Well Traveled B&M Coaster Will Resurface at San Antonio Six Flags
Roller coasters designed by Bolliger & Mabillard are some of the most popular and successful on the planet. They deliver smooth, but thrilling rides, have great capacity that keeps queues moving and are almost always crowd-pleasers. For these reasons, until this year, only one B&M coaster had ever been relocated. It was a Batman The Ride inverted coaster clone that was originally Gambit at Thrill Valley in Shizuoka, Japan. Then when Thrill Valley closed in 2002, it was purchased by Six Flags for its new park in New Orleans. It operated there as Batman: The Ride until Hurricane Katrina flooded Six Flags New Orleans. After lying abandoned in the defunct park, Six Flags has decided to move it to Six Flags Fiesta Texas where it will debut next year as Goliath.
Nonsensical Naming from Six Flags
The naming and theming of the new Dark Knight coasters was a smart move, but Goliath? Really? I guess they just can’t get enough of that name. I know that the majority of park visitors don’t visit multiple Six Flags like coaster enthusiast do, but some originality wouldn’t hurt Six Flags. This is their sixth Goliath-named coaster and this one makes the least sense. At least the other five are hyper coasters. This incarnation is an inverted coaster which so it resulted in the Fiesta Texas’ PR department creating an odd-named press release title like:
“Goliath Soars into Six Flags Fiesta Texas Bringing Major Park Coaster Count to Eight”
Goliath soars? They could have just stuck with the Batman: The Ride name. Ah, well. Leave a comment below.
January 22, 2008 at 15:06
Six Flags has had a history of different rides with the same name, yet they are completly different. Take Viper for instance, there is Viper at SF Magic Mountain, once was a Viper at SF Astroworld, and was once at Over Georgia. All three coasters were completly different from each other. Obviously they have a lack for origionality. Being a coaster junkie myself I would know that Goliath at Six Flags Over Georgia is different than the one at Magic Mountain. Enough of that I have made my point, most people would be like my family that we would only go to the nearest park which at that time was Astroworld, we never went to other parks, so there could be a Six Flags park that every coaster had the name Viper and I wouldn't know/ care if I were not visiting other parks.
January 22, 2008 at 16:14
Don't forget Viper at the former Six Flags Darien Lake. You're right Six Flags is terribly unoriginal or just plain lazy. I ranted about some good coaster names and a few terrible names in one of my first posts. Check it out here. Thanks for stopping by wiyoh20.