Gutterflower

Found some more pics. still a month old though Source: http://bj.happyvalley.cn/bbs/dispbbs.aspx?id=43198&boardid=4&page=1 Loving that first hill The RCDB has some slightly older ones here http://www.rcdb.com/9140.htm?p=0

Hey guys Just came across these pics of the World Joyland flyer supports being pieced together. Source: http://www.cnhzdd.com.cn/newEbiz1/EbizPortalFG/portal/html/InfoContent.html?InfoPublish_InfoID=c373e9280f1acda98ffa743cf145098d Not quite sure why the pieces for the support are all together on the ground but I will let you speculate on that.The report also says that the first delivery of parts should have arrived on the 5th of May.

I seem to remember that the yellow B&M track with the XWorks stamp on it was supposed to be for 2nd part of the long delayed Expansion to Ocean Park in Hong Kong and that it has already shipped and is waiting in storage. If anyone has access to First Drop Magazine i swear it was in there somewhere a few months back. Or am i just talking out of my arse?

Hey guys Just came across this news on a few Chinese Sites. Looks like Wuhan in China is working on getting its own version of France's Futuroscope Park. As with all chinese news its probably worth taking it with a pinch of Salt. But in the interests of reporting the news I include a Dodgy Translation and link Below Source: http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&sl=zh-CN&tl=en&u=http://www.chinaparks.cn/html/20100131/1029221.html&prev=_t&rurl=translate.google.com&usg=ALkJrhjzZvT3LecewcXChKhAVg_yWq0gBw Can't say i know much about the current Futuroscope park but it sounds like a good concept. ADMIN EDIT: I just updated the main title to include "NEWS:" at the front. Thanks for finding this for us!

Looks like the first of China's 2 launched S&S coasters is already pretty far into construction. Can't wait to see the layout of this one. Source: http://www.rcdb.com/9140.htm?p=27018 Apparently the Shenzhen version will have a different layout too.

It's not much. but there is a 2nd render on the new press releases. Looks like a clone... but its still not 100% proof Source: http://www.changzhou.gov.cn/czportal2008web/Default/InfoDetail.aspx?CategoryID=3c494f29-ff60-4eff-b47e-81b29c538e7b&InfoGuid=af738a1f-8c4e-4300-be4b-73e469c4c7b1

Well that was odd. Pretty amusing though. Loved the giant hotel monster and the green dude being helped up by the kid

thanks for sharing. Before today I didn't know Portugal had any parks. It has always struck me as odd that a city as big and as nice as Lisbon doesn't have its own major park

Nice to see a bit more news about this This is the park that has already built the first Vekoma Big Air. There is a topic here about the coasters http://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=52497&p=807469&hilit=EDA#p807469 However as this is a newer topic and bit of news Cracking picture. Source: http://forum.canonfans.biz/viewthread.php?tid=58807 Great page here with tons of pics on the themeing and such Source: http://speedbug.pixnet.net/blog/post/25723568 Lovely Rock Themeing on the rather large flume ride Massive statue infront of the Vekoma Big Air Coming down the road towards the park

http://www.rcdb.com/9038.htm Looks like the park will also be opening China's Second Maurer Sky Loop of the year in 2010 and a LSM X-Car in 2011 to boot. Along with the S&S launched coaster at happy valley Shenzen is getting busy. From a quick look around their site the setting of this park is just stunning. They have a Horseshoe walk like at the Grandcanyon and one of the most beautiful hotels I've seen in a long time.

