DirkFunk

It's making all the right people angry, sometimes for reasons that have nothing to do with the piece. As someone who feels kinship to many provocateurs, I approve of that immediately.

Someone bumped a dead thread, but I have input, so what the hell? I worked several wood coaster with ratchet bars *including* Blue Streak, and I assure you that if the reason to add them was to prevent riders from standing up on the ride, it failed. The reason rides were retrofitted is because it reduced liability on the park's behalf by establishing that they had taken action that would better contain a theoretical incapacitated rider. That perhaps no one or very few people over thirty years had been rendered incapacitated was unimportant. Same with the possibility that someone might have fashioned themselves a lapbar key (you joke; I don't. People did that!) to free themselves anyways. Doing that shows intent, and showing provable intent on the part of the rider is great for insurance companies if that rider manages to get themselves mangled.

It's a Mondial. 110%.

What makes SDC isn't just that it has good coasters. It has good-great everything else. The amount of money that would need to be poured into WOF to get it to that level now that much of the original theming is long gone would cost millions and millions of dollars. This is to say nothing about the quality of the shows and food either...

Cedar Fair unquestionably invested money in the park. The key questions are: -Did the investments generate adequate return in revenue? -If they did not, was it because the investments made were poorly geared for the market or because the market under performed? 99% of discussions about theme park investment ends up in the smokescreen of "Something was done, and thus it was the right and best thing to be done at that time." These people aren't infallible. For all the years some had invested in the industry, some of them ultimately turned out to not be capable of making good high level decision making in specific instances. Often times this results in their very public departure. I sometimes say that any of us could have coached the Detroit Lions to an 0-16 season, and also any of us could have run Six Flags into bankruptcy or Cedar Fair into private capital ownership. It doesn't take skill or experience to badly screw up.

The Knott's swing is a smaller model with lousy capacity. But you know what? Any dry ride capacity will help on busy weekend days when stuff like the Trabant has a half hour wait.

There's truth in what both are saying. Charlotte looks like a smart market to spend money in: under served, growing at a prodigious rate. Worlds of Fun also, from the perspective of someone who has only seen it in recent times, is a theme park that looks like it took a ton of ill advised Cedar Pointizing in the Kinzel era. The Orient section of the park is tragic to see in its current state. There's a reason why the stock price dropped and Dick ended up getting the heave ho. To that end, shoring up existing infrastructure and making the place a more pleasant and coherent experience, IMO, seems to be the direction they should go in before choosing to chase Branson and St. Louis for tourists. What I see in the notes from Q&A is exactly that. Build more big coasters when the ones you have can generate lines Monday-Thursday.

I'm told people entering the park were given flyers indicating the presentation would happen in the water park. So, I think that answers the questions here. I'm gonna hope for a water coaster.

I feel the same way about Harry Potter. I never read the book and saw two movies, but I still grasp enough of it that it makes sense to me. No difference in "magic stuff" vs. "space stuff" in that sense to me. Putting the new land on a specific planet and having aliens work the gift shops tells me that those who see the movies will get a lot more out of it than those who don't. Everything I got out of the announcement, blue sky as it might be, indicates that they're going for something with that Potter level of depth and not just Tomorrowland with occasional Star Wars symbolism. This stuff all literally takes place in a different universe, after all. That's my attitude.

This is a great reason why I think this will do well. Yes, they are creating a Star Wars land, but they are also creating a Space Land, I believe they will do a great job of being relatable to the non-fans because everyone has a general understand of space and the concept of aliens. This land is just an alien world with space ships and wacky things going on. The only thing that would need explaining is the Force; which they may not even touch. In Harry Potter everything has to be explained, so there's a lot lost on the casual non-fan. C'mon. They're obviously going to do stuff with the Force and Jedis. They're suggesting aliens will run storefronts. Already, Jedi Academy features characters I know nothing about and Star Tours 2 is full of characters and references to the films that will be much better embraced by people who saw them than didn't. The overwhelming majority of people seem to be enjoying the Harry Potter stuff and I'm sure it'll be the same with Star Wars. But this isn't gonna be a generic "space land" with Star Wars stuff. C'mon.

If they don't do that kind of fan service, it'll take a beating and probably rightfully so.

