ginzo

Families do, which is the exact market Six Flags is targeting now. It's obvious that Shapiro has shifted the emphasis to family attractions. Sorry they aren't getting an XTREEEEEEEMEEEE coaster for you guys, but that's just how the company is being run right now. The Wiggles World at Great America was packed, it's obvious the shift is working for them right now. Yeah, it's not like the previous management team didn't give thrill seekers more than their fair share of love. And look at how that turned out. If anything Shapiro is giving the chain some much needed balance. Family attractions have the added bonus of not costing $20 million, which is good because Six Flags seriously can't afford too many high cost installations right now. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that families are going to pump more cash into your parks and cause less problems than teenagers with season passes. Did people really think that the coaster wars were going to last forever? Wait a few years, and things will change. Six Flags will eventually start building monster coasters again.

The author makes a decent case. The locals may get over it just as soon as Geauga Lake closes entirely. I doubt Cedar Point will be affected much though.

Hersheypark - 10 Coasters BGE - 5 Coasters Great Adventure - 12 Coasters (After The Chiller Removal) I don't get your complaint. Great Adventure still has an absurdly good coaster collection; better than what Hershey or BGE has, especially Hershey. The Chiller had a lot of problems, which they had spent years trying to fix. Eventually you have to just give up. Why not say Premier sucks since they're more to blame for this ride sucking than Six Flags is? Six Flags bashing is so three years ago.

It's always good to wax sentimental about a park you've never been to. The place was a dump. The coasters weren't that good, and the ones worth saving will be saved. You're confusing longevity for quality. If Kennywood was closing down, I'd be upset. But there is really not much being lost in all of this. If this park was so important to Cleveland they would have gone there. But they didn't. So the park closed.

I'll offer 100 to 1 odds that The Chiller is melted down for soda cans. Imagine trying to auction off this sucker: "Come buy this great coaster that Six Flags tried to fix for 10 years, but failed! Act now to get in on this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to buy a coaster that will kill your maintenance budget and disappoint guests with constant downtime." The new owner would also probably lose the Batman and Robin theme, which doesn't help either.

I'm not so sure that converting is going to help that much. I rode the Hersheypark Wildcat back in July, and it was still a pretty darn uncomfortable ride. Granted it was in the 90s and super dry on that day, but Lightning Racer was running just fine.

Ohio is currently the 7th largest state in population, coming in at about a million less than Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania has the following parks: Kennywood Knoebels Hersheypark Idlewild Lakemont Dorney Waldameer plus a few misc. smaller parks. Yes, none of these parks are as big as either Cedar Point or Kings Island, but I think it illustrates the fact that Ohio *could* support another park, especially in the Columbus area. Columbus has no local park, and is a reasonably large metropolitan area. What Ohio could not support was another largish park in the Cleveland area. Had Six Flags not overexpanded Geauga Lake, it may have done fine as a smaller park just like all those smaller PA parks keep chugging along without gradiose dreams of becoming the next Cedar Point.

Ohio doesn't have 2 great parks. Well I guess King's Island was good 15 years ago. Yeah, and I don't think Ohio supporting 3 parks is out of the question. Look at how many parks Pennsylvania has.

Although I have yet to visit VF, it sounds like El Dorado would make a great fit. El Dorado is easily one of the most craptacular flat rides I've ever experienced. Riding that slow, dull thing cemented in my mind just how much Geauga Lake sucked. How can you mess up a simple ride like that?

sarcasm A form of irony in which apparent praise conceals another, scornful meaning. For example, a sarcastic remark directed at a person who consistently arrives fifteen minutes late for appointments might be, “Oh, you've arrived exactly on time!”

Hey, now I have all the credits at Great Adventure. Neat. Thank you Mr. Wrecking Ball.

This is not a big surprise at all. The rides side of Geauga Lake was pretty dead when we went in May. We did all the coasters in a few hours. Now that Cedar Fair has gotten rid of their big money pit maybe they'll build up the water park some.

