In this issue:
(To go directly to a story, click on a blue keyword below):

Amusement Today jumps in with Splash;

Jazzland plays on while awaiting any new owner;

Denver's Ocean Journey gets a lifeline in the form of Chapter 11 bankruptcy;

Holiday World staff get a lesson in Survivor techniques;

Coaster fans bring a little color to Conneaut Lake Park's Blue Streak;

Oklahoma City Zoo turns to the Toledo Zoo as its advertising agency;

We celebrate the new arrivals of a Batman at Six Flags New England and a Superman at Six Flags Over Georgia, a gyro at Drayton Manor and a Tilt at Taiwan's Discovery, and jelly art at Monterey Bay Aquarium and Imagination at Dollywood;

We honor the rebirths of the Vampire at Chessington World of Adventures and the train at Folsom Children's Zoo;

And we make a Splash of our own.

For back issues of THE LOOP,
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For a printable version of this column,
click here

Making a Splash
The little publisher that could has again. Gary Slade of Amusement Today has reached an agreement to purchase Splash from Future Communications, Inc. and will continue publishing the waterpark industry magazine. Though Marilyn Turner will remain as editor, Splash will be written and produced by the Amusement Today staff, beginning with a combined April-May issue scheduled to be shipped to subscribers early next month.

The World Waterpark Association dropped Splash, previously published by WWA founder and president Al Turner, as its official magazine after the March issue, less than one year after Al Turner’s death (THE LOOP, March 8, 2002). The WWA chose to publish its own magazine as a revenue-raising source rather than keep the business arrangement Al had established between the two entities. Al’s sister, Marilyn, wanted to keep Splash going but could not come to terms with WWA for a buyout.

Enter a mutual friend who hooked Marilyn Turner up with Slade as a potential buyer. “He saw it as a good opportunity for Amusement Today to buy Splash and keep the magazine alive and keep Al’s legacy alive,” said Slade, who does not want to reveal the go-between’s name.

Slade has redesigned Splash to bring the journalism expertise of Amusement Today to coverage of the waterpark industry and has made navigation of the magazine easier. However, long an admirer of Al Turner’s photography and promotion of waterparks, Slade is keeping the magazine’s focus wholly on water leisure facilities in the commercial, public and resort sectors and maintaining Splash’s mission to provide service articles to operators. He also has added a section called “Al’s Archive” featuring some of the magazine founder’s photography.

“We’re in good hands with Gary Slade,” Marilyn Turner said. “He’s done very well with his publication, and (Splash) magazine will be a good sister publication.”

For Slade, this acquisition gives him a triple crown just as his own publication turned five years old. Two weeks before coming to terms with Marilyn Turner he unveiled Amusement Today’s alliance with Minton Enterprises, publishers of THE LOOP (THE LOOP, March 22, 2002), linking the two news venues and creating a joint venture in amusementtoday.com. That alliance now extends to production and promotion of Splash. Additionally, the Splash magazine web site, under the auspices of Web Weasel’s Kelley Martin, will be revamped as yet another medium of news and information for the industry. With this network of five news venues, Slade is offering both advertising and subscription packages.

“When you look at the overall picture, you look at the ability to write and sell Amusement Today, Splash and gettheloop.com and the other web presences, we are a strong force with much to offer for our advertisers and readers,” said Slade.

That said, Slade is not so much expanding his publishing empire as he is furthering a mission: Al Turner’s mission, which jives with his own. A winner of three IAAPA awards in his first four years of publishing Amusement Today, including the association’s Impact Award, veteran journalist Slade pursued publishing Amusement Today out of devotion to the amusement industry. That same emotional tie spurred him to take on Splash. “It’s an honor to me to carry on (Al Turner's) tradition,” he said. “We are going to try our best to make Al proud.”

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Getting Jazzed
Though given only enough money to operate a couple of weeks, still ownerless Jazzland garnered enough cash flow during its first two weekends to continue running well into a full-time season. “We see us going all season,” said David Wright, the New Orleans, Louisiana, theme park’s director of marketing. “We’re very impressed with the numbers, and we’ve done better than we had budgeted. That’s the reality of it. Despite the roadblocks, we're exceeding our numbers at the beginning of the season, and people—even with the question marks—have continued to buy season passes over the first two weekends, which shows their faith as well.”

