abovethesink

I've got the park penciled in for Sunday 6/2 if the weather doesn't look like a disaster. It has been a while, so I am looking forward to it. While La Ronde and Great Escape were closer, this was my "home park" every summer growing up because my parents liked to camp in the campground and I was the right age to be a coaster kid during the big SF investment. It has been over a decade since I have been back, however, even as I have roadtripped around the country multiple times and it is still only 5ish hours from me. Twice it has been x'd off our trips, once due to torrential rain all day and another due to illness. I still don't even have the Tantrum credit somehow.

Minebuster got serious Gravity Group love this offseason, didn't it? I am curious as to how it rides now when we are back in early August.

No, I do not have any inside information. It is a great question though. The answer would definitely shape their decision making.

Six Flags does not make the largescale type investments at its smaller parks to move and refurbish a monster like Superman. It would be pretty similar to just building a new hyper in all likelihood in terms of cost and we know they aren't going to do that at parks like Great Escape or Michigan's Adventure. And not that it matters since they wouldn't do it either way, but it would also be worse than building a new one too.

I think this deserves its own place of discussion. We have two parks on the way out, as we all know. California's Great America and Six Flags America. The connective tissue between the two closures is quite clearly and openly the huge value of the land they sit on. That's got to be the starting point on any speculation of any future potential closures. It doesn't have to be the only talking point. It doesn't have to be the only reason Six Flags could close or sell a property. Being on super valuable land also doesn't mean a park will close. But I am definitely curious. Which other parks are on land as valuable as SFA and CGA? Are there any others they might be looking at the value of selling/developing the land for other uses versus the profits of running the current park?

It is hard to come up with a reason as to why Six Flags would be interested in purchasing Darien Lake when they are otherwise openly looking to downsize their portfolio. It is also just as hard to imagine a large company that is saying "hey, we want to have less" viewing the sort of management contract they have with Darien Lake as something positive too. Obviously I don't know for sure, but I'd say all signs point to them getting out of the deal at the first point it makes sense and Darien Lake losing the Six Flags name once again. But still, regarding the trains that Six Flags America literally just bought, where else could they even go? SFNE? They'd have to be modified to make Massachusetts happy, but I guess it is possible. Anyone know how old those trains are? I am not sure there is a single other competitor for them. Could they be ran on any other Intamin hyper?

If SF does continue managing SFDL, they just bought new trains for Superman at SFA literally this year. Those trains feel like a lock to go to SFDL. Even if Six Flags pulls out, the market for those is pretty small and they need to sell them somewhere. Darien Lake could still end up with them. Honestly, it feels likely no matter what unless Darien Lake straight up closes.

I would love to be wrong, but I think there is a 0% chance anything other than the spinning mouse gets relocated for the coasters. Anything else would be a really big project and not move the needle much at all for whoever does it. What a bummer to see any park close though. Sad day. The only hope left is probably local government causing a stink, but it is hard to see this one surviving with the underlying value of the land in that area being so high. I am real glad we got down there last year. Not a great park, but any place that is open has potential and it did seem like they were slowly moving in the right direction. What a shame.

14 million plus people travel to within a couple miles of the entrance gates annually. A population to pull in from is not the problem no matter what it looks like. You can sit here and list dozens and dozens of parks that live and many that thrive on much, much less.

It is a purchase that makes a lot of sense. It goes without saying that this is prime potential real estate for a majorly successful park if there was a company in position to eat the massive upfront costs of building a desirable one. It would be a strange time economically in the world to do so, but ignoring that, if someone were to do so, the reasons SeaWorld makes a ton of sense are swimming around in the open. They wouldn't even have to try to salvage the even more awful than their own reputaiton of this place as a home for animals, either. As questionable as SeaWorld's own habits and faciliies continue to be, there are levels to being bad at something. If they shipped the wildlife off to their own parks, it would be an upgrade for the wildlife. Then this is a wide open canvas for Busch Gardens Niagara Falls. Hell, I think the acreage of MarineLand is close to 3x Busch Gardens Williamsburg. Over time, if successful, this plot of land is literally big enough to be an Aquatica, a Sesame Place, and a full size Busch Gardens. Obviously that is dreaming EXTREMELY big, but they are within eyesight of Niagara Falls. A top ten most visited spot on the entire globe. The potential here is legitimately off the charts. It would just be so expensive to get started at any real scale. But they could just start with a Sesame Place and see how it does, or anything like that.

I am an accountant in the hospitality industry. From my experience, I would expect something like this to be an effort to increase likely sad occupancy numbers on Monday/Tuesday. Pay for Friday and Saturday, which is probably common, and get two more days for the half the cost of the already lower Monday rate? People will take the deal. Most of their customers are not hardened theme park vets that have a solid understanding of how much there is to do at the park. It makes sense to use the beds as a loss leader to drive further revenue in the park to offset it. Food, drinks, souvenirs, etc.

