WolfBobs

When will people realize that almost ALL B&M installations done with CF have been done around the same exact time? It's not early, it's on schedule as planned. Finishing in Jan/Feb is common. Fury was finished Jan 30th. Gatekeeper was Feb 27th. Banshee was Jan 23rd. Leviathan was in Feb sometime. And so on...! Please don't ruin enthusiast conspiracy theories... It's not like CF strives to actually have their rides open with the parks opening day and on rare occasions miss them. It's not like they choose to open new attractions after Memorial Day like another regional chain.

Okay okay.. no need to bad mouth Golden Corral. I would actually love if Midway Market could come close to the quality at Golden Corral!

Throwing in the Italian food offered at BGW as another exception but I would agree with you. I tend to stay away from anything heavier than pizza when at parks. BUT if CP could offer BGW level quality Italian dishes ( like that would ever happen) I could change my mind. Also, whatever goes into Midway Market's location I'm hoping it would have some options on the dining plan, as more options outside of burgers, hot dogs and chicken tenders are always welcome. Assuming we will get an "official" announcement at Chill Out in February.

Would love to see a fast fire'd pizza place like PizzaFire or Blaze show up at the park. That would be a perfect location as it would fit two of the giant ovens that cook a pizza in 180 seconds. They move through lines very quickly and the pizza is actually quite good. Since the park has been working closely with the LeBron James Family Foundation and James is a huge investor in Blaze I wouldn't be shocked to see one show up at the park.. It would definitely be a huge upgrade over the current pizza options.

The ride was unique for it's time and a step towards improving the flying concept from it's big brother Stealth. My feels for it being demolished are solely because I worked on it's crew for it's inaugural season as X-Flight at GL (SFWoA at the time). It was a fun and honestly challenging ride to operate compared to your average coaster. A lot of great memories. Onto 2020 however and the hype train for what may be replacing it!

Personally I'd love to see KK be one of the first American parks to invest in some new generation Vekoma rides. Maybe work a deal to re-track T3 like Morey's did with Great Nor'Easter and some new trains as well as add a new gen looper like Lech. https://rcdb.com/11034.htm A man can dream!

Yes, yes it is...

Yeaaaa.. the likelihood of either of those two parks getting one are low. But assuming with the low cost of these smaller GG woodies ya think if those two (or similar) parks would consider new coasters anytime in the next decade or 3 these rides would be legitimate candidates.

^Not gonna lie... that white with red looks seeexy. Also, can more park invest in these family GG woodies? MIA, Dorney? Please? Thanks!

^Yes, the parks that have the FL+ option usually keep the newest attractions on that. As well as some of the lower capacity attractions (Electro-spin at Carowinds is a FL+ ride). For example, CP has their 3 newest from the ground up coasters on FL+ as of 2018. Gatekeeper, Valravn and Steel Vengeance. You can plan on Copperhead Strike to be on FL+ as well as Fury 325 staying on there for 2019.

Since your trip is booked you can always buy the Fastlane online and save yourself time and usually a little bit of money.

Thanks everyone for the feedback! I've been pushing the Hotel Breakers stay for all the obvious reasons but not my money so... I do believe the plan is to get Platinum passes so that will give them at minimum the parking and early entry perks. Anywho, thanks again for all the help!

I've only been there once (from Germany) and can highly recommend Breakers if the go for a once-in-a-lifetime-trip (or better once for a long time), because it halps you really getting on everything and having the option to go back, take a nap, avoid the midday ruhs and heat and use your time. Sure it's expensive. But for us, it was worth it. The room was great. We were there for three and a half days, went to the park at 10 or 11 am, went for a nap around 3 pm, took the last ride on eacht coaster in the middle of the night and were in bed only 20 minutes after leaving the train. Just so convenient. As long a we will go there, we'll use Breakers. If they will be to the Point more often and have probably Platinum Passes they may go to hotels off ground. Coasterbill has some good advices here. I already recommended the park owned properties due to all the added benefits but with travel and what not those hotels are a little out of the price range for their current trip budget. Not completely ruled out but they definitely want to explore more budget friendly options before making decisions. Thank you for your advice!

Hey guys random question here. I know I can scroll through the thousand plus pages for this info but I kinda wanna be lazy and ask anyways cause I'm trying to help a friend from the UK research a trip. I have never stayed in any hotel in Sandusky or on property so I have no idea. I just know some can be real hell holes. I'm really curious if any of you who travel and stay off property can list the hotels to avoid like the plague. And if anyone has any suggestions for clean, affordable accommodations as well. But the more important information is honestly the hotels to avoid. Thanks! (They are pricing out park owned properties but would like some other options too)

I've never understand why enthusiasts hate dive coasters so much. Shiekra is at my home park so I know it pretty well (rode Griffin and Valravn before but don't remember them that well). With Shiekra, what's not to love about two intense weightless drops, an immelman with hangtime, a tunnel, and a water splash effect? Not so sure, I think a lot of enthusiasts still just get caught up in "bigger, faster, better" and don't stop to just enjoy each ride for what it is and what it brings to the park it's in. I have been on 4 dive coasters and love each one and I'm looking forward to this as much as I'm looking forward to Yukon Striker at CW. The other thing we should be excited about is what rides like this symbolize for the direction the SW parks are headed. It appears that rides and coasters will be a focus to get these parks...caught up let's say in the rides department. We already know 2019 and 2020 will be exciting years for the SW and BG properties, the next ten or so could be a very exciting period of growth.