Part of Wright’s faith in the park is in his certainty that somebody will buy the property in the next few weeks. It is not lacking for suitors. The city, which has a stake in the parks, has been courting Six Flags, and Ripley Entertainment Inc. has expressed an interest. Yesterday WAC International of Heathrow, Florida, finally revealed itself as a suitor with an offer of $50 million invested over five years to include a new thrill ride and infrastructure upgrades this year and a new ride every year plus an amphitheater and waterpark. Representatives of the company admited, however, that WAC would have to raise money to accomplish its plan, according to a story in The Times-Picayune.

Jazzland is in Chapter 11 bankruptcy, but Entertainment Associates, a company formed of previous owner Alpha SmartParks executives led by CEO Randy Drew, had submitted a purchase plan and took over active management of the park, putting former Six Flags vet Larry Cochran at the helm (THE LOOP, March 8, 2002). When Entertainment Associates was slow to raise the money to finalize the transaction, the city withdrew its endorsement of the deal and began publicly courting Six Flags, which remains mum on the negotiations. Entertainment Associates then withdrew its intent to buy, but keeps the right to resubmit a bid if the other potential buyers fall through. Cochran departed April 12.

All of this uncertainty handcuffed the park’s marketing efforts before the season opened April 13, but Wright said the campaign is ramping up. The Jazzland's saless partner, grocery chain Sav-A-Center, put season passes on sale at its locations yesterday, and television and radio spots are finally beginning to air. Meanwhile, the park has 700 seasonal employees on the payroll, about half of its projected summer peak.

“We’re running the park, the day-to-day operations,” Wright said. “All we care about right now is making sure we’re doing our job and leaving all the legal stuff to the tons of lawyers involved.”

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Ocean’s 11
Another attraction surviving on its short-term take is Ocean Journey aquarium in Denver, Colorado, which, after announcing it would close to the public April 2 (THE LOOP, March 22, 2002), earned enough money to file Chapter 11 bankruptcy less than 24 hours before shuttering.

“We had to have money for Chapter 11,” said Kimberly Thomas, public relations manager for the three-year-old aquarium. “We have enough money to run for a portion of the reorganization, about four months.” That money came largely from donor Barbara Bridges, who pledged $1 million if the aquarium raised $2 million more in donations. With that pledge, the family of volunteer diver Bruce Kelley came forward with a $500,000 gift, and the Hensel Phelps construction company, one of the aquarium’s builders, anted up $250,000. “It all came together at the very last minute,” Thomas said, and based on other pledges made during the two weeks of the announced closure, Ocean Journey officials are certain they will meet Bridges’ $2 million goal.

Those two weeks also saw a spike in attendance as the public rushed to get in a last visit to the aquarium. Since the Chapter 11 filing, attendance has settled back into its normal range for April, Thomas said, but the aquarium did sign up 300 new or renewed memberships during the month. While backing away significantly from the original feasibility study’s projection of 1 million visitors a year, Ocean Journey is looking to a recently opened simulator and playground, rotation of exhibits, and an upcoming rays touch pool exhibit to fuel return visits. Its interim survival plan projects 208,762 visitors through July 02. “If we can sustain 600,000 people a year and get this debt fixed, we can go forward,” Thomas said, referring to a $63 million debt, $57 million of that in bonds.

What the not-for-profit aquarium is hoping for is public funding, specifically from the regional Scientific and Cultural Facilities District, which helps fund the Denver Zoo. The District already turned Ocean Journey down last summer saying it was not financially feasible.“They couldn’t see throwing good money after bad, as it were,” said Thomas, but she said the aquarium’s management thinks the reorganization forced by the Chapter 11 process would answer the District’s concerns.

Meantime, Ocean Journey’s staff presses on. “All the animals are still here, business is normal as far as that goes,” Thomas said. “From the public standpoint, things are the same. Where it really changes is on the back end. We are an open book in anything we do; any money at all we pay out is public record and will continue to be. It is just a lot more paperwork.”

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Kentucky Joe (left) learned a lesson in survival from Holiday World's John Kenworthy. Photo courtesy of Holiday World & Splashin' Safari.

Survivors near and far
It may seem like a harsh, but fitting, theme for a host and hostess orientation course—“Survivor”—but Holiday World & Splashin’ Safari turned the topic into a celebration and celebrity-enhanced event.

