Geauga Lake Discussion Thread

[coasterkid124]

Lol, I need someone to restrain me before I start throwing money at whoever is selling that. I don't even care about the Geauga Lake part. I just would love to own an Arrow car.

[Philrad71]

Wow...$5,500?

 

They could move Teh Big Dipper approximately a couple of miles in pickup trucks with that sorta dough.

[coasterbill]

So as of yesterday what was left of this park is closed forever.

 

Here's a video of the park at closing as guests in the wave pool chanted "one more wave" and in semi-sad and semi-hilarious fashion didn't receive it.

[chadster]

^That was pretty damn funny, or shitty, depending on how you look at things. I'm going with funny. Those guys were all, go complain to guest relations, we will note your disappointment in no more waves.

[SixFlagsAstroworld]

^^ I pretty much expected something like that to happen, but it's both sad and funny to see.

[robbalvey]

How much you want to bet that a lot of the coaster enthusiasts who showed up for the parks closing day to cry about it rarely stepped foot in the place since the rides side of the park closed?

Edited September 6, 2016 by robbalvey

[coasterbill]

Oh absolutely. I came across a few pictures of the park yesterday and my first thought was that if they were drawing crowds like that on a consistent basis then there's no way they would ever have closed.

[DirkFunk]

Oh absolutely. I came across a few pictures of the park yesterday and my first thought was that if they were drawing crowds like that on a consistent basis then there's no way they would ever have closed.

 

The water park probably served no real purpose except to generate revenue while they shopped the land. Could have been bonkers and still been scrapped for condos.

[coasterkid124]

Yeah, I didn't see them shutting down the entire operation just one year coming off adding the water park. It's not like they could just relocate the wave pool or lazy river to another property, like they did with the coasters.

 

Ten years was enough for them to get their investment back on those items, and the slides will be moved elsewhere. Done deal. At least now the property can be redeveloped and local fans of the park can have some closure.

[WolfBobs]

Oh absolutely. I came across a few pictures of the park yesterday and my first thought was that if they were drawing crowds like that on a consistent basis then there's no way they would ever have closed.

 

Went yesterday to say a final goodbye as I worked there from 2001-2005. Kinda bittersweet in the end.

 

To be fair, that was the 5th time I went this season and that was a fairly common weekend crowd. However, I never made it to the park during the week to see how busy/dead it was then.

[Geauga Dog]

In the 11 years that WWK had existed they did nothing to it other than add new wave pool in 2006. It's obvious there was no plan to keep it going long term. I'm not much of a water park person but if they would have added something interesting I would have visited.

 

Plus add in the fact the very little advertising they did for the park.

[DaMarkSta]

I worked at WWK in 2013, and actually visited it a decent amount every year having a platinum pass. Honestly I would've visited more if they added a new drop slide complex but anyway I made sure to visit on the last day as I still have plenty of friends who still worked at the park. Anyway about the coaster nerds on the last day yes I saw way too many, some I''ve seen on multiple visits to Cedar Point but never have I ever seen them step foot into WWK. Was actually a little pissed off about that, acting like they cared about the place closing when they've never gone themselves after the ride side closed. Oh well to each their own I guess.

[jconsolmagno]

What will always confuse me about shutting it down this year, was the fact they added all new lounge chairs all over the park. Green ones, the same ones the other Cedar Fair parks got at their water park. Not saying that's a big investment, but now these have been lugged to another Cedar Fair park. If you were closing the park down, why even bother?

 

Also, behind the Thunder Falls tower complex, they pushed back the wall a couple hundred feet. Poured new concrete on the walkway and re-landscaped areas that weren't touched in over a decade.

 

That will always strike me as strange.

 

I visited the park 6 times this year and was happy with each visit. F

[grsupercity]

Maybe they did not plan on closing it, but did not have a good season?

[DirkFunk]

Maybe they did not plan on closing it, but did not have a good season?

 

Cedar Fair has been shopping the land now for several years and finally got a hit on some of it with Meijer coming in on part of the Geauga site. It seems pretty clear to me that the operation of WWK was largely on a conditional basis that they couldn't sell the real estate under it. They could have filled the place every day: if selling 500+ acres of land was contingent on it closing, it was closing. Given that they had communicated plans about the redevelopment of the site months ago to the local authorities, it appears that is either on the verge of happening or actually happening.

 

My personal belief is that if Matt Ouimet was in charge rather than Dick Kinzel back in 2004 when the opportunity to buy the park came up, we'd still have a Geauga Lake in some form. The best I can say about Kinzel's administration of the park is that it was done cynically enough to create the opportunity for sale and dispersal of the rides if it didn't succeed on its own merits. What happened there between Six Flags (primarily) and Cedar Fair (secondarily) is one of the great travesties in the history of the industry.

[coasterbill]

What will always confuse me about shutting it down this year, was the fact they added all new lounge chairs all over the park. Green ones, the same ones the other Cedar Fair parks got at their water park.

