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» Theme Park News
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WindSeekers Announced for Cedar Point, Kings Island, Knott’s & Canada’s Wonderland
Four WindSeekers To Debut at Cedar Fair Parks in 2011 Anyone monitoring Theme Park Syndicate on Tuesday might have thought they were experiencing deja vu. All afternoon theme park news sites and blogs were reporting on announcement after announcement as Cedar Fair announced the addition of a new ride called WindSeeker at Cedar Point, Kings Island, Knott’s Berry Farm, & Canada’s W...
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11 Rumored Roller Coasters & Attractions for 2011
It’s the time of the year when theme park fans turn into detectives. We scour the Web for documents from public hearings, take pictures of pavement and dirt and proudly upload them, and we bite our nails as we countdown to August and September announcements. Here are 11 confirmed and rumored projects for 2011: Confirmed 2011 Roller Coasters Mr. Six’s DanceCoaster at Six Flags Magic Mou...
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Roller Coaster For Sale: Still No Buyers for the Big Dipper
Big Dipper is the sole survivor of the now defunct Geauga Lake Amusement Park in North Eastern Ohio. In 2007, Cedar Fair closed the amusement park while keeping the adjacent water park, Wildwater Kingdom, open. Several of the park’s largest roller coasters found new homes and others were scrapped. Thunderhawk migrated to Michigan’s Adventure, Head Spin transformed into Carolina Cobra a...
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Woman Dies After Fall From Roller Coaster
Last weekend, a woman fell from a roller coaster called Xtreme at Dixie Landin’ Family Theme Park in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Before the accident, 21-year old Lindsay Zeno was seen trying to pull her restraint down as she was riding. Soon after, she fell 30 feet to the ground. Local government officials checked out the ride and reported that there didn’t appear to be anything wrong wi...
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Carowinds Coaster Stock to Feature B&M Engineer
Aspiring roller coaster designers should take note. Not only will Carowinds’ roller coaster enthusiast event, Coaster Stock, feature plenty of ERT (Exclusive Ride Time), but the event will also feature a rare opportunity to talk with a roller coaster designer. Recently, the park announced that Bob Mampe from Bolliger & Mabillard will be on-hand to take questions. Here’s the full i...
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Holiday World President Will Koch Passes Away
Sunday night, Holiday World President Will Koch passed away. While I don’t know him personally, I do know what Holiday World has done in the past few decades. Since he took over the reins the park has transformed from a small regional park to an amusement park with national recognition in the enthusiast community. On my visit to Holiday World in 2006, I not only got to experience the maratho...
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Bert the Conqueror Takes on Roller Coasters
Last Summer, we had the game show Brain Rush where contestants were asked questions while riding Knotts Berry Farms’ roller coasters. This year, the Travel Channel has launched Bert the Conqueror. Here’s a description: Thrill-seeker Bert Kreischer takes viewers to the legendary events, competitions and adrenaline rushes that celebrate local culture. He experiences the most hilariously...
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Riders Left Hanging on Mumbo Jumbo
Flamingoland (Yorkshire, England) is home to the steepest roller coaster in the World in the S&S Power-designed Mumbo Jumbo. Unfortunately, the rides’ ultra-steep 112 degree drop wasn’t the scariest part of the ride a few riders last week. During their ride, the car they were riding in became stuck. It just so happened to get stuck while they were upside-down some 50 feet in th...
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TPS Report: How The Busch Gardens Drop Tower & Xcelerator Accident Are Connected
Straight from the headlines of Theme Park Syndicate, here are some of the biggest news stories. Busch Gardens to Add a Drop Tower Much like during the creation of Griffon, Busch Garden’s future plans are revealed by a height waiver submitted to the local government. This time the waiver mentions a “thrill attraction of a single tower not to exceed 260 feet above ground level.” Many have ...
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Harry Potter’s Wizarding World & Forbidden Journey Update
Universal has been promoting the new Wizarding World of Harry Potter like crazy. A few months ago there was the augmented reality map that went out in an issue of a USA Today. I thought it was the coolest marketing idea I’d heard of in a long time. Unfortunately, the execution left something to be desired. Augmented Reality Map After holding the map in front of my web cam for tens of minutes...
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Videos Reveal Thirteen’s Secret Weapon
Thirteen’s Secret Weapon Revealed! You might not want to read this post if you’re planning on visiting Alton Towers and you want to be completely surprised by Thirteen. British news shows GMTV and ITV were on location to film the first footage of Thirteen, Alton Towers highly anticipated new roller coaster. The park boasted that the ride was going to have a one-of-a-kind, World’s...