The theme touched on the whole breadth of survival, from getting through a day at the park or dealing with boyfriend/girlfriend problems to real life-or-death struggles. Among the trio of speakers offering testimonials about real-life survival was Rodger Bingham, the “Kentucky Joe” who lasted until the final five on television’s Survivor: Australian Outback series. He was a surprise guest in the annual orientation program for some 300 third-year staff members at the Santa Claus, Indiana, theme park; only the park directors knew who was standing behind the curtain.

“People who had followed Survivor were shocked and thrilled” to see the 54-year-old teacher and farmer from Crittenden, Kentucky, said Paula Werne, Holiday World’s director of public relations. “Everybody else was intrigued. You could tell people were listening and not squirming in their seats waiting for it all to end.”

Bingham had done his homework. He noted the park’s free unlimited soft drink program for guests as a survival technique in opposition to the big corporate parks in the region, and then he praised the assembly for earning Amusement Today’s Golden Ticket awards last season for cleanest and friendliest parks. “We don’t give those things a second thought, but he talked about how remarkable they were,” Werne said. “He said, ‘Friendliest park in the world?’ and let that hang in the air, as if to say, ‘Think about that!’ The directors can go on and on about that, but it’s nice to have that praise come from somebody outside, and somebody you recognize from TV.”

The TV star had a tough act to follow, however, after two homegrown survivors had spoken. First, park owner and matriarch Pat Koch talked of her battle with cancer last summer. Then, John Kenworthy, a seasonal employee, spokes of his own fight with cancer. “He said how every step of the way he didn’t think things would get worse, and then they do,” Werne said. “He stopped and went to his seat and there were some tears. Then he went back to the microphone and said, ‘By the way, last time I went to the doctor he said I was cancer free,’ and everybody cheered.”

The stories were more than merely motivational; they hit home to the park’s mission of delivering customer service. One of the seminar’s most poignant recountings came from Koch, who thought she was on her deathbed in the hospital and had to frequently answer status-of health questions from nurses. One entered the room with a clipboard, but before launching into the litany of questions the nurse soaked a washcloth in cold water and cooled Koch’s forehead. That one bit of kindness, treating the patient as a human being, helped Koch turn the corner toward recovery, she told her employees, and she charged the staff to think that way when dealing with guests.

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Paint scheme
American Coasters Enthusiasts is as much about saving old classic rides as it is about experiencing new cutting edge coasters. While the organization actively lobbies for and finances preservation efforts, seldom does its members get down and dirty with the physical tasks of preserving an endangered coaster.

This weekend, however, ACE members and other volunteers will wrap up a monthlong effort to repaint the 1937 Blue Streak at Conneaut Lake Park in Conneaut Lake, Pennsylvania. Spearheaded by Dave and Maggie Altman, ACE’s Western Pennsylvania Region representatives, the effort has drawn labor and funds from across the state, New York, Michigan and as far away as Georgia. Last weekend 58 volunteers descended on the park to paint the coaster, some from other coaster clubs as well as members of the ABATE motorcycle club.

“We did not want this to be perceived as an ACE event,” said Dave Altman, who is also the organization’s treasurer. “This was more of a fund raiser for the park.” The Altmans were contacted by Betty Tolbert, a longtime supporter of Conneaut Lake, and the ACE members in turn put the word out through the ACE grapevines and sent notices to other coaster clubs, who published the drive in their own newsletters. The ACE executive committee also donated $5,000, and Western Pennsylvania Region members ponied up another $500. The money goes for paint and supplies and pays for local Amish workers to paint the structure above six feet (2 meters), the limit OSHA places on non-certified workers.

Tolbert, a member of the Conneaut Lake Historic Society and the park’s Preservation Society, has been visiting Conneaut Lake Park since she was 12, and she and her husband, Jim, honeymooned there 50 years ago. She has long tried to help out around the park, cleaning and caring for rides and structures while the park, currently under court trusteeship, struggled to survive. “I wanted to see what we could do to make a big mark in the park. I wanted to do something monumental,” she said. She asked park General Manager Gene Rumsey, who noted the Blue Streak needed painting but he didn’t have the money to do it. Tolbert then organized the painting campaign through the various historical and coaster societies.

Rumsey said his not-for-profit park depends on such volunteer assistance, and encourages the help through tradeouts. High school classes who take on landscaping tasks, for instance, may use the park’s ballroom free as a prom venue. For the Blue Streak painters, he is providing free rooms at the Conneaut Lake Park hotel plus two days of breakfast and lunch and dinner on Saturdays. “This is the kind of thing that makes the whole baby run,” he said.

