kenban

There are two big LSM providers in the industry. Indrivetec who is used by Intamin, and Intrasys who is used by the majority of the rest of the industry. Indrivetec did Red Force. Intrasys typically uses parallel rows of stators, for instance Thunderbird at Holiday World uses two rows of stators and that is a very heavy train. My understanding is that you can just keep adding rows of stators as long as you have the proper spacing between them and room under the train for the permanent magnets. I would bet Intrasys could build a launch with 3 rows of stators that could easily power even a 20 person train to 120 MPH, it might not be as short as the current TTD launch, but it does not need to be because there is a lot of space available. Intamin very recently removed Dragster from their website. I suspect whatever is being done, Cedar Fair hired someone else to do the work. I cannot help but wonder if they talked B&M into designing custom trains, maybe something like the trains on Steel Dragon 2000, just 5 cars long.

Intamin drop towers did not originally have belts on them. They were added after an incident similar to this occurred at what is now California’s Great America but was at the time still owned by Paramount in I believe the late 90s. Just putting the blame on the tilt is a mistake, although I believe tilt definitely made it more likely to occur. I hate seeing accidents repeat. I would not be surprised to see the tilt removed, but I also expect Funtime to come to the same conclusion Intamin did, a seat belt between the riders legs connecting the OSTR to the seat is necessary. My understanding is this park is owned by a subsidiary of the manufacturer. Roughly a year since they had a cable break on the slingshot over at Old Town. Also a few years ago they had an employee death during maintenance on the sky flyer.

This makes zero difference, the park does not have insurance. The big chains in the country just pay for everything directly themselves. In this case all injuries, lawsuits, or settlements would be paid directly by Cedar Fair. Disney, Universal, and Six Flags all do this, it helps keep things out of the news. Injury and death lawsuits are extremely uncommon in the amusement park industry because of this, the companies tend to favor settlements and try to make a deal before anything makes it to court.

4 Six Flags parks including St Louis have removed Holiday in the park as a perk on the season pass sales webpage. Six Flags Great America, America, and New England also appear to be losing the event. The other parks with the event this year still list it as a perk.

The art makes it look like it’s going to GCI trains. Since they are going for a steam punk theme I wonder if it will be retracked using Titan Track?

Neither, the last major investment was in 2015. The Justice League dark ride. You might not consider it major but they were extremely expensive rides to build. Easily several million dollars. Enough to have built a decent affordable coaster.

https://www.denverpost.com/2021/09/24/glenwood-caverns-death-child-ride-operator-error/ Well investigators know exactly what happened and how it happened. The ride worked as designed and it was not an issue with the design. Reading this felt like reading the report after the accident on Smiler. The operators failed to unbuckle seatbelts from seats which were not occupied during the previous ride cycle. The girl sat on the belts and when the operators checked the belts they did not notice she was sitting on it. Then the ride generated an error and would not start the cycle. A second operator arrived and unlocked the belts, removed and reinserted the locking rods, without fixing the fact that one of the guests was sitting on the belts. Then they reset the rides system to reset the alarm and dispatched the ride.

I have not made it to Glenwood Caverns so I am unsure on the exact operation or design of the ride. But I am reminded of Soarin at Disney since it also only has a seat belt. What they do for smaller individuals is have a strap between the legs which you put the seatbelt through. Adults just ignore the strap since it is not needed. That would likely prevent a smaller individual from sliding downward or squirming out. Having said that no one should ever be forced onto a ride. I have no idea what the circumstances behind what happened are. But if the rider did not want to be there they should not be on the ride. Restraints are not there to protect you from yourself, they are there to keep you safe from the normal operation of the ride. There are a lot of rides, mostly older but they were designed with the idea of personal responsibility in mind. PTC Buzz Bars for instance.

From what I have read a county has to meet the requirements for a tier for 3 weeks before it qualifies which would actually allow a park to open. Right now only CGA would be allowed to open, no other park is located in a county in the correct tier. This whole reopening system still seems like garbage that’s not really based on what it should be. The rules as written allow CGA to open but require SFDK to stay closed which is just crazy. But then frankly shopping at a grocery store is likely more dangerous then visiting an outdoor amusement park.

The layout came out in December it will be located on a corner of the parking lot near the main parks entrance, and is based on similar lands that have already been built.

I have been hearing rumors for weeks that Herschend was in talks to acquire the park and had heard executives had been spotted touring the park recently. That map is pretty much a map of Herschend properties. Except I can cannot account for an extra circle to the west.

It is actually 2,160 feet of track that are being replaced, it was announced by the park at an event where they also discussed what sections were being replaced. It works out that only 2 or 3 elements will continue being topper track and the station. Although you are correct I would think they can get this done in time for the 2021 season.

