[RCT3]Catskill's Dam

Authors Note: This Is my First CS RCT3 park. I have tried really hard to make this look realistic as possible I have had this park on my computer for sometime now and I just recently started working on it again. I finally think it is good enough to share. The first thing you will notice is that the fountain in the entrance is floating. That is because I actually made the entrance in another park and I can't seem to fix it. Second I'm really horrible at making buildings so don't bash them. Other than those two I really want some constructive criticism.

I want to apologize about the quality of the pictures. For some reason I can't screenshot on my computer so I have to get out of full screen mode and then screenshot.

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Welcome to Catskill's Dam, The newest amusement park in Upstate New York.

Hello I am John Tomson I am the General manger at this fine park. From now on I will be updating you on the park posting many Trip Reports, News and even be bringing you the new Rides before the GP. A little about me is a used to work at the smallest six flags in the chain, The Great Escape. I was the operations manager. The owners of this park contacted me about moving into the general management role and I agreed. Thats enough about me lets get to the park.

My favorite part of this entire park is the entrance. It is small but it does the job for what we need it to do.

Here is a overview of the entire entrance plaza.

Enough with the entrance plaza lets get to the rides.

This is our first ride called American Flyers

Unfortently this ride is a portable ride. That is why there is a wall around the base. On the bright side the park can move it at will to accommodate future additions.

Our next ride is my favorite it is called Jumper.

That building in the back is what we call the Dj's booth. This ride is top of the line in technology. From that booth the Ride Op can open the gates to let people on the ride. He can close the restraints and check them right from the booth without even leaving. Also from the booth the Ride op can control the world class audio system on the ride. As the ride starts The song "Jump Around" from House of Pain begins to play. Boy that must get annoying for the Ride ops.

Last but not least is Golden Zephyer

If you were wondering where all the Food and Drinks are, here they are. Everything is in here everything from T-shirts to Food and Beverages. Also the buidling has a large bathroom to accommodate the entire park

Welcome!

Not to bad for your first CS park. I am also getting used to using CS, Valley Hills is my first CS park as well.

Since you are open to constructive criticism, I'll offer some. All of this is my personal opinion.

Overall, the Entrance looks swell. Lots of shrubs and greenery to be found, it has very authentic look. Albeit a bit small. It works for now, but if this park is looking to expand, the entrance paths will need to be enlarged. In the second picture I noticed some errors? Missing path edges, fencing & walls. In the third picture I noticed a missing wall towards the wooden structure, IDK if all this is intentional or not.

American Flyers is looking a bit tacky with that overdose of generic walls. Not the best choice, AF is looking like a concrete jungle. Maybe try circular fencing around the ride, with some vegetation. I think that would have a better look, and would certainly add to the ride experience. Because right now, your peeps are just swinging around in a concrete box. Basically: to much concrete. Try and capitalize on the scenery, nature always prevails.

Jumper has some minor flaws to it, mainly the audio equipment. It just seems like it was randomly placed next to the ride, and doesn't really fit in with it's surroundings. Maybe try and make it looks like it's part of the ride, IDK it just really sticks out like a sore thumb to me. The QUE really detracts from the ride & the realism. Maybe try some smaller sized paths (quarter tile) or just make the line more direct & less switchbacks. And again, you can never have enough vegetation. The more greenery, the better!

Golden Zephyer is the golden egg of the park. Everything blends together well. Great Job on that one! I strongly suggest using a similar style (walls & fencing) for the other two rides, because their current "themes" are rather lackluster. Not trying to be rude, just giving some pointers.

The eatery is understandable, I to am not so great with CS buildings. Don't feel like you have to include CS buildings. Create something you are comfortable building & what looks good to you. That way you'll be able to design buildings without any pressure, which usually results in great looking structures. Some smaller independent buildings would be better suited for a park this size anyways.

I know this post is rather long, so I'll wrap this up. Catskill's Dam has lots of potential, just work on that choice of fencing, and try and make the rides themselves stand out. American Flyers could really use some TLC. Really not trying to downplay your park, I'm just giving some advice. GREAT choice of signage, never seen those before - and they work well for your park.They definitely fit in with Jumper. I'd also like to note your great looking path textures.