Tolbert said that once the painting scheme went out on the Internet, she got a call and a check from a man in Florida who grew up near the park. “That’s the important thing about this park: it has memories,” she said. “One of the painters who came, I saw him grow up at the park and now he’s bringing his children. The coaster is historic, and that’s wonderful, but the main thing is we’re making memories.”

Anyone who would like to join this weekend’s painting party and is in need of a room at the hotel should call the park at 814-382-5115.

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Frequent flyer
Wanted: a professional advertising campaign on a shoe-string budget. Found: a pre-owned model.

Jo Ann Keirsey, director of marketing and interpretive services at the Oklahoma City Zoo in Oklahoma was looking for an inexpensive way to promote a free-flight bird presentation by Steve Martin of Natural Encounters which began showing at her zoo March 16 and runs to June 16. Important as it is to driving traffic to the zoo, Keirsey worried about the potential cost of promoting the show. “We’re trying to hold budget dollars down,” she said. “Many of us have been in a position where we spend $6,000 on a television commercial that runs only three months, then the exhibit is gone. Thse only one to gain is an advertising agency, who was going to make a whole lot of money.”

After surfing through Internet sources for potential campaigns, Keirsey chanced a meeting with Martin and asked him which zoo on his previous stops had built the best advertising campaign for his show. “Without batting an eye he said, ‘Toledo,’” Keirsey said.

Keirsey ended up purchasing the outdoor and print portion of Toledo Zoo’s campaign, “Close Encounters of the Bird Kind,” for $3,000. Her zoo’s own graphic department expanded on the campaign with street banners and employee T-shirts, and she got trade-out sponsorship from a local television station for three months of promotion.

“They are not paying anywhere near what it cost us,” said Bill Dennler, executive director of the Toledo Zoological Gardens, of the campaign worked up by Lauerer Markin Group in Maumee, Ohio. Nevertheless, he supports such cooperation. “I would encourage AZA (the American Zoo and Aquarium Association) to start encouraging this nationally. I think it’s a wonderful way for all of us to save money.”

Sharing ideas is a long tradition among AZA member institutions, but the purchase of a full campaign, including all creative material, takes the practice a significant step further, with financial benefit to both parties. It works if the zoo owns the copyrights to the material, as Toledo Zoo does for all its advertising—“It’s part of our agreement with Lauerer Markin,” Dennler said—and for facilities that don’t overlap markets. The campaign also needs to have the same subject matter, Keirsey said. “This wasn’t just a generic campaign; this was a specialized bird show campaign. I couldn’t take a naked mole rat campaign and make it fit.”

Dennler believes the type of deal his zoo struck with Oklahoma City’s could expand to co-operative contracting for ad campaigns. “Let’s say we have six or eight zoos that want to do a bird show, or this bird show. We could have saved a lot of money doing one campaign for everybody. In this mindset, we could have produced a TV ad that could go all over the country. Hopefully, we’re heading in that direction.”

Oklahoma City and Toledo zoos have at least taken a giant step in that direction. “Will I do it again?” Keirsey asked rhetorically. “You bet.”

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Eric's Turn

Splash up
You could say we turned three this month—not in terms of age but in terms of presence. Or, as Marilyn Turner, editor of Splash magazine put it, we are now a triple treat. First, we formally join forces with Amusement Today, then Amusement Today purchases Splash (see story above).

I had already been working as a contributing editor for Splash since last summer, and that title continues on into the new version of the magazine as revised and—I’ve seen the upcoming April/May issue—improved upon by Amusement Today publisher Gary Slade. Still, just as the alliance with Amusement Today is allowing for a more streamlined journalistic operation, so the merger with Splash will remove the dichotomy of duties I previously balanced between two competiting publications. It might make for a crowded business card now, but it will be only one business card rather than three.

Bringing Splash on board will mean two things to the web side of our operations. One, THE LOOP will noticeably improve its water leisure industry coverage. Two, we will see yet another bold internet presence in splashmagazine.com. In the tradition of gettheloop.com and the month-old amusementtoday.com, when fully ramped up later this year Splash’s web site, currently undergoing renovations by webmaster Kelley Martin of Web Weasels (www.webweasels.com), will provide an unparalleled service to the water leisure industry that will compliment the trends coverage we do in THE LOOP, the news coverage we do in Amusement Today, and the feature and service profiles we will continue to do in Splash.

