Double0Kevin

^Phantashialand River Quest (I don't have a photo to post, someone else feel free)

You work for the media...

Entenmann's products because it sounds like Intamin. Dry cleaner's moving rack. BART Trains... or any kind of train for that matter. Buildings that have been recreated at parks (Many in San Francisco are present at Disney and Universal Parks, also Legoland's Mini-Land) My alarm on my phone because it's the on-board song from California Screamin' Shopping Carts at grocery stores because when I was little I pretended they were the jeeps from Indiana Jones and would swerve them out of the way just before I ran into things will whistling the theme song.

In the past they opened for the season on a Sunday. But the Saturday was a SP preview day. I'm sure they will do a Media Day event prior to opening day or at least early in the day before opening it to guests like SFDK does.

You would be surprised. When I was working the Skycoaster at SFDK, we used to get pretty backed up even with two flight lines, and we had a 100ft ride so the ride length is less than the larger ones. We could get backed up 1-2 hours sometimes because of the demand. Don't underestimate the popularity of the Skycoaster. haha.

When I went last summer, I enjoyed the park. I did everything in half the day and left to explore D.C. But overall I thought the park was pretty much what I expected it to be. I agree Superman was the best ride with Wild One being a surprising close second.

I just had my ass handed to me. 11/20 but half those right answers were guesses.

I feel like SFDK has destroyed everyone in the Bay Area's perception of when a ride can open. Almost every attraction CGA has built opened on opening day of the season. Even Stealth opened on April 1 which was the opening day in 2000 (Albeit it probably should have opened in 1999, but we won't blame CGA for that one). I've never once worried about this thing not opening on time. You have to remember that GCI is essentially the B&M of wood coasters. Once everything is put together... it works, from the start. I wouldn't doubt that we see this thing making test runs in early to mid-February.

While waiting to board Manta at SWO, This group in front of me pointed to the other station and said it was for a different track. Later when we got off one of the girls says "Yeah, the other track dunks you underwater and gets you wet." Her friend responds "Oh, lets not do that one." I just shook my head.

I still can't believe CGA is finally getting a new ride. It's so surreal. Can't wait to get on this thing.

Most of them have just been moved to a new park, but I seem to have done quite a bit. Space Mountain 1.0 - Disneyland Hurricane - SCBB (Moved) Tony Hawk - SFDK (Moved) Zonga - SFDK (Moved) Tidal Wave/Greased Lightning - CGA Invertigo - CGA (Moved) Stealth - CGA (Moved) Son of Beast - KI Wildcat - CP Disaster Transport - CP Psyclone - SFMM Deja Vu - SFMM (Moved) High Roller - Stratosphere Speed: The Ride - Sahara I think that's it.

Manta at SeaWorld Orlando on Saturday. Absolutely loved it. It was way more intense than I had expected and much more enjoyable than Tatsu in my opinion.

Wow, I haven't really payed much attention to this park. But looking at this photos, I am very impressed. I 'm not at all a fan of water parks myself, but it at least looks very impressive.

Universal already has quite a bit of land. If anything I could see them rebuilding some of their sound stages utilizing current technology to fit more useable space into smaller footprints of land, thus freeing up land to expand to. Also They can do this with rides too, look at transformers which essentially the same length as Spider-Man, but in a much smaller footprint of land by utilizing the 2 floor layout. Honestly, if they bought the golf course (which I now agree, after reading more into it, is not going to happen) I would think it's more likely they keep it as a golf course to enhance their "resort" offerings. That said, it's not going to happen so we'll see what happens with what they already have, eventually.

^You sure ranked Alpengeist pretty low despite your username and avatar.

The problem is, when you have Universal and Disney down the road, does even an awesome flat ride compete with Harry Potter or Carsland? Magic Mountain is in a location where they need something unique to market, and giant coasters is really all they have. It competes by giving something to do to families and not just teenagers and adults. People that spend more money are always families but it's easy to alienate them by offering nothing for the young kids or less thrill inclined adults to do. Yes, for us coaster enthusiasts it's fantastic, but I find it funny that SFDK generates more revenue for Six Flags than SFMM does and it's about half the size with a lot less operating days.

Spaceship Earth totally took my by surprise when I rode it last week. I had never heard much about it, and what I did was mostly that it's boring. I absolutely loved it and rode it more than anything else on the trip.

Windseeker is closed until Feb. 1. They announced a date? I thought it was a wait and see sort of thing.

I remember the waterslide incident. As my college freshman roomate's good friend was one of the people on that waterslide when that happened. He seemed pretty messed up from it happening. I was a big theme park person back then and couldn't believe it when he was telling the story. I also remember that one well, as I went to the High School that was involved in the accident. We had a scholarship awarded every year in memory of Quimby Ghilotti, the girl who died in the accident. My class (2005) was actually the first senior class allowed to go to theme park for their Senior trip after that happened. We did the Disneyland Grad Night.

I caught a glimpse of the royal people the other day. Didn't stop to watch much as I was on a mission for food at the time, but the people around seemed to be enjoying them a lot. Streetmosphere seems to be getting more and more popular at parks with themed areas, and it really does enhance the experience. Good to see MK really pushing the offerings in New Fantasyland.

^Don't hold you breath out front by X2, That's the park's picnic areas. Big money makers for parks when large groups visit like company outings and what not. SFMM is far from being tapped out on land, they just get creative on where to put stuff (see Full Throttle). But that place does NOT need new coasters. They need to round out their offerings with flat rides and other attractions as well as fix up the crap they already have. Some of those rides could use some serious love (not that I expect them to get it).

The only thing I could see ever potentially happening is moving sound stages to the golf course and freeing up land in the lower lot for the theme park. I say this because the sound stages are relatively quiet and wouldn't cause many issues to the neighbors next to the golf course. The issue would be the eye sore which might be able to be worked around if Universal for ways to disguise the buildings a-la Indiana Jones at Disneyland or something... But in the long run, yeah, I don't see it happening. I guess we'll find out eventually, but I think if anything we'll see repositioning within the existing land owned to try and shoehorn in new attractions.

I can back this up. I was Senior Site Controller for a while at a Six Flags park, I had to complete A LOT of that paperwork and fax it in every month. The training and certification on those rides are no joke. To be a "Site Controller" you have to know the 250+ page manual pretty much forwards and backwards. You have to spend a certain amount of training time operating the ride, and then a rep from Skycoaster comes out tests you with both written and practical tests. You don't have to be a Site Controller to operate the ride, but a Site Controller must always be present at the ride when it's in operation. I don't know of any ride that is probably safer both in it's design and with the training to operate.

Going back to Big Thunder at DL, I think that has to be one of the worst because of the monumental failure on so many employees. I remember reading the OSHA safety report after the investigation had been completed. Not only had the safety cables not been attached properly in the event of a coupling failure (which is what happened), but the operators who reported hearing unusual noises coming from the train approximately 12-13 cycles and never removed the train from service. It's scary to think that they had so many opportunities to prevent the problem and someone ended up loosing their life. Another one I remember was shown to us at a Skycoaster convention a few years back where they played a video of why they have policies about shutting down in high winds (we weren't told what park it was, but they no longer have a Skycoaster and it wasn't in the US). Basically a young girl around 11 was made on swig through the structure and on on her way back she was blown into the flight tower going nearly 60mph. I believe she made a full recovery, but still something that has stuck in my head and pretty terrible.

You do in China! I see them at Disneyland all the time. They aren't too uncommon actually (though I hear more so in China). No to mention the Lions and Tigers at SFDK and the other various animal parks!