Steely Dan

Given Togo's track record, I don't doubt that Viper was a terrible coaster, but I never got a chance to experience its awfulness. I have however ridden Big Apple/Manhattan Express (another Togo trainwreck) and rank it as my least favorite coaster I've ridden of all time. For those that have ridden both, how much worse was SFGadv's Viper compared against Big Apple/Manhattan Express?

I'd say that the worst coaster i've ever experienced was Big Apple Coaster (Manhattan Express). It's the only time I've ever gotten off of coaster and said to myself "well, I'll never ride that again".

at 5.5 hours away, I don't consider HW to be a day trip from chicago. That's a total of 11 hours of driving AND going to an amusement park in between all in one day? No thanks, that has hotel stay written all over it for me. Chicago doesn't have a ton in that 3 hours or less range, but stretching it just a bit further to 5-6 hours, you can get to valleyfair, adventureland, SFStl, holiday world, Kentucky kingdom, king island and cedar point, so it's not the end of the world, the really good parks just require a bit more time and money. But the east coast is still where it's at for park density, which directly stems from the fact that it's the most densely populated region in the country as well. As you move west through the country, things gradually get pulled further and further apart until you get to the Pacific Coast and all of the milions of people piled up there.

#eastcoastproblems I look at what's within a ~3 hour drive of chicago and there's obviously the biggie, SFGAm, but outside of that, the secondary day-trip roller coaster parks are Michigan's Adventure, Indiana Beach, and everybody's favorite whipping boy, Mt. Olympus. There are certainly much worse problems to have than having a place like Dorney as your fifth option "local" park.

And that's after rocketing down a steep 100+ ft. drop from an outward banked airtime hill. This ride keeps looking like so much damn fun! I'm very happy to see that our favorite twitter account is back in business.

I once rode a sheet of plywood down ~75' of gently sloping roller track in a warehouse facility. COUNT IT!

Somewhere on this planet, at this very moment, coasterbill's head is exploding into a fantastic supernova.

That's one crazy shot of the point, thanks for posting! It took me a while to figure out the orientation because MF's lift hill is viewed straight-on and gets tangled up with Valravn's lift. If there's a more impressive roller coaster skyline anywhere else on our planet, I'd like to see it.

What a travesty that would have been, not only for the loss of whizzer itself, but also for the likely loss of most of the wonderful trees and other plants that have grown in and around whizzer over the past 4 decades that help make it the best night ride in the park. Whizzer was wonderful back in the day with 5 train operation and before seatbelts, but the fact that it now runs its course through a literal forest is pretty fantatstic too. Thank god that management reversed course and saved this masterpiece.

I feel the same way. Corkscrew is bad, but it's not THAT bad. I usually ride it once per visit. Not that it's so bad, other arrows were deff worse, just ya know it isn't that good, not enough for me to ride it again. I just don't bother. Right, it's no longer a high-octane thrill ride by today's standards like it was when it opened 4 decades ago, but it's not an objectively bad ride (it's just really short), and it still fills a niche in the CP line-up. And the iconic corkscrews over the midway are beautiful and provide perhaps the best coaster/midway interaction moment in the entire park. Those kinds of design touches help make amusement parks a little bit more fun for everyone, both riders and spectators alike. I'd hate to lose that. And Corkscrew's biggest problem, just like all other old arrow/vekoma multi-loopers, are those damn rigid horse collar OTSR's that seem specifically engineered to induce headaches. If the train change on blue hawk/ninja is as dramatic as people here have reported, then I think such trains could transform a lot of these older arrow rides into perfectly serviceable medium thrill coasters for all of the park-going 6 - 10 year-olds who might feel ready to stand up to the challenge of their very first upside-down coaster. A great amusement park like CP needs to be WAY more than just all extreme thrills all of the time.

I don't think the new vekoma trains with soft vest restraints would eliminate Corkscrew's roughness, I just think that they'd make experiencing that roughness a whole hell of a lot more tolerable compared to the old rigid horse collars currently in place.

