Jew

I changed the title to be less misleading. Feel free to change it back to "P:TR" once you upload your photos!

^It wasn't Dick Kinzel quoted. Still, your point still stands. Why would she make that false statement?

^What did that e-mail say? "We have to travel to Japan with museum fund money to have a meeting to decide whether or not to bid on the coaster?"

^That's a tough call to make "in the heat of moment". It happened so quick in real time, and absolutely didn't look THAT bad as it happened (Pierce should have done some acting)...that's a call refs will miss at least half the time. Replays made it more obvious it was probably a reach in. But that's an easy call to miss IMO.

^Neither of them can afford it.l That's not their business anyways...they are "regional" theme park companies, not "tourist" theme park operators.

Just to add to what Elissa said... -I didn't think Led Zeppelin was terrible, but I didn't think it was amazing either. I think it is a great "GP ride," in the sense that they will just be amazed with the stats and the "zOMG, it has music" element. But it definitely rattled a lot more than any other new B&M ever has. The song choice (Whole Lotta Love) is a great song that doesn't fit a roller coaster. The preshow I thought was well done, but just not something take makes sense operationally. -As Elissa said, the park is very small. To the designers credit, the lake in the middle really made it feel bigger than it was. -Agreed on the no shade comment. The indoor air conditioned areas seemed to be the busiest areas in the park. -Ditto on the staffing comment as well. It is clear that they projected much bigger things with how they are staffed/operating. But all the staff they did have there seemed to be really into their jobs. -We also thought the park felt like MGM Grand Adventures...great looking park with not enough to do and no life. -I didn't think the food was horrible. I had the grilled chicken burger at the place across from the water play area and it wasn't amazing, but I've definitely had worse at theme parks. I like that it looked like there were lots of food options available though. -I like the "nice touches." The guitar fountain and the Cow Statue were fun. "Phonehedge" looked cool too. -It doesn't seem like there is lots for kids to do. A roller skater, a couple of generic zamperla kiddy rides, a couple of smaller flats, and what seems like an endless number of play areas. The park definitely needs more kids rides, and could probably use a "signature" kids ride or two. I actually really like the fact their design philosophy was not to build a separate kids area because it breaks up the family, but they definitely need to add more kids stuff to each land. Overall, I see lots of potential for the park. If they adjust their operating plan and add a few more signature attractions (it looks like there is lots of room for expansion) I can see it being a moderately successful park. For a brand new, non Disney or Universal park, it looks REALLY nice. It has a decent collection of "GP" rides (by that I mean rides the GP will probably enjoy, but enthusiasts won't), but it still definitely needs more to do. I would recommend checking it out, but not planning on spending an entire operating day there. There's no way there is enough to do to fill a 10am-1am operating day yet.

^^Why should it be Cedar Fair's obligation to spend thousands of dollars to save a roller coaster they have no intention of operating? Offering the coaster for free (minus the expenses of deconstruction/transportation/storage) is a very nice gesture, since I would guess it will fetch at least a couple hundred grand at auction (someone will buy it for parts/scrap). They basically said "fine, you guys are all bitching so much, so put your money where your mouth is!"...And of course, ACE fell short. If the coaster was offered to ACE, why didn't ACE take the initiative to get the word out to people? It's not Cedar Fair's job to say "hey...we offered this to ACE." Uhm...Kinzel isn't quoted in the article. Of course ACE hasn't accepted the offer. How else would their executive committee be able to afford all their "business" trips if they actually used the museum/preservation money for the museum and roller coaster preservation?

^That's exactly why it sounds like they are outsourcing. Well, besides cutting costs that is. Now someone's talent isn't being wasted working on a basic animatronic.

So now Disney can outsource jobs to them without paying the overhead costs associated with having them on the payroll. Win-Win. I know of a guy who is a friend of a friend who actually made more when WDI had to contract him as an outside vendor, but the costs were still probably less for WDI because all of the hidden costs (like insurance, payroll taxes, training, etc.) are no longer there. Do you really believe that TDS didn't involve hundreds of vendors as well? FWIW, everyone seems impressed by the animatronics on Mummy @ USF. Guess what? A company in Valencia (technifex) made those.

You're right. MJ just "retired" twice when his supporting cast didn't look as good. There's never going to be another MJ. But there is also never going to be another Kobe. FWIW, at age 29, MJ only had 3 title as well to his name. And that was after 6 years of not even making it to the finals before the 3peat. Although it appears to be EXTREMELY unlikely, what if Kobe dominates the next 3 games and the Lakers somehow pull it off? Or with Bynum back, what if the Lakers go on another run of titles? Will you also quote the 5,000,000 inevitable articles that will once again compare Kobe favorably to MJ? But hey...I guess Chris Paul isn't the second coming of (insert name of great PG here) either. No great PG would let their team blow a series like he did.