/\ I think you may have missed the humor in that statement slightly

As if a 4D wasn't enough the park is adding A Motocoaster this year and a as yet unknown looper. (don't want to stoke the fire too much but did we ever find where that yellow B&M track went?) http://www.rcdb.com/9037.htm It appears there is an investment of 2.3 Billion Yuan being spread around 2 sites which includes Dinosaur Park. Source: http://news.dichan.sina.com.cn/2010/01/27/116569.html However I'm not sure if the Chinese use the British or American version of 1 Billion so I'm unsure how that equates into dollars really. I think it comes out as $335 million

Never one to turn down an opportunity of a good Chinese Coaster Web hunt I dug up a couple of news article from the Chinese Press. Could be a proper rendering of just a S&S stock cgi image. Sources: http://news.ifeng.com/mainland/201002/0209_17_1542923.shtml http://china.gansudaily.com.cn/system/2010/02/09/011454789.shtml There's also a lot of stories about the massive expansion of this park in the future (a 4D is a big step up from a single spinning wild mouse) There's some crude CGI of the new area opening this year in May Source: http://i.dayoo.com/news/v2-news-china/57400/201001/19/57400_100808055.htm

If it is a Chinese park I'd put money on it NOT being for Ocean Park, Although they are expanding they are getting a Mack Powered ride next year and strongly rumored B&M after that. (admittedly it is only a rumor but I believe it popped up in the ECC magazine which is usually pretty accurate). The New World Joyland Park in Guangzhou seems to be built at least partially on a hill but they have seemingly announced their coasters already (B&M and Maurer) and there's no woodie in the concept art. http://www.jiaziworld.com/html/JoyLand_About.html So My bet is... I have NO idea.... wow what a rubbish climax to a post.

Could be China already has 1 working Vekoma motorbike, 1 under contruction and one rip off which doesn't work because they can't get the launch to work properly (see image below) they also have/had a transportable model of the Zamperla Motorbike in Nanhu. http://homeimg.focus.cn/upload/photo/zw_photos/1728/270/2706512.jpg (if it says access denied then refresh) But I'm not sure on the proximity of those to this new ride. After all China is a BIG country. Overall its a nice variation on the motorbike coaster and nice to see a new layout

Love the Waterslide/Coaster adds as well as the gorilla cadbury one. Wasn't so keen on the Airport race one when it came out. Honda are another one who impress me with their Adverts http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NJ-OwywZZ8 Did you guys never get these in the USA? i always just sort of assumed you would

Im not so sure on this. For example check the final one when the ride brakes on the entrance to the station. yes the camera skips slightly but the clouds dont move more than a few seconds rather than a whole 20mins. You can clearly see the clouds moving at quite a speed on the video afterwards. The same with the Camera on the end spike. Look closely and the clouds dont change. The camera reacts to the change in light but if you compare the clouds on the entrance and exit to the spike they appear the same. I use a thin dark whip of cloud on the left which is visible as the camera adjusts. The skip in the return loop is obvious but i think its just a few missed frames as the camera again adjusts. I think the answer is probably just a dodgy camera. It dows cut out at times but it doesnt appear to be 2 videos stiched together. Just my 2pence Anyway I like the look of this. Its brilliantly original and really mixes it up. ive love the look of them since seeing this. must give some awesome air

In a way they are. but as far as layouts go they appear to be a bit of a step up from your standard rollerskater style family coaster This one at Märchenpark Neusiedlersee looks awesome

Although its been on the RCDB for some time construction of Chimelong Paradise's (China) new Mack YoungStar coaster has started recently Source: http://www.gd.chinanews.com.cn/2009/2009-12-21/2/33820.shtml Not the biggest story of the year but the youngstars do look superb.

Although not strictly about this coaster this chinese blog post is quite interesting http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&sl=zh-CN&tl=en&u=http://hi.baidu.com/tetsunesonicthehedgehog/blog/item/ca22b421f309874eac34deb2.html&prev=_t&rurl=translate.google.com&usg=ALkJrhjVgI5dLI99Ax6_T4qIfxk_mgQUBg The blog is talking about Walter Bolligers speech at the Chimelong Paradise Dive Machine ride opening ceremony where Walter clearly said the ride was 60m tall (in english) and when the Chinese Park Representatives made their speeches they referred to it as 80m We all know Chinese parks do tend to exaggerate stats but its interesting to read about it so blatantly. Something to keep in mind with the coaster in this topic.

Where am i?

Thought I would take a look at this. Seems like the Danish do extremely well for themselves. But us Brits just edge out the Netherlands.