Dollywood had a Q&A earlier today. Coaster Crew was there and posted on Twitter the magic number 2,160 feet of Lightning Rod is being replaced by I-Box, the ride is 3,800 feet long. So 57% of the track. Based on what I have heard it’s the launch through the first drop all going I-Box then a significant section of topper track. Just before the 45 degree banked hill it will become I-Box and stay that way through the brake run. So two sections of I-Box, and two of topper track, but the one will be very small just basically the station. So everything except the station visible from the park will be I-Box. This includes every area of the coaster I have every heard having problems, so I would assume it will be more reliable. It’s about what I had guessed when I heard about the work but the percentage of the ride and the number of feet of track being replaced still surprised me.

Your a little high, an empty Millennium Force train weighs in at 19 tons.

My speculation has been the launch, and high stress areas are going to be replaced with I-Box. As far as I know the dimensions of the track are the same. So it’s really just down to how they are connected together and frankly that does not seem that difficult. GCI just did something similar to White Lightning. Retracting the entire coaster seems unnecessary, but I have no idea how often maintenance is having to work on the track and structure. It also depends on how much of the track needs upgraded. The lightning strikes twice makes me suspicious of just how much work is planned, it gives me this feeling it’s going to be a lot more then I originally thought, or I am trying to read too much into a simple sign. I believe we will see the original front to the train return as well, I would think the removal will no longer be needed once it has been fixed.

Kings Island has two executive chefs, who are likely responsible for the increased food quality over the last year or two. But they have really stepped it up this year. A month or two ago they started doing special dinners on Saturday nights, they start serving at 5PM and stop when they run out of food. The menu is different every week and it is being cooked out in the open at Wishbone Grill on International Street. This week was Grilled Flank Steak, Chimichurri, Fire Roasted Sweet Peppers, Fried Plantains and Warm Tortilla. If anyone is at the park on a Saturday night this year I recommend at least checking it out. It’s even on the meal plan.

Replacing the launch track and high stress areas with IBox makes a lot of sense to me. IBox will hold tolerances a lot tighter then topper track and will spread the forces out across more of the support structure. For example if the train has had alignment issues with the launch or with the brakes IBox should help with those issues. It does not take much of a misalignment to cause serious issues on a launch. Plus the issues with what has been described by riders as potholes in the track, IBox would likely be a permanent fix. Most of the track is likely fine, but I could definitely see sections get replaced.

Not a local but when I was there for Holiday in the park in 2018 they ran basically everything. All of the coasters and major thrill rides were running. I had a great time, the lines were short and the food was better during the holidays then the regular season.

It’s actually not a bad location, just requires removing something. But it’s really unlikely to be a coaster. The park also just built dorms and the road the markers are on is the direct path from the parking lot to the dorms, likely they want to improve the road, maybe it’s just new lighting, maybe some security cameras, maybe even repair the road. It really just looks like infrastructure improvements.

I might be wrong about this but I was under the impression that Cedar Fair corporate leaves ride repainting decisions to the park level and are paid for by the parks budget. If that is accurate Carowinds likely placed a higher priority on the rides paint job then the other parks. Kings Island has been spending discretionary money on Restroom renovations for instance.

The second theatre has been used as a location for an HHN house for years now. They remove the seats and build a temporary floor before building the house. The cancellation came way too late to not perform this work. It takes several weeks to tear out everything and return the theatre to normal. Unless the park decided to not use this location it’s almost not possible the theatre is in one piece and usable right now.

^^ No idea where you got the idea most of the resorts are open... At Universal, Portofino Bay never reopened and Dockside has had its opening basically cancelled plus they announced a few days ago they are suspending operations at Sapphire falls, and Aventura hotels. So half their resorts will be closed. Disney World has 30 resorts, only 15 are open to the public, and NBA players are staying at 3. The list of closed resorts is pretty long, and a handful have reopening dates but they keep getting pushed later and later. I suspect a lot of the crowds are just locals, or at least people within driving distance. Universal has been offering deals to Florida residents. Kings Island has been seeing pretty big upticks in attendance on the weekends, last Saturday it was pretty busy with hour plus long lines on most of the big rides. I have heard reports Cedar Point is seeing a similar gain on the weekends at least.

They also want to open Knott’s, although that’s year round typically. The big 4 parks, Knott’s, Cedar Point, Kings Island, and Canada’s Wonderland combined provide 80 percent of the chains profits. It’s down to profitability, they can make money at a much lower percentage of regular attendance then the other parks. Same reason why even parks that did open are closing earlier in the season then normal, except for Cedar Point and Kings Island. I doubt the park will have haunt or winterfest, the chain already cancelled it for the rest of the parks.

Kinda, they are honoring ones already sold, so the fast lanes are open and people are using them. But they are not selling more, due to ride capacity, at least at Cedar Point. Other parks like Kings Island are selling fast lane.

Ed Hart has publicly stated a dislike of launched coasters and that he does not intend to install one in the park. The chances of the attraction being a launched coaster are very small. Anyways the permits filed by the park state Raptor and I have seen nothing which even suggests any involvement by Intamin.