[About the screenshots: does F10 not work? That's odd, it usually auto-saves it to your RCT3 picture folder. Also, naming a peep "David Walsh " & then pressing ctrl+U will remove the UI.]

Looking forward to seeing more!

John's Coaster Blog:

Hi my name is John Cweikel and I am a coaster enthusiast. Recently a park just opened down the road from me. The name of the park is Catskill's Dam. From their website it looked like a small park so I decided to stop in after work one day. Boy Am I in love with this park, I have never seen a park with such nice employees. That is a really good compliment because I have been to over 50 parks in the US. The park has a special feel to it. Everything was extremely clean and it had extremely nice landscaping. you could tell that whoever was in charge of this park really cared about the little things. It was kind of lacking in the way of RIdes. I mean it only had three small flat rides. I am looking foward to making another visit soon. A strange thing I noticed was a bunch of construction eqiupment behind Jumper. Here I'll let you be the judge, I took a couple pictures.

Whatever is happening it looks like it is pretty involved. It looks like whatever it is it will require quite a bit of electricity judging by the amount of wiring. Could this be the park's first coaster? I can't wait to find out . The park is holding a news conference a month from now. Maybe that means they will announce what all this is about.

Out of curiosity, why is the park called Catskill's Dam if there isn't any dam to be seen? Have you not shown it yet or what?

^Yes, There will be a waterway in the future and it will have a dam

^I'm excited to see how that turns out, keep the updates comming!

John's Coaster Blog:

I happened to see something strange on the way home from work the other day so I decided to stop in. What I found is extremely exciting. It looks like the Park will be adding it's first roller coaster!! From the looks of the station it will be a wooden but we can't be sure. Just a side note some of Jumpers audio equipment has been removed for construction. The park has added speakers under the platform for the mean time

This is the park's last week of operation so I will no longer be able to give updates until Opening Day. From now on you will have to watch the park's social media pages for news and construction pictures! Remember the park's news conference is in under 2 weeks

Hello My name is John Tomson. Many of you know me as GM of Catskills Dam. I know why all of you are reading today so I am just gonna cut to the chase. It's Announcement day! On behave of our owners I would like to announce our first coaster!!!! We have been working with Gravity Group since the park opened to develop this ride. I have some models of the coasters to show you.

I hope Everyone is as thrilled about this coaster as I am. While we reveled the coaster we still are keeping some stuff secret until opening day like our station design and name. From now on we will be sharing frequent construction updates.

Woodie is rather simple, I hope you have a great theming package to go along with it. The park is improving some, keep it up!

Sorry Guys, I've been really busy lately. I was planning on doing construction updates but then I realized how time consuming supporting a wood coaster actually is. I've finished the coaster and all the supports for it. Sorry on some of the pics I left the UI on by accident. Also please don't critize the supporting of the coaster. I know it looks sketchy but It took alot of time.

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John's Coaster Blog:

I was looking at the park's Facebook page today and I saw they added a bunch of pictures of the new coaster today. The thing that is werid is that they look like they are from different points in time as the progress is seen progressing. I guess they saved all the photos until the end.

I like the layout. Nice and twisty. Great for a park like this. I'm looking forward to how this area will look in the finished product.

I know you said not to say anything about the supports. But I will. Just two things

1 - (pic1) supports on lift are jutting out.

2 - steel supports do not blend well, at all.

P.s.

Drop Photobucket and use something else(Flicker). Photobucket will cause you some real issues. It has a monthly viewing limit.

Hello My name is John Tomson. Many of you know me as GM of Catskills Dam. It's been a busy couple of days for me and the park. Friday we had a soft opening for the new coaster Forest Run! We opened the park just so the ride ops can get experience working with large crowds that they will be faced with on opening day. We set our ticket price to $10.00 because The new coaster was the only ride open. Then on Saturday at 9am we had our official season two opening. We expierenced the largest crowd the park has ever seen. I wanna take a moment and thank the PR department for getting the word out about the Coaster.