I personally love B&M Dive coasters. This was kinda out of left field since it wasn't included in any prior released document. Nevertheless I'm super stoked for this ride and it has moved SWSD up from a "I'll go one day" park to probably something I'll plan for in 2020-21. Definitely will try to include this park on my next SoCal trip!

You watch your mouth! I absolutely LOVED the Scooby Doo Ghoster Coaster! I was 17 the first time I rode it and loved every second including the random hard stop in the middle!

Made it down for my first Winterfest experience this past Saturday (Dec 22) and I'll have to admit I really enjoyed myself, about 100x more than I thought I would! Enough people here have posted tons of pics and I don't really take any when I go to parks but the park really knocked it out with the lights, decorations and re-themes for the shops and food stands. I wasn't even too disappointed in the rides line up. Rode Flight of Fear and Mystic Timbers once each (my nephews took multiple spins thanks to the single rider lines) and a few flats. But once we ate, did the ice skating and shopped around a bit time really flew. If I was local I would definitely hit Winterfest more than once cause for what it is, with the all activities, shows, etc it could could be a multi-day event. In fact I heard multiple families say they would be back next weekend. I think CF really has a winner on their hands. Personally, I would love to see a few more rides open for next season. I'm sure the new antique cars will be open with lights to drive through. Maybe 1 side of Racer or Backlot. But honestly I didn't even notice the limited ride line up too much just cause I was having such a good time doing everything else available. Didn't even see half the park! Can't wait to see these events grow through out the coming years.

And that's fine. Let me ask you: Do you think New Jersey would not have it regulated multiple times in the 232 pages of amusement industry regulations (I cheated and looked already, obviously) that parks defer to operations manuals provided to them by the manufacturers? Alternately, do you think it's possible that there was a determination made in-house by someone at CF as to what "safe operating temperature was" which was above the possibly nonexistent such figure provided by the manufacturer? Consider the preponderance of evidence for a moment. I'm not telling you that it isn't true, but I'm just asking you to think critically. Which do you think sounds better to tell a front line employee (who will then interact with guests outside the closed ride): "Maintenance determined that the ride was unsafe to run because of temperatures" *OR* "management would like to skip staffing this attraction if possible to save a few bucks at the end/beginning of the season when crowds would be expected to be light, ergo it's closed, please visit our souvenir stand"? Oh I'm not saying you're wrong. And I'm not saying the 40 degree temp is right. Not even trying to argue as I think it's ridiculous. I'm just saying what I know from experience and what we were told from our maintenance guys. Is it true? I don't know. Could they just be over cautious so they don't have to do an evac on a ride that didn't complete it's course? Maybe. There were plenty of mornings we tried to test run in late October and trains wouldn't make it through the course. First runs for each train were always white knuckle hoping you'd see it hit the brake runs! The 40 degree mark we used could have easily come from an insurance lawyer who decided what was best. But this could be settled easily with some interviews! A lot of industry fan websites and vlogs have been interviewing ride designers like the gentlemen from B&M, Intamin, Vekoma and RMC, someone should ask! I'd love to see some ride/park urban legends put to rest from the designers themselves!

Here is what I know. I worked as a ride operations supervisor for GL for a few seasons during the CF era. We were flat out instructed by maintenance not to begin test running rides until temperatures were above 40f and that that was the recommendation from B&M and other ride manufacturers. Was this listed in our SOP? I honestly can't remember. And our SOP's (Standard Operating Procedures) were written in house based off the recommendations from every ride manufacturer. I never once saw an original ride manual for any ride in the park and most SOPs at the time were carry overs from the pre-SF days or the SF days. (ironically some terminated SF management took SOPs with them and we had to rewrite a lot of the ones we used based off tribal knowledge) A lot of times an SOP would be typed up from being on-site with the engineers and being taught to operate the rides from them. I was there when XF was being installed for example. We would then take that info and write our manuals. So I can't confirm or deny the fact that there is a written recommendation on operating temps. But even as an operator we were told that 40 degree mark was the magic number. Again probably doesn't help since we know some parks and some chains operate below this mark but while I was at a CF park we were forbidden to start testing if it was below that mark.

Not sure how good these deals are but Kennywood does have some decent deals online for their holiday sale. $33 one day tickets valid until September 15th. Anyone in the 55+ crowd looking for a one day ticket the holiday special is $13! Not bad in my opinion.

I guess it depends on your definition of "thrilling" as this is a small park rebuilding after being closed down and most rides and coasters removed. I wouldn't expect a B&M, Intamin or anything huge and expensive for sometime. But as stated before a small eurofighter like Tantrum at Darian Lake would be perfect here. Also I would love to see a SBF Visa Spinner or a GG family woodie. Those would all be amazing, cost effective additions that would help this park continue it's amazing success story. But Dan Koch has been very transparent with their growth strategy and it is waterpark and family friendly focused. If you're hoping for a giant B&M Hyper in the short near future you're gonna be very disappointed.

6th if we are only counting traditional lift hill gigas. 5th North American giga so I guess that could fit.

^ That's a rhino (edit: you corrected yourself lol) Amazing so far! Thanks for the updates and hard work!

Screamscape is reporting on FB that Scandia Family Fun Center and Bowcraft have quite a few rides and attractions up for sale including some steel family coasters for decent prices. Wouldn't mind seeing some of these make their way to ASA to help round out their dry side. In a cost effective manner. Even if they were open gradually over 2-3 seasons as rides are rehabbed. I'd love to see an SBF Visa Spinner open up here. A nice solid family coaster. Then some attractions on the wet side as well. Love how this park is growing. But lets keep expectations real, the tweet said "additions" so maybe two new chairs and an umbrella to go between them!