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Six Flags & Cedar Fair Merger Rumors
There have been a number of shakeups in the amusement industry since I’ve started this blog in 2006. Closings, acquisitions, and sales have been a sign of the times for the industry. If the latest rumor in the theme park business World comes to fruition it would be more like an earthquake than a shakeup. The Wall Street Journal recently reported that there may be a Six Flags Cedar Fair merge...
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Thirteen’s Creepy Blipvert TV Ads
Alton Towers has the hype machine going at full speed as the opening for their much anticipated new roller coaster draws near. Not much is known about Thirteen other than that it’s supposed to be so scary that there will be a controversial age limit. There was also talk of a limit to the times per day one could ride, but I would have to imagine that both of these restrictions will be lifted....
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Six Flags Closes Kentucky Kingdom
Six Flags announced today that they will close their Louisville, Kentucky park known as Kentucky Kingdom due to a disagreement over the lease for the land that the park is located on. Here’s part of the official statement: Six Flags announced today that as it nears the scheduled end of its restructuring process, it has decided to reject its lease with the Kentucky State Fair Board relating t...
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Legoland Florida Announced for 2011
As I mentioned in my 2009 Theme Park Year in Review, Cypress Gardens (Winter Haven, Florida) closed last year. This week, Merlin and Legoland Park executives announced that they will be building Legoland Florida on the site of the old Cypress Gardens. Here are a few notes from the announcement: The park, which is planned for the former site of Cypress Gardens, is expected to include between 40 ...
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Augmented Reality Preview of The Wizarding World of Harry Potter
Augmented Reality Preview of The Wizarding World of Harry Potter USA Today & Universal have teamed up to provide a pretty interesting preview of the highly anticipated Wizarding World of Harry Potter. Set to open in Spring 2010, the multi-million dollar section of Islands of Adventure has Potter fans and theme park fans anxious to see details of this new ‘theme park within a theme park&#... -
Roller Coaster Museum Comes to Texas
Plainview, Texas is Home to the Roller Coaster Museum On a recent edition of the Season Pass Podcast I learned about the new roller coaster museum in Texas. When I heard that it was in Plainview, which is 7 hours from the closest major theme park (Six Flags Over Texas) I was a bit puzzled. I always thought that an amusement park filled state like Pennsylvania would be perfect for the museum. But,...
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2009 Theme Park Year in Review
Happy New Year! It’s time once again to recap the biggest theme park news stories of 2009. The Roller Coaster Class of 2009 The two huge roller coasters that opened in Orlando had very different fates. SeaWorld’s Manta opened early to rave reviews while Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit opened several months late with mixed reviews. To be fair, Rockit is a one-of-a-kind ride with several techn...
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Cedar Fair Sold to Equity Firm Apollo
Apollo Global Management Buys Cedar Fair for $2.4 Billion, $635 Million in Cash In a move that I didn’t see coming, Cedar Fair was purchased today by equity firm Apollo Global Management for $635 million in cash. Other reports (like this article from The Street) say the deal is for $2.4 billion in total. It’s reminiscent of Blackstone’s purchase of Busch Gardens a few months ago....
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SeaWorld Parks & Google Team Up for Street View Virtual Tours
The Best Theme Park Virtual Tours Ever? The Busch theme parks (now known collectively as SeaWorld Parks & Entertainment) have teamed up with Google to provide virtual walk-through tours using Google Maps Street View. In case you’ve been living under a rock, or still use MapQuest , Street View allows you to get an on-the-ground view of streets in Google Maps. Until now, these views have ...
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- Intimidator 305 @ Kings Dominion | Roller Coaster Reviews
- WindSeekers Announced for Cedar Point, Kings Island, Knott’s & Canada’s Wonderland
- Superman Krypton Coaster | Most Wanted Roller Coasters
- Kings Dominion Trip & My 200th Coaster
- Sky Rocket @ Kennywood | Roller Coaster Reviews
- Happy Roller Coaster Day & USA Today’s 10 Roller Coasters
- Coaster Stock 2010 Recap Pt. 4: Trivia, Videos, & Night ERT
- Trip Report: Filming Bert the Conqueror at Carowinds
- 5 Most Missed Defunct Roller Coasters
- Brian on Dare Devil Dive Coming to Six Flags Over Georgia in 2011
- Quil on Bizarro @ Six Flags Great Adventure
- Sir Coaster on Bizarro @ Six Flags Great Adventure
- Hoss on Intimidator 305 @ Kings Dominion | Roller Coaster Reviews
- Hoss on Intimidator 305 @ Kings Dominion | Roller Coaster Reviews
- Quil on Bizarro @ Six Flags Great Adventure
- Quil on Coaster Stock 2010 Recap Pt. 4: Trivia, Videos, & Night ERT
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- Memorable Coaster Moments (7)
- Most Wanted Roller Coasters (5)
- Roller Coaster News (109)
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- Top 3 Thursdays (36)
- Trip Reports (27)