^^It's all part of the NBA conspiracy. Now the inevitable game 7 will have more hype because something has got to give: either the Lakers become the first team to come back from 3-1, or the Celtics finally win another title. Duh. The Lakers got lazy and the Celtics are just too good to stop attacking. Absolutely horrendous. But hey, it could be worse: we could be Kings fans. Then all we would have to root for is the lakers losing because our team is absolutely hopeless. Being a Kings fan is probably only a little less depressing than being a Lakers fan after tonights game. Is it time for USC football yet?

I'm jumping on the NBA is rigged bandwagon after this game. The league obviously wants Boston to win the title. I really don't know how the Lakers recover from that. That was BRUTAL.

I wonder what that is going to cost the park with diesel prices so high?

Hurricane Harbor is getting a new food venue. I believe it is a BBQ place.

Beetlejuice was awesome! Spiderman Rocks and Fear Factor Live? Not so much. I'll reserve judgement for now, but I will gladly settle for an improvement over Fear Factor. Even if it is just a slight improvement.

Warning to all who may get this credit: do not sit in a wheel seat. Zonga is the worst coaster I have ever been on.

Six Flags has to protect their equipment. No one is going to leave the park without their license or credit card. Kids without anything of value on them to lose? They don't have any incentive to return the Q-bot.

^What's that supposed to mean? Even though the new tour blows IMO, you can't say they haven't been investing in it. The "new" tour debuted just two years ago with Fast and the Furious, new spitters on the JP section, new videos, added water canons to flash flood, and an upgraded queue. Attractions take time to design. Especially ones you probably weren't planning on building anytime in the near future (I'm sure they had ideas on the drawing board for an eventual replacement). IMO, going as far as announcing they intend to replace Kong (instead of some BS like "we are going to evaluate our options...") is a positive sign that we will see something in the next few years. ^^The Kong building is nowhere near the actual theme park. It's not going to be anything other than a new tram attraction. Anyways...Here are some great photos taken by the LAFD:

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-studiofire3-2008jun03,0,5961570.story

^10,000 guests don't NEED 5 trains. 10,000 guests can have the same wait with 3 trains and a 4th ready to go if it's needed. Theme parks wouldn't be able to stay in business if they subscribed to your business model. But getting back to the topic....Magic Mountain has a long way to go if they want to live up to your standards. Because you won't find Magic running 3 trains when it isn't needed either. I haven't seen Tatsu or RRv running 3 trains in ages. I've only seen it on Viper and Goliath. Which is something, but still...

^You couldn't have just asked "Did this make the news anywhere else? It was the biggest story here in LA!"? That was a pretty obnoxious statement you made. A simple google search would have shown it to be big news on tons of national and other local market stations. I mistakenly went to nbc4.com thinking it was the LA station, only to find out it was the Washington DC stations site. Guess what? They had it as their main story too. Cnn.com was the same way.

You call it running on a budget, I call it being cheap. As Robb said, operations aren't what they used to be. The top brass actively choose where not to spend money, knowing full well what the consequences will be, and it comes down to you as running on a budget. I get it, but I still don't like it, especially when Disney did just fine not doing that in the past. I can understand trains breaking down affecting capacity. I can understand configuration of a system basically setting what the capacity will be. What I have a very low tolerance of is any theme park charging as much as possible for parking/admission, etc and then turning around and purposely cheaping out on those guests. This can be done by not running more than 1-2 trains on weekdays. This can be done by hiring minimum wage slackers who'll spend more time chatting with each other & on a cell phone than actually doing their job. This can be done by building two loading stations for your attraction, and then rarely, if ever, using both sides. It's very transparent when it does happen. That's why people complain about it & have complained about Six Flags doing it for years. To see Disney taking the cheap way out is just flat depressing. Magic Mountain is at least saying they're trying to do their best with what they have, and Six Flags is pretty deep in debt. Disney is hardly having financial problems. For them, budget is no excuse IMHO. -- PMM There's a difference between being cheap and being efficient. Back in the 80's the capacity/attendance trends/economy were different. Times have changed since then. A park has to find that balance between efficiency and fiscal responsibility. If the park is only predicting 10,000 guests, it doesn't make sense to run more than 3 trains (or whatever the number might be). I'm OK with a park doing what you call "being cheap" as long as they react accordingly to any crowds/lines that do build up. It's being smart with their money.

That is correct. The small picture of the 1990 fire you posted is EXACTLY what the backlot currently looks like (with the obvious exception of Kong and the video warehouse not surviving this time). The New England street facades on the left, the park and clockhouse buildings, plus some of the alley streets to the right all survived. As a side note...the clock itself has been in storage ever since Ghost Whisperer took over the area. So that "historic" item is safe. The tram reopened today, taking the route it always takes when the metro sets were closed. A new script was written acknowledging the fire and the firefighters great efforts. I'll have a PTR tomorrow.

I'm not sure if you are joking or not, but I am guessing a B&M Hyper next to the backlot in an area nowhere near the theme park might not be the best idea.

The park never opened. The video vault burned for like 5,000,000 hours. Kong is completely destroyed, as are all the Metro sets. Only the courthouse and the park in front of it, New England Street, and some of the alley sets next to the courthouse remain.