like the addition of Iron Menace is almost a sort of start of a new era for Dorney Park. According to Eldredge the ride "says not only that things are going to be different moving forward but also that we are going to invest... and we want to be a part of the community because we want to grow even more so that more generations of Dorney park fans can continue to come."
Iron Menace is planned to be open by Spring 2024. Right now guests who purchase a 2024 Gold season pass before September 4th, 2023 will be invited to "an exclusive Iron Menace event." You can be sure that we'll be there as we are over-the-moon excited for Iron Menace! We've been anxiously waiting for the park's next big development and now that it is here we couldn't be an more excited!
The park is planning to release details about a connected-in-theme new Halloween Haunt maze currently under construction next to the Iron Menace worksite. More details on the actual coaster and its theming will come in the future as well - for now get ready to forge your own fate on Iron Menace at Dorney Park in 2024!
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