Meantime, this melding of the three entities is nothing short of a bonanza for the industry’s suppliers. Now you can take advantage of cooperative rates among the three publications—THE LOOP, Amusement Today and Splash, as well as amusementtoday.com—to get further mileage out of your message. And because we know these are still tough times for the industry (though the 2002 season has shot off at a record-breaking pace), we can offer advertising packages to meet any marketing budget.

For advertising on THE LOOP, click here, call our ad manager, Lynne Mosman, toll-free at 866-902-LOOP (outside North America call 1-937-294-3406) or email her at lynne@gettheloop.com. For advertising in Amusement Today and Splash, click here, call Randy Duffer at 817-460-7220, or email him at rduffer@amusementtoday.com.

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Major theme park proposed for Nashville

Santa's Village hires Robinson

Sally Rides allies with MGM films

Attractions earn Thea Awards

El Paso Waterpark installs VirtualTrak

Kings Island coaster goes to broker

Anheuser-Busch PR team wins award

For updates, click Extra! Extra!

New Arrivals

Air National Guard fighter pilots acknowledged the wonders of this particular Batman. Photo courtesy of Six Flags New England.

It’s a roller coaster!
Six Flags New England in Agawam, Massachusetts, announces the arrival of Batman—The Dark Knight, April 18, 2002. Measurements: 117 feet high (35 meters), 2,620 feet long (794 meters). Delivered by Bolliger & Mabillard.

Things got hot for Mary Ann Stebbins, Six Flags New England’s marketing communications manager, when media day arrived for her park’s new floorless coaster. And that was a good thing.

With near freezing temperatures settling in early in the week, Stebbins began planning the procurement of heaters to warm the tents at that Thursday evening’s VIP event. But Wednesday blistered to a humid 95 degrees Fahrenheit (35 degrees Celsius), and Thursday enjoyed the same heat without the humidity. “I was so lucky, I was so blessed,” Stebbins said. “It was like a July day.”

For the media preview that morning, A-10 fighter pilots from a nearby Air National Guard unit enjoyed the unveiling ride and, wearing their flightsuits, put on quite a show for the press, Stebbins said. That evening for a crowd of some 300 dignitaries and invited guests, Batman itself put on a spectacular show for its official grand opening, the train passing through pyrotechnics and lighting effects.

Saturday the ride was available to the public for the first time and, highly visible from the parking lot, drew a quick line at the start of the day, Stebbins said. However, this Batman—and just about any ride Six Flags New England introduces henceforth—will have a hard time competing against its two-year-old comic book hero cousin, Superman—Ride of Steel. Even on Batman’s opening day, Superman, widely regarded as one of the best coasters on the planet, had longer lines.

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Maelstrom swung into action at last at Drayton. Photo courtesy of Drayton Manor.

It’s a gyro swing!
Drayton Manor in Tamworth, England, announces the arrival of Maelstrom, April 17, 2002. Measurements: 17.4 meters high (57 feet), gondola swings out to a height of 22.5 meters (74 feet), revolving at 5 rpm, 32 riders. Delivered by Ride Trade.

Originally slated for a celebratory April 9 opening, Maelstrom’s debut was pushed back a week out of reverence for the funeral of Britain’s Queen Mother. With the period of national mourning receding, Drayton Manor rolled out a big bash for its newest white-knuckler.

On hand to cut the ribbon was pop chart toppers Hear’Say, a primary choice of celebrity for a park intent upon building on its primary teen-age market. The band did the trick of attracting a huge queue on an unseasonably warm and sunny day well before the ride opened. Hear’Say led the way for Maelstrom’s first official ride that Wednesday morning, and the queue remained an hour long for the rest of the day, said Edward Pawley, projects manager at the park.

“There was a lot of local interest about the ride, and a lot of people from the city of Birmingham came out,” Pawley said. Maelstrom differs from other gyro rides in that the passengers face outward in suspended seats with their legs dangling. Swinging through a rotation of 5 rpms, “this gives riders the unique feeling that they are flying through the air,” Pawley said.