 

Who knows? Maybe it was slightly beneficial to increase expenses for tax purposes. Maybe they thought it would be beneficial to the park this year... it really doesn't seem that strange since as you stated they're the same ones that the other parks have so they'll obviously be able to move them wherever they want (which since we're talking about lounge chairs isn't really much of a process). Honestly they're probably going to the expanded water park less than 2 hours up the road.

[DirkFunk]

What will always confuse me about shutting it down this year, was the fact they added all new lounge chairs all over the park. Green ones, the same ones the other Cedar Fair parks got at their water park.

 

Who knows? Maybe it was slightly beneficial to increase expenses for tax purposes. Maybe they thought it would be beneficial to the park this year... it really doesn't seem that strange since as you stated they're the same ones that the other parks have so they'll obviously be able to move them wherever they want (which since we're talking about lounge chairs isn't really much of a process). Honestly they're probably going to the expanded water park less than 2 hours up the road.

 

LOL, yeah, they could have spent $50,000 on chairs, but that seriously isn't that great an expense. Too bad they use the same crappy ones in general as Cedar Point. Those things are trash. Again: this is a park that had a section consisting of the same Little Tykes play sets that sit outside just about every trailer home where 5 kids are running around their single parent du jour and treated it as an attraction. There was no heavy investment done.

[Geauga Dog]

Again: this is a park that had a section consisting of the same Little Tykes play sets that sit outside just about every trailer home where 5 kids are running around their single parent du jour and treated it as an attraction. There was no heavy investment done.

 

It's also very sad that the Columbus Zoo totally went beyond what CF did and created what WWK could have been with Zoombezi Bay. The first time I saw their water park I was like "Oh, crap, now that's a water park!"

[coasterbill]

I really need to get back there. Not only is it a great zoo but I always enjoyed Wyandot Lake and would love to see what they did with the place.

[DirkFunk]

I really need to get back there. Not only is it a great zoo but I always enjoyed Wyandot Lake and would love to see what they did with the place.

 

It's basically Aquatica Midwest.

[Philrad71]

Again: this is a park that had a section consisting of the same Little Tykes play sets that sit outside just about every trailer home where 5 kids are running around their single parent du jour and treated it as an attraction. There was no heavy investment done.

 

It's also very sad that the Columbus Zoo totally went beyond what CF did and created what WWK could have been with Zoombezi Bay. The first time I saw their water park I was like "Oh, crap, now that's a water park!"

 

Agreed....very nice water park and kiddie ride area at CZ.

 

Despite having Platinum Passes and being about two hours from my house, I never had any desire to go to WWK. If I was driving to Cleveland, it was simply a no-brainer to keep on heading west to Sandusky versus going to a small water park with mostly dated attractions.

 

As Dirk mentioned, there was very little investment to it and most of us knew that it was only a matter of time before it's fate was sealed. It sucks that it all went down the way it did....but such is life.

[John Peck]

The public have created an online petition to save WWK. If only they visited in greater numbers instead the last 9 years, we wouldn't be having this conversation.

 

What hurt worse, is since GL was the place I grew up, the outcry seemed to be lacking (or much less) when the ride side closed in 2007.

 

http://www.wkyc.com/news/local/portage-county/more-than-1500-sign-petition-to-save-wild-water-kingdom/315564404

[jconsolmagno]

The public have created an online petition to save WWK. If only they visited in greater numbers instead the last 9 years, we wouldn't be having this conversation.

 

What hurt worse, is since GL was the place I grew up, the outcry seemed to be lacking (or much less) when the ride side closed in 2007.

 

http://www.wkyc.com/news/local/portage-county/more-than-1500-sign-petition-to-save-wild-water-kingdom/315564404

 

I actually read in 2014 that they had record attendance numbers for the slide side from an employee. Some of them sneak onto the Geauga Lake facebook page occasionally and post in the comments.

 

I went to the park 6/7 times in the past 2 years, it had great attendance from what I could tell. Things were looking on the up from what I could tell.

 

The only attendance numbers I can find that are set in stone, are that the park did almost 200,000 visitors in 2008, the year after the ride side closed. Are those bad for a 12 acre water park?

[DirkFunk]

The only attendance numbers I can find that are set in stone, are that the park did almost 200,000 visitors in 2008, the year after the ride side closed. Are those bad for a 12 acre water park?

 

That's rock solid for a park of this nature. But like I said earlier, it doesn't matter what the attendance was because they were going to get closed no matter what.

[wicked_twister]

The only attendance numbers I can find that are set in stone, are that the park did almost 200,000 visitors in 2008, the year after the ride side closed. Are those bad for a 12 acre water park?

 

Seems like a great turn out for that size water park, would love to know how much it was costing Cedar Fair to keep that thing running. I worked the ride side one of it's last seasons and kept in contact with some of the supervisors who stayed, I'm pretty sure 2009 was their first year of profit.