Cool, thanks for the alternate opinion. Some enthusiasts here write-off many coasters as "turds" or "crap" that I find to be decent or ok. Because I haven't ridden hundreds upon hundreds of different coasters across 5 continents, I imagine that my standards are simply lower. Also, as a child of the '70s/'80s, I have a bit of a soft spot for the old Arrow and Vekoma multi-loopers that I cut my first coaster teeth on. The height limit for Corkscrew is 48". The height limit for Blue Hawk is also 48". It seems likely that Blue Hawk's new trains could be added to Corkscrew without affecting the rider height requirement. If there were a way to get that down to 42", and maybe tweak the "airtime hill of death" a little bit, that could really help solidify Corkscrew as a good mid-level looping family coaster.

its a much more comfortable ride now, to the point where it's almost fun. But one way or another, its still a piece of turd, because you can't fix or paint a piece of turd. It's just not a thrilling coaster - that's what I'm implying. I've never ridden it in any of its versions, but it seems like it has a fun enough layout to me. If the new trains really do make a big difference for the ride's overall comfort and enjoyment, then maybe that would be a good way to update Corkscrew.

Yeah, that's probably a really good starting point. For anyone who has ridden both blue hawk and its former iteration, ninja, how big of a difference do the new trains make for the ride? Is it night and day, or just marginally better?

At the ripe old age of 41, Corkscrew has the 3rd longest tenure of any coaster in CP's entire history (only Blue Streak & CCMR have been around longer) and those corkscrews over the midway have become an iconic fixture at the park (at least for me because they've been there my whole life). I know that Corkscrew, like all things, will eventually reach the end of its useful life, but I wonder if, in the future, there might be an RMC type of company that will refurbish and breath new energy and life into aging arrow multi-loopers like Corkscrew? Keep the iconic corkscrews, but make it a better, smoother, longer, more exciting ride. I know that when its end finally does come, it'll probably just be removed, but I'll really miss those midway corkscrews, particularly those beautiful structural arches that arrow used to support the inversions on their earlier coasters.

oddly enough, the first time i ever rode mean streak back in '91, i had woken up that morning with a pretty bad back/neck ache from sleeping in a funny position. after one spin on mean streak (our first ride of the day) i was healed! seriously, the thing had completely readjusted my spine like a chiropractor and i felt so much better for the rest of our day at the park. true story.

Yeah, I saw the new image as well, and it looks awesome! an upwardly inclined zero g type inversion that levels out right at the apex of an airtime hill only to then dive down under and through the lift structure followed by an aggressively banked turn to the the right off to parts yet unknown (but likely also awesome). I don't think we've ever seen anything quite like this element before. This thing just keeps looking better and better.

The map looks naked without that giant mass of timber sitting atop the point like a beautiful mane. That's one of my favorite aspects of the RMC conversion. Not only will we be getting a VASTLY improved roller coaster at cedar point that will likely rearrange many people's top 10 list, but a good deal of mean streak's gorgeous and supersized wooden structure is going to be saved, and perhaps even enhanced. It's always been one of the best-looking coasters on the planet in my opinion; I'm very glad it's not going away entirely.

I believe the shed is just a POV video presentation of what an RMC'd Son of Beast would have looked like if CF hadn't jumped the gun on its demolition. Sort of like a "we could have done this, but you just got to ride the consolation prize instead" oh, to play "what if" for a lunch break........

^ Yeah, it's an amazing shot. The angle looks correct to be a zoom from the top of MF, or possibly from a drone, I suppose. Wherever it's taken from, it does seem to pretty clearly show a double-up (with what looks like some airtime potential) into some kind of inversion following the 3rd drop. I can't wait to see what might come next. This slow reveal is so much damn fun!

-delete-

And a pair of Arrow interlocking shuttle loops, a mediocre Intamin bobsled, an Intamin stand-up torture device, and a couple of Togo oddities. Seriously, has any park ever REMOVED more coasters than SFGAdv in the modern era?

"and that's how, with a few minor modifications, you can turn a regular gun into 5 guns"

If that things rides even half as good as it looks, Vekoma will have a sure-fire hit on their hands.

According to RCDB, there are still 3 jet star 2's left operating out of the 10 that were originally built. One in Utah, one in Poland, and one in Sweden.