Hey all I do a fair amount of research for the RCDB and have often thought as the database how much information it actually holds. For us Enthusiasts is an invaluable tool but I thought I would take a look a bit deeper into the world of coasters and provide some mostly pointless graphs and stats. Notes: All work done on this (with one exception) is done using ONLY operating coasters and using all coasters in the RCDB (powered and gravity) so depending what your definition of a coaster is the stats may not be quite accurate. Another point to make is that the DB is not infallible, the older data is clearly less reliable and there will be things missing. I also understand my maths is not perfect so if you spot an error let me know and I will endeavor to correct it However lets get on with it and lets see some pointless stats For starters i decided to have a look at some of the major coaster companies in the world and see how they rate against each other in terms of coaster numbers. This table shows coaster numbers and percentages for B&M, Intamin, Vekoma, GCI and the now defunct CCI. I would have taken Gravity group over CCI but they just don't have the coaster numbers yet. Most interesting for me here is that Vekoma have built almost 10% of the worlds currently operating coasters in the DB (over 10% of steel alone). That's a hell of a lot and will make some people shudder. CCI despite being defunct for a while still have a sizable chunk of the wood market with GCI playing catchup. Intamin don't fare to shabbily thanks to their almost complete domination of the Asian Market for wooden coasters. Running with this i took a look at where Vekoma have their rides. (sorry for the awful colours) Not much unexpected here though. Asia, Europe and USA have the biggest chunks with the rest of the world following. I expect to see Asias Chunk increase rapidly in the next few years though. Next up i took a look at the worlds non-sit-down coaster types. Unfortunately the DB groups Dive-Machines and Hypers into the sit-down category so they are not included. (something i may sort out 2mo if i get time) however even with this data the Inverted Coasters in the world would have a serious lead. The 4D's in this graph do include Intamin Ball Coasters, Its nice to see stand-ups holding their own even after this long. With Chang Currently out of operation the number could go up again soon Taking a closer look at B&M's statistics we can clearly see they have spent most of their time on Inverted coasters although Dive Machines and Flyers have really started to proliferate recently. There are very few product lines compared to Intamin below but then that's what B&M do, And they are good at what they do. However when we compare this to Intamin we see some interesting trends. As most enthusiasts know B&M only have one launched ride where as Intamin for Intamin its their main product line. Hyper/Mega/Giga coasters come a distant 2nd with their sitdown loopers actually gaining bronze. (I included Jet-Ski Rescue as a Launch not an Aquatrax) Next up i looked at the industry as a whole and how many new coasters we have seen in the last 25 or so years. Obviously older data is going to be a bit suspect but it made a pretty graph. Included is the data for new coasters in USA, Japan, UK and Germany as well as an overall number. Clearly the US leads the way still with the rest of us fighting away down the bottom 2000 was a great year across the world but interestingly the USA saw its peak in 1999, This made me wonder about who really about who is luckiest to live where in terms of coasters. So i got some area data and figured out coasters/km^2. This graph surprised me a bit with the UK and Japan coming out top. But then I realized America is mostly Cities tied together with road, (there's quite a lot of empty space out there) As most parks are near urban centres this is not very accurate but it's something for us Brits to think about and stop moaning about our coasters I followed this up and decided to ignore area. I thought population might be a better figure to work with and figured out many coasters there are per person. Again the UK finished Top but the USA rocketed up to 2nd. The Australians did a bit better out of this too. Finally something completely pointless to round this up for now. The number of coasters with a given element can be seen here. Cobra Rolls are undoubtedly given a boost thanks to Vekomas Boomerang but the Batwing could do with more representation in my opinion. More pointless graphs to follow if i get time Hope you enjoyed it Cheers Dave

It does have the "Magic Roundabout" A nightmare for most Brits let alone Americans. But apart from that Swindon in my experience is bland and boring. odd choice.

This ride is actually the same as the one in this thread http://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=52948&highlight=global+digital+carnival If you look at the CGI image in that thread you will see an artists representation of the flyer. As far as the layout of the ride I believe Duane got the info on the layout directly from B&M while at IAAPA. I know he was waiting to add the ride to the DB until after he confirmed it with them.