Though Drayton has made a thrill impact with its Apocalypse stand-up drop tower and Shockwave stand-up coaster, the park was badly needing a flat ride thrill of the nature of Maelstrom, Pawley said. “We’ve got a number of coasters and water rides, but other than a pirate ship that swings we hadn’t had something like this in the park for a number of years.” Signifying the ride's importance, Maelstrom was placed right in the center of the park, becoming something of a focal point for Drayton Manor.

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It’s a jellyfish exhibit!
Monterey Bay Aquarium in Monterey, California, announces the arrival of “Jellies: Living Art” April 8, 2002. Measurements: 4,650 square feet (1,409 square meters), four galleries, nine species permanently exhibited and up to 16 species taking turns in a “tank of the month,” 13 pieces of art.

The large Dale Chihuly glass sculpture introduces guests to the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s new $2.85 million exhibit of jellies—a price tag that included commission for and loans of the artwork. However, it is a video early in the exhibit that puts across the venture’s message, showing a Mona Lisa that morphs into a jelly that then morphs into the Sistine Chapel Ceiling that then sparks into Van Gogh’s Starry Night which turns into a host of jellies that swim into a da Vinci notebook.

“We are making the statement that art and nature are inextricably intertwined,” said Ken Peterson, the aquarium’s public relations manager. “We are presenting more of the aesthetic of jellies instead of the natural history.” That, he said, is what guests said they wanted after a previous exhibit focused on the fate of the endangered species. While patrons appreciated the message, it was the jellies’ beauty they appreciated more.

In one of its exhibits, “Jellies: Living Art” almost contradicts any notion that these animals are endangered. The Moon Jelly exhibit features 5,000 gallons of floor-to-ceiling tanks with mirrors at the end, giving guests the impression they are in an endless tunnel of moon jellies. The soundtrack is trance-like vocalizations, and a lighting sequence produces an effect of swirling water on the floor. “It’s a trip,” Peterson said. “We are definitely blowing a few minds with this exhibit.”

The purposed impact is succeeding. Peterson reported many guests emerging in tears, and one woman during a donor preview said she had to hold tight to her husband because her knees were buckling. “This one is so different and so captivating it’s reaching people in a really different way. Our goal is to reach people at their hearts.”

Even as staff members prepared what they knew would be one of the storied aquarium’s more sensational exhibits, they nevertheless engineered a low-key opening. “After September 11, we looked hard at our budgets for this year,” Peterson said. “We didn’t do anything splashy:” nothing more than a family day for the media, previews for donors and the Monterey Bay area hospitality industry and an advertising campaign featuring models holding art frames underwater. Jellies, however, draw with little prompting, and Peterson reported large crowds turning out.

Like all Monterey Bay Aquarium exhibits, “Jellies: Living Art” is a temporary display, scheduled to last only through the end of 2004. “That assumes people let us close it then,” Peterson said. “My feeling already is that this will be up longer.”

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It’s a themed area!
Dollywood in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, announces the arrival of Adventures in Imagination, April 6, 2002. Measurements: Seven acres, a motion theater with 4-minute ride, an 11,000-square-foot (3,333-square-meter) exhibition hall, one store and one donut shop. Motion theater delivered by JHP Productions, MY Design and IWERKS, exhibition delivered by Bruce Robinson, Sandlot Pictures, UV/FX, Bandit Lites and Maltbie.

Dolly Parton was in Pigeon Forge on September 11, 2001, filming scenes for Smoky Mountain Wilderness Adventure, the Iwerks film replacing Thunder Road at her park’s motion theaters, when the terrorist attacks on New York City and Washington, D.C., brought her world to a stop.

Almost seven months later, she was back at the park to unveil the film about her and whacky inventor Clovis riding through the Smokys in an all-terrain vehicle that floats, flies and sometimes runs. She called the moment bittersweet, recalling that during the filming nobody was even sure if they would be celebrating an opening day. Now, while she’ll always remember the circumstances of the filming, she felt proud to be able to open the park’s 17th season on schedule.

That’s a large part of what the new $10 million Adventures in Imagination area is all about: Dolly and her life of successes. The centerpiece attraction is Chasing Rainbows, a two-story exhibit dedicated to Parton’s upbringing in the mountains and subsequent music and film career. Many of the displays feature her own keepsakes, from an old sauna to a piece of butterfly carpet she once had in her house. On the Friday before the public opening, she led a press contingent of nearly 200 reporters and photographers through the museum and the rest of the themed area, then treated the media to a 40-minute private concert with her new band, the Blueniques, a warm-up gig for her upcoming world tour.

