Son of Beast Under the Knife

Kings Island finally revealed today that the rumors were true, they are removing the loop from Son of Beast.

Why is this happening? Well, simply put: Cedar Fair. And no, this isn't a Cedar Fair Ruins All Wood Coasters rant - in this case I actually think CF made a good decision.

I've never been on the ride but the general consensus was that it was rough - too rough. The park plans to use "lighter" trains (PTCs?) which will make the ride bearable. The trains that Premier Rides created were probably a mistake from the start, but necessary because of this loop.

The reason I think Cedar Fair made a good decision was because let's be honest: they hate big wooden coasters. Mean Streak has been a $ pit for maintenance since it opened, and Hercules took them to the point of deciding to tear it down.

The way I look at it, they could be using GCII (rumored) to fix the ride and get some new trains, or it could be torn down. In this case, I'm glad they kept the thing standing.

Heard On... Six Flags 2007 Conference Call

Six Flags had a conference call this morning to talk about their plans for 2007, and while it wasn't a full capital expenditure breakdown it did have some interesting info. Here's some tidbits I heard that were interesting:

• Thomas the Tank Engine themed areas. They plan to open 3 next year, where to be announced later. They are building a railroad in the land, along with other rides. The queue for the railroad will have TVs that play tapes of the shows and take place in the train station. They also have plans for live characters to be in the parks from the show. Six Flags has exclusivity for these themed areas for 300 miles of the park they are built in.
• The Wiggles. They already announced this for Great Adventure, with two more coming in '07. They seem to be REALLY excited at the merchandise opportunities that come with this. They spoke of having personalized merch. available, and also having TV's in the land showing tapes of the shows. The areas will be cross promoted at Wiggles concerts, and the lands will have a stage show with "Dorothy and Friends."
• Tony Hawk rides: Two next year, more on the horizon in later years. Also going to have heavy merch. being pushed and videos of Tony Hawk stuff in the queue.
(Sensing a theme here?)
• Cold Stone Creamery. Eight will open next year, 7 will have premixed ice cream, Six Flags New England will feature the cold stone mixing of the product as a prototype. Six Flags Coaster Crunch will be featured as a signature flavor.
• Holiday in the Park: To be added to Marine World and Fiesta Texas for Christmas 2007, not in like a week as being reported on other sites.
• Panda Express food locations will double from 6 to 12 for 2007.
• Six Flags Kentucky Kingdom will have the park's largest expansion ever, focused on the waterpark. They said the name will change to Splashwater Kingdom, and it will have a ride unique to North America. Interesting name choice, as that is the name of the water park at Great Escape which is hardly a model park.
• Great Adventure is working on the Safari. Shapiro said he believes it's one of the most under utilized assets that Six Flags Inc. has. He also stated - get ready for this - that he thinks it is better than Animal Kingdom's Safari. WHAT!? Regardless, they are making some places to see animal shows and pet them and such. The biggest news to this is that it will no longer be given away with admission, but be extra charge once again. We'll see how this one turns out. Seriously.
• Last year to date they had sold 52,000 season passes, this year they are at 109,000. This is really rather promising. Group sales are also up 27%.
• The 9 parks for sale will continue to operate as amusement/theme parks regardless of who ends up owning them. They also stressed a couple times that originally they wanted to sell the group together, and that now they are looking at selling them separate, in groups, or however they feel like it. This tells me that perhaps only some of the parks will be sold and some will be kept. (probably cause no one wanted some of them)
• Attendance in 2006 was down 14% to 28 million.

Call me crazy, but which looks nicer to you?

Great Adventures Safari:
^ Photo from Coaster Net.

Or Animal Kingdom's?
You be the judge.

Steel Force Construction Diary #1

Steel Force celebrates it's 10th Birthday this year, (11th season, though) which is a nice milestone for the ride. When Steel Force at Dorney Park was being built I was a total spaz about new rides and took a lot, really a ton, of pictures of it being built. I figured that it would be interesting to share a much condensed version of this 'photo diary.' That said, there's only one place to start, and that's the beginning.