From the pictures I've seen there's really not much left of the park or rides. This park closed down in the 1970s. Entropy has done a lot of work in the past 30+ years. Has anyone here actually visited the site?

Nah. Both chains get a C- at best as far as food goes. Maybe a D+. Counter service at virtually all US parks is awful.

This poll should be updated to include Maverick.

"Really good amusement parks" doesn't fly with Cedar Fair either, unless you're talking about exactly one of their properties. Kennywood, Knoebels, Indiana Beach are really good regular amusement parks, but not the non-CP Cedar Fair properties. Cedar Fair is a well run business in that they turn a pretty good profit by cutting every corner imaginable. But this doesn't translate into a great experience for the guests. They also have issues investing in non-CP properties. I'm betting that within 5 years there won't even be cause for threads like this. CF will so obviously be the third rate operator that there won't even be discussion about it. The purchase of the Paramount properties all but assured their continued mediocrity. It would cost too damn much to really turn those parks around, and they have almost no financial incentive to do so. People keep coming no matter how bad the rides and food are.

I'm not a fan of Millennium Force. The first drop is good, but could be more intense. Then there's the big overbank, and ... nothing! Sorry but a coaster has to do more than just go fast and be smooth to be a top ride. How about some airtime?

That's not trash. That's what KBF calls theming.

Ouch. Having ridden Outer Limits at its worst this is about the worst thing you can say about a steel coaster, short of "I wound up in the ER with neck trauma".

Thanks for giving a detailed exegesis on why you prefer CF. I prefer SF, but can certainly appreciate the other point of view when someone articulates, and recognizes the tremendous progress that Six Flags has undergone. As for filthy park environments, the most disgusting thing I've seen this year was the queue for Volcano at Kings Dominion. It had chewing gum stuck everywhere, cobwebs grown up on the ceiling, and massive amounts of dust. It was deplorable.

I'm not the hugest fan of GCII (airtime owns curves), but I do respect their craft. They make quality woodies that can be enjoyed by enthusiast and GP alike. And they don't require 20% retracking every year. Considering that Six Flags is trying to rebrand into a family park chain, I think GCII coasters fit the bill exceptionally well. They're fun, don't take up much space, and are reasonably priced.

The Six Flags parks are designed for the people who just visit their home parks, not the coaster weirdos who try to hit every park in the chain. A single park will typically have one Batman and one Superman. They don't quite pull the comprehensive DC comics characters theme off, but they did do some very nice work with the Batman: The Ride inverts.

Yep. Even with coasters from 4 different parks they still fall short of Great Adventure. Heck, even if you consider MF a top 10 coaster (many people do) they still lose.

"...Easily the best wooden coaster in the U.S." said Robb. Let's see, what else. SFGAdv also has Kingda Ka, which at worst matches Top Thrill Dragster, and a few SF parks also have Superman: Ride Of Steel, which some say is better than Millennium Force. But maybe the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, which could be why Cedar Fair is consistently voted the #1 park in the world. SFGAdv also has Nitro, S:UF, Batman, and Medusa, which makes for a pretty damn awesome coaster collection. Cedar Point is consistently voted #1 by a bunch of gravy swilling ACErs who don't get out much. I can think of more than 10 parks I'd rather go to.

This is where I stop reading. I actually think guests can be controlled to some extent. I noticed that Great Adventure was doing some really corny sing-a-long MC stuff up by the fountains in front with the characters before they dropped the ropes to open up the park. They were also doing weddings, and prominently displaying this around the park. I think this type of environment might be unfavorable to the gang members that frequent this park. Also, building up the kiddie area and avoiding installing rides like KK that are just going to attract ghetto idiots helps. I also think that adding resort hotels can help improve the quality of your customers. Ghetto people don't tend to stay in $200/night hotels. Six Flags also need to up the pricing on their season passes.