More such warm-up concerts came as a surprise to Opening Day guests. Every vehicle entering the park received a scratch-off game card with prizes ranging from free popcorn or Coca Cola to free admissions or upgrades. Grand prizes were four tickets to one of Parton’s three concerts that day, which had not been announced in advance. Everybody entering the park was a winner—some beyond their Imaginations.

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Superman gave riders the sensation of flying from the start. Photo by Gary Slade/Amusement Today.

It’s a roller coaster!
Six Flags Over Georgia in Atlanta, Georgia, announces the arrival of Superman—Ultimate Flight, April 4, 2002. Measurements: 115 feet high (35 meters), 2,759 feet long (836 meters), 28-passenger trains. Delivered by Bolliger & Mabillard.

B&M introduced its flying-type coaster to the world at Alton Towers in England a few weeks before (THE LOOP, March 22, 2002s), an installation that, despite the park's geographic and height restrictions, indicated the Swiss manufacturer had another winner for its catalog. With Superman—Ultimate Flight, built in a section of Six Flags Over Georgia that allowed plenty of room to rise and soar, B&M demonstrated its flying coaster could become the next big thing, with the kind of marketing power its Batman-style inverted coasters wielded.

“I hope it is as popular as the inverted,” said Claude Mabillard. “But we don’t want to get into the higher, longer, taller factor with this ride. If parks want higher, taller, faster, we have other coasters in our library that accomplish that. The reason you buy the ride is to let your guests fly, to experience flight.”

That it does. Coaster enthusiasts on hand for the opening ceremony not only raved about Superman but rode it continuously throughout the day as first the media then employees of the Publix supermarket chain—as a reward for their season pass selling efforts for the park—were given an opportunity to try out the new ride. The park’s Vice President and General Manager John Odum, a private pilot, kept comparing the ride to how a child imagines flying through the air. The sensation starts in the station when the four-abreast seats, suspended under the track, tilt forward to put riders in a prone position. When riding up the lift hill, you see no structure below you, only the ground slowly receding. It’s a different kind of coaster experience.

For the media day official opening, two actors representing Clark Kent and Lois Lane greeted the crowd of some 400. The Kent character went into a phone booth and out emerged Odum, who took the first ride on Superman with the blonde Lane. The whole event took on super proportions for the park: media outlets from throughout the Southeast sent reporters or camera crews, and the park’s own satellite feed registered 500 accesses.

Though the park planned no special ceremony for the public opening the following Saturday—just as well as crowds sprinted from the main gate to Superman at the back of the park, where lines overflowed the queue area throughout the day—Superman’s dad was on hand for the event. John Schneider, who plays Clark’s father on the television show Smallville and is a former Six Flags Over Georgia employee, signed autographs and worked the crowds standing in line. He also got a chance to ride with Odum on Superman, which, despite the Man of Steel theming and celebration, is a ride more perfectly suited to the second half of its name: Ultimate Flight.

— Gary Slade contributed to this report

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Discovery Theme Park patrons tilted into action on Gravity Max. Photo courtesy Yamay Resort.

It’s a prototype coaster!
Discovery Theme Park in Hou-li, Taiwan, announces the arrival of Gravity Max, March 27, 2002. Measurements: 35 meters high (116 feet), 559 meters long (1,845 feet), 90 km/h (56 mph), 24-passenger trains. Delivered by Vekoma.

Yamay Resort, the hotel-waterpark-theme park complex in Taichung County, wanted something unique in a thrill ride, something you could not find in any other park in Taiwan or even Asia. “Everyone has a freefall tower, and everyone has a good coaster,” said Luke Tan, vice president of planning and marketing. “We combine the two. We found a coaster that crosses with a freefall tower.”

What they discovered was Vekoma’s plans for the Tilt Coaster, a prototype ride in which the train ascends the lift hill but then stops, anchored to a track that swings down to a 90-degree angle, where it hooks to the rest of the coaster’s track. Released, the train plunges 40 meters (132 feet) into a tunnel, ascends through a loop, then into a vortex and back to the station. “It’s a short ride (only about a minute),” Tan said, “but it’s really amazing stuff. The tilting action is so good. The back seat goes to the very top (43 meters or 142 feet above the ground) while people in the front seat look down into a small hole in the ground.”