The stuff you could add in: Enchanted Forest And Water Safari: http://www.watersafari.com/ It has some new stuff (I think Proslide), and it has some old crazy concrete slides a la Action Park. Heated water on almost all of them. If that wasn't enough, a well preserved Storybook Land, classic train, skyride, and more. New York State Fair: http://www.nysfair.org/. Wade Shows is providing the midway, and a full ride list is available here: http://www.wadeshows.com/event-details.asp?eventID=222. Notables include Comet II (former Old Indiana Schwarzcopf Wildcat), Mighty Mouse (Mount Olympus' Coma Inducing Wild Mouse), Space Roller (Mondial Top Scan), Delusion (Technical Park Pegasus), Flying Dutchman (Majestic built Flying Scooters attraction), Fabbri Mega Drop, and a whole lot more. Seabreeze's flume is better than Waldameer's. Hands down, no competition. I went on a bright and sunny Saturday last year for Memorial Day weekend, arrived at opening, and banged everything out. Concentrate on capacity lacking rides first if possible. My recollection is one half of the park opens an hour before the other, with the half that opens being the one with the flyers and wood coaster. The flyers are Bisch, they spin fast, but they don't snap. They engineered a shock absorber thing on the end of the cars to allow you to fly however you want without generating all the stress on the ride. It is actually pretty ingenious. Other must do's at the park are the carousel (has a heckuva back story, park also has a small museum in the building and, IMO, the train, which is all sorts of crazy looking. I familiarized myself with the Garbage Plate before heading out last year and ended up at Jimmy Z's in Brockport, NY. Basically, a garbage plate is an enormous thing of food with a bunch of condiment and side dish type items stacked on one another with a red hot and/or a burger patty stuffed in there too. It is a Rochester thing for the rest of us in America to shake our heads at. Mine was really good though.

My wife and I had been discussing Legoland as option as part of our time in Singapore, and honestly the 4.5 hours you spent in transit/immigration/customs loudly told us that we should pursue something else given the limited number of other attractions of appeal in Johor Bahru. Thanks a bunch; there's not a ton out there from coaster enthusiasts about it.

I'm not sure why they wouldn't have announced it with the rest of the land if it was coming. I'm just happy there will be a 40% increase in the number of mechanical rides at that park.

I'm sure Robb's heard about this for awhile like I have, and while I am excited about it, the long rumored opening dates of 2017 for Toy Story and 2020/2021 for Star Wars keep my enthusiasm a bit muted. 2021, if it ends up being true, is 6 years away. I'll be 38. Trying to be excited about a ride opening then is kinda impossible. I'm sure it'll all be good though. Slinky Dog looks like a (probable) Intamin version of Manta at SWSD and Firechaser Express. Should be fun.

Or if sharp/heavy objects are the problem, do the same there. Install lift cameras and have security watch it. *Arrest* people who intentionally attempt to injure others. It is, in fact, illegal. Use your biometrics to ban them from the park. Metal detectors are a lazy approach.

THIS A THOUSAND TIMES THIS. I don't care what the rationale is - "people had knives!" Man, it seems like there's a bigger issue there, huh? Maybe they should handle that in a different manner than treating everyone going on roller coasters as criminals? Sure seems to me like if knives were a problem there before, they'll probably be a problem somewhere else that doesn't have them in your parks soon after.

Some of the Orlando nerds saw this and suggested the idea of metal detectors based on Universal's use of them. There are times where I wish we could cut off Orlando and send it floating to join the rest of the Caribbean.

This. I'm going to guess that nobody on this forum is actually a "bug spray expert" and how it effects organisms nor do I actually believe that bug spray caused an entire bay to "go dark" (c'mon, really? you actually believe that?!??!) I'm going to side with the guides who do this for a living and are experts in the field. If they tell you to use bug spray, use it. I'm pretty sure they aren't going to recommend you do something that will kill future opportunities to do their tour. TBH the kind of scientists that would be experts on this are the sorts of people I go to concerts and have BBQs with these days, and I can tell you unequivocally that when in the field they rock 100% DEET. You can't do good science dead. That isn't to say it can't do damage. DEET can flat out melt plastic. But unless you get in the water and swim, I don't think it would be a problem. And who swims in mosquito infested water?

Well, by kayaking, I think the plastic boat is enough of a barrier to prevent a mixing of DEET with the water. A lot of the outfitters I've seen in the island of Puerto Rico and Vieques both highly suggest the use of bug spray. Better that than tropical diseases. *BUT* seriously I am way bummed out that this is not gonna be available the weekend my wife and I are in Orlando. I might have to plan a trip next year specifically for this.

I get the sense that Ferrari World hasn't been doing crazy business. Still, how busy can I expect it (or Yas Waterworld) to be on a weekend?

Franklin BBQ is legendary. Coopers in Llano and Salt Lick in Driftwood (near Austin) are also very good.

FWIW: I know coaster enthusiasts tend to totally overhype "brakeless" or "night rides". Actually working on a wood coaster and seeing how the times ran in daylight and night, dry vs. rain pretty much murdered all those tales for me. With that said, I've heard pretty compelling argument as to why trimming a coaster doesn't necessarily save on maintenance. Maybe in this case it does; I hope so for their sake. For my money, Voyage isn't a top tier or destination ride with the block on full. I've said my piece on it before. I'll probably spend my money at the more convenient Kentucky Kingdom with that rad RMC instead going forwards unless they build something really off the wall amazing. I'm sure they'll do just fine and so will I.

The Sandusky Register leaked the ride's identity months ago. It's cool that they got lots of people to play along with a game of "What is it gonna be?" since then. But how many people really had doubt after that?

Beat me to it. Actually really cool to see this happen. I'd like to see the state put a permanent carnival on Belle Isle next while they're at it.