Yeah but then I can't add them to my spreadsheet and see my nerd count tick up. Did you think of my nerd count?

Six Flags buying Darien Lake feels like a pipe dream at this point. I expect them to end the lease to even operate the park as soon as possible, whether there is an exit clause or they need to wait for it to expire. This is entirely speculative, of course, but I just have a hard time seeing this weird operating set up as something Six Flags wants to spend time on when they have all these parks they need to operate now. Plus, they have already making it clear they are looking to downsize on some level.

The poster you are responding to probably knows it is literally possible. A lot of people have moral concerns and, even if you don't share those, the practicalities and expenses of traveling so far will also eliminate the trip as a possibility for most.

I am not 100% sure what to expect here, but I was not a fan of the status quo at these Palace parks and you've gotta be hopeful that they are at least likely to treat Kennywood to nearly on par with Dollywood and Silver Dollar City, right? I could see a three tier system forming pretty quickly in this chain. The three big parks I have mentioned would get the biggest and most consistent investments. A second tier of Kentucky Kingdom, Adventureland, and Lake Compounce might not get the same highs or consistency, but I could definitely see Herschend doing some big investments here and there like they have announced for KK. I can't see them doing much with the rest of all their properties though.

I really do think long term the single biggest winner of the merger will be this park.

Are they doing any sort of reprofiling or is this a new coat of paint and trains? I won't know what to expect with the latter. At SFNE with Riddler, the new trains were and are a night and day difference. I expected the same out of the one SF America and that was a big old nope. Sure, no headbanging is better than headbanging, but it tracks so poorly that is was still extremely rough anyway. Of course, it was also 105 degrees out and probably running faster than normal, which probably didn't help.

What are we looking at in the picture? Are those red cars the old train? EDIT: Nevermind, just had to, you know, read. That is the old train.

I've read that the park filed permits for a 309' structure in the La Vibora plot. Obviously there can be unexpected hurdles and solid plans can change unexpectedly, but barring something unusual, the giga dive seems to definitely be happening here.

I am not going to complain about a new RMC if that comes to pass, but that would also mean the SLC/Volare plot would skate by once again. I really want to see them both ripped out for good and replaced by a single new coaster. Regardless, looks like we will be making our second trip ever to the park in early August as long as AlpenFury is running. I am also realizing now that despite being there two years ago, we somehow have six credits still waiting. The two new coasters weren't there, of course. Wonder Mountain and the Boomerang were down. We chose to skip the hang and bang for road trip time and this time we should have the three year old twins with us, so kiddie credit.

Sounds like the park is working with Intamin to give El Toro a full retrack over the next three offseasons. I fully anticipate the new Six Flags investing huge in this park, so hopefully this is the turning point away from this inefficiency scrapping mini-dark age into a new golden age for the park. I can dream, anyway.

I only have two rides on Nighthawk from two or three years ago. First one was right as it opened and I liked it a lot. Second one was later in the 99 degree day and it was running crazy fast in the heat. Too fast, based on how I felt. It was pretty violent and I was quickly just bracing for it to be over. I rode Batwing last summer on a 104 degree day and had the same exact experience as my second ride on Nighthawk in the heat. So, at least on crazy hot days, I don't really like the model. Always sad to see any kind of coaster die out and you gotta figure Batwing is on its last legs too, but I won't shed too many tears for this one in particular.

I mean you're right, but in a kind of pointless way. People aren't going to stop engaging with their passions and hobbies. So we will just bitch and continue to give them money.

There is a lot of confidence in various theme park nerd communities that Kingda Ka and Green Lantern are gone at the end of the year. Not only that, but that the park isn't going to announce it either. I can't say I would be shocked about either of their removals, but to do both together quietly is eye brow raising. Green Lantern could be snuck off from a lineup as big as SFGA's, but Kingda Ka? This leads me to believe that they are waiting on good news to annouce in the pairing. The rides do butt up against one another and run along the parking lot. All I am saying is that there is going to be a lot of backlash for sneaking Kingda Ka off in the middle of the night, if they are, and from a PR perspective, Fury Northeast would do a lot of good to undo that damage.

Purely from the fit perspective, there are a number of parks in the new chain that would benefit from a relatively largescale floorless being moved in. I don't know about the future of Green Lantern though if it is removed. The ride is almost 30 and it has already been relocated. This puts it around the point where we have seen B&Ms need serious track work, if not straight up an entirely new track. Green Lantern has over 4,000 feet of track, so this would be a sizable investment for a Michigan's Adventure-Darien Lake level park despite it being a relocation.