The first ever ride on Forest Run! The guests on the first train received memorabilia to remember the occasion

The second train out of the station going up the lift

Here you can see the Entrance the queue of Forest Run and the new Logo. Because of Costruction on the coaster we needed to knock down the old food court building. Now you can see the new bathroom facility we build in it's place.

As you can see the skyline of the park has been forever changed

The line for the new coaster on Friday Night.

The new open air eatery directly in between Golden Zephyr and Forest Run( Don't worry this one won't be knocked down after one season.

The queue of the coaster and the bathroom in the background

The queue looks excellent, a vast improvement over the others. The open-air eatery also looks lovey. Simplistic yet effective, great execution.

Station is a bit disproportionate to the ride, but it still looks awesome.

This coaster looks wonderful.

P.s. If your not going to remove UI, try editing.

Example:

(Love the station & queue in this pic especially.)

Keep it up!

John's Coaster Blog:

Just a little Mid Season update for you guys! The park has been extremely busy almost every day of the week. Forest Run has been a huge hit and a Fan Favorite. I haven't been able to ride since opening day because the line usually reaches up to one hour. The craziest thing is that all the other rides also seem to be busier. I would expect that the new Coaster would be pulling people away from those rides but I guess not! I have some new pictures for you so here they are.

Golden Zepher doesn't look as busy but it also has a huge capaticity swinging 75 people per cycle.

The park is really growing. I'm looking foward to seeing what they are gonna add for next year. My guess is nothing big due to the new coaster this year but hey you never know!

John's Coaster Blog:I returned from the last Town meeting and I have some awesome news! The park has gained approval from the town to enclose a park ride!

Some notes from the meeting.

The park did not specify which Ride will be Enclosed. They simply refereed to the ride as X.

The town approved the ride only under certain conditions.

Some of the specifics were precautionary measures due to the Rye Playland death of the operator some years ago.

The town added a limit to the number of lights and speakers in the dome.

The town also limited the volume of the music inside of the dome.

I Think the general assumption is that Jumper will be the ride enclosed. Golden Zephyr is just to Huge while American Flyers is unlikely because no Swing ride has ever been enclosed.

I'm really looking forward to this addition. Music and lighting always adds another dimension to the ride to make it 100 times better

Enclosed rides are always great, especially with audio & visual effects. This could draw big crowds.

Hello My name is John Tomson. Many of you know me as GM of Catskills Dam. As some of you may know we have had a really busy off season. You may be wondering why could the off season be soo busy if the park isn't even adding a new ride? The answer has been hidden until today... Opening day. On behave of the entire park, I would like to announce A brand new twist on a Original ride. The park has enclosed Jumper!!! Over the long offseason our crews were busy taking apart Jumper to be refurbished and painted, clearing extra land behind the ride's old location and even building the dome. After that we brought in a team of three experts in Sound, Lighting and Amusement ride effects. The sound and lighting guy's came right from Broadway. Under the command of the experts our crews were busy strategically hanging theatrical lights and speakers. After all of the hardware was wired up into a central computer system, the actual ride returned to the dome through a back garage door. The next month of the off season was used for the expert to create a program that lined up with the Ride's program. While the experts were creating the program we were busy training a select few ride ops on the ride. NYS requires a crazy amount of training for ride ops of enclosed rides. So as you can see the park was extremely busy.

The park would like to keep the actual ride experience a secret so everyone can be stunned when they walk in the dome. The only thing I can relay to you is that Jump Around by House Of Pain will no longer be in the program.

I can only provide outside pictures of the ride. I grabbed these just a few hours ago just before the park closed.

John's Coaster Blog:

Sorry it has been a long time since the last update but my work has really been busy latley so I havent been able to provide updates. Another thing is that not very much has gone on at the park during season 3. Attendance has been up over season 2 and season 1. The park is definitely doing much better. Lets see some photos

Jumper has quickly become the busiest ride in the park