Such is the unusual nature of the ride that it is proving as entertaining to the crowds watching as it is to riders, said Katie Ho, supervisor of the park’s public relations department. “People watching were screaming louder than people on the ride,” she said. And the people on the ride were screaming loud enough. “Taking the ride is like a challenge, it’s like a Mission: Impossible. Everybody wants to be a Tom Cruise.”

The park, which itself officially opened February 12, did not stage any dedication ceremony for Gravity Max. When the ride was deemed ready, it opened and the public descended on it. The park did conduct a press conference about the ride, and that resulted by happenstance in a most unusual but effective marketing ploy.

Because the park was four months late opening and the coaster came on line six weeks after that, the resort's shareholders, including the Taiwan government, were paying close attention, Tan said. The press conference featuring the coaster drew many of these shareholders—what Tan called 40-year-old, conservative salary men—to Discovery Theme Park.

Taking off from their jobs at the bank or in government service, these men would show up in their suits and ties, but upon their entering the park Tan “invited” them to ride Gravity Max. “They are reluctant to take the ride,” Tan said. “We tell them you can not be a shareholder if you do not try the ride. After they take the ride, they are smiling and so full of self-confidence. Then they go through the park so proud, these people in suits and ties, 40 and 50 years old, inviting teen-agers to go do the ride. It’s so amazing.”

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Rebirths

It’s a roller coaster!
Chessington World of Adventures in Surrey, England, announces the rebirth of Vampire, April 17, 2002. Measurements: 16.6 meters high (55 feet), 716.4 meters long (2,350 feet), 53 km/h (33 mph). Redesign delivered by Vekoma on a ride originally by Arrow Dynamics.

After a year of dormancy and some delays leading up to its scheduled resurrection, the 12-year-old Vampire suspended coaster finally reopened to the public sans ceremony late on a Wednesday afternoon. The inauspicious start was yet greeted with much appreciation, especially by some of Chessington’s younger guests. In addition to replacing the old enclosed cars with ski lift type seats, the new Vampire lowered its minimum height restriction from 1.2 meters to 1.1 meters (48 inches to 42 inches).

“Now the average 5- or 6-year-old can ride,” said Emma Hart, the park’s public relations manager. “For them it’s a hugely thrilling ride they can get on.” Though Hart was not able to reopen Vampire with appropriate public fanfare, she plans to stage a media event for the ride later this spring.

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A trainload of dignitaries and donors celebrated the renewal of a Lincoln tradition. Photo courtesy of Folsom Children's Zoo and Botanical Garden.

It’s a train!
Folsom Children’s Zoo and Botanical Garden in Lincoln, Nebraska, announces the rebirth of its ZO&O train, April 13, 2002. Measurements: One C.P. Huntington Engine with four passenger coaches, one of which is wheelchair accessible. Delivered by Chance Rides.

John Chapo, executive director of the Folsom Children’s Zoo and Botanical Garden, calls the train, which predates the 37-year-old zoo by two years, a Lincoln icon. “It’s a tradition. We have people coming back who rode it as children bringing their children and sometimes bringing their grandchildren. If you have family visiting, you come ride the train. If it’s springtime, you ride the train at the zoo.” The train sees ridership of about 80,000 passengers per year, almost half the 170,000 annual attendance the zoo averages.

So, Chapo was not surprised that about 1,000 people showed up for the official dedication ceremony and free rides on the new engine and coaches that replaced the original train. The new version received a glorious welcome, too. With a Dixieland band playing “Chattanooga Choo Choo” and kettle corn popping, the new train carrying its donors and Lincoln’s mayor emerged from its storage shed and through an honor guard bearing American flags. Donors received chrome-plated rails as gifts of appreciation and engineer’s caps bearing the ZO&O logo. But what they really wanted was to get back on the train. “They hadn’t had a full ride.” Theirs was the first of the day’s free rides before the train went into regular-fare public service two days later, a Monday that saw 1,100 people visit the 17-acre zoo.

Chapo said that while the city holds dear the tradition of having a train at his zoo, it had no special affinity for the C.P. Huntington it put out of service last fall after 38 years. The new train maintains the look and patriotic red, white and blue color scheme of the old, but its newness drew appreciative remarks. “The seats are six inches wider, and people commented that this is roomier,” Chapo said. “My staff just loves the mechanics of it, especially the braking system and transmission. And the volunteer engineers love it because it’s easier to drive and safer to drive.”

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