At the end of the 1996 season, this sign was put out in the park. It was located (obviously) in front of the Carousel at the main entrance. I know the detail of the stats doesn't come through clear enough, but the layout does. I like the slogan "A Coaster To Metal With!!" - I know they used it some in the first year but it seemed to trail off after that.
This view is from August, 1996. As you can see they started to demolish the picnic groves that used to sit along the lake here. You can also see the lake that was here, now where Revolution and some overflow parking now stands. The tires are in the water because the Swan Boats had a season here before being moved over to the other side of the park. The area that eventually became Steel Force's station was some employee parking.
This view is from October, 1996. You can see that not much more demolition took place, however, you see that white stuff sitting behind the trees, next to the lake? Yes, that's track! The first track arrived at the park in October, and was not painted its final color. There's a fun fact for ya!

You like? let me dig out some more photos!

More Grand Adventures

EBay sure is fun! I found this guide map from MGM Grand Adventures that was from June of 1994 and it was a steal. This is shortly after the park opened, so it had not been butchered at all at this point. Here's the map:
The map has some nice detail on it, certainly when compared to the map I posted earlier. Here you can see Lightning Bolt still indoors, some details of the theming that was on the Backlot River Tour, and the Haunted Mine. Deep Earth Exploration was still listed as a coming attraction at this point.
The above is the Rides section of the guide map. I know it isn't the most exciting of things, but it's neat to see the original logos of these things as well as the small backstory / info that is provided for each. I also love how Lightning Bolt provides you a trip "through Las Vegas at Night" - apparently this was a small blacklight model of the strip that was along the brake run!

One more little gem: here's a post card that shows some of the concept art of the park that was used. There's lot of interesting detail in here, I'll let it speak for itself.

Dorney Park 2007 Season Update #1

I'd like to cover the changes that Dorney Park has planned for the 2007 by providing some pictures and my take on what they contain. Being local to the park helps greatly with this. Let's kick things off with a batch of photos, they are all from 12.06.06.

Thus far the highlights of the 2007 season have been rumored to be a new addition to Wildwater Kingdom, and some rather large changes to the parking lot and parking lot entrance areas.

First, Screamscape is reporting a rumor that Laser will see some work this off-season. I'd love that to be true, and if it is they certainly haven't started yet. I can't see any discernible changes on the ride. It's early though, we shall see.
This parking toll booth can be found in the corner of the overflow lot. It appears to be one of the old ones, but the five located in the main lot are still standing. Regardless, I'm curious to see where this ends up. I doubt it is for the overflow lot specifically, as traffic flows through the main lot and their toll booths and then into the overflow lot via the tunnel. Again, time will tell at this point.

This is a view of the area that has a good possibility of turning into additional parking next year. I don't know this for sure, but from what I've heard they want to use a lot of the area down here as more formal parking. I do not believe that they intend to pave the area, just use one of those small stone treatments to get the job done. Regardless, no work yet.
The entrance road. This is supposed to be widened and the parking toll booths are supposed to be moved onto it. Yes, that means they are cutting into the park to accomplish this. Also looks like they haven't started yet.
Lastly, let's look over at Wildwater Kingdom. Notice something missing? It may be no secret at this point, but the Torpedo Tubes are gone. This is the area (not exactly in the Torpedo Tubes footprint though) that the new attraction will be placed.

That's all for now!

Geauga Lake Before and After

I wanted to have some more thoughts or news or maybe even notes up on Geauga Lake by now, but it's a large topic to start to cover. In the meantime, I noticed that Windows Live Local has both old and new photos of Geauga Lake up. I love how you can get a great comparison of the old Sea World park that is now a water park.
Here we have the old. You can see the Water Ski stadium, which is a good point of comparison as it is still standing. I really like how they used the Dolphin pool and made it a part of the lazy river/activity area. Sometimes water parks are too generic and bits like that made the park unique.
And here we have the new. You can get a good idea here of how many buildings they cleared out when building the water park. The wave pool is not featured in these pictures, but is located to the bottom right of this view. The coolest thing about this water park is the vast room they have to expand, if necessary.

I'm updating this post because I realized I had pics of the wave pool and old stadiums part of the park. Above you can see the park currently, this was taken winter of '05-'06 as the wave pool is under construction. The wave pool sits almost exactly where the Sea Otter Stadium was, and the Shamu stadium is now a pile of dirt on the hillside. The other park buildings over in this corner are still standing.

Okay here's the old version. You can see the stadium that is now a wave pool, and Shamu's stadium still standing. Also a lot more trees and building are still standing. It's not the exact same view as above but is pretty much as good could I could grab.