Volume 1, No. 9.   June 1, 2001

 

 

Class action

 

For an industry that in North America has been steadily losing ground against lengthening school calendars, the actions of the Texas state legislature last week may prove a watershed moment. Senate Bill 108, mandating that no school district may begin its calendar before the week on which August 21 falls, passed both chambers by overwhelming margins and moved on for almost-certain signing by Governor Rick Perry.

That date may still seem too early for many amusements operators, but the measure at least halts a trend among Texas schools that were starting their fall semesters as early as August 3. The majority of the state's districts were in school by August 12.

The state's action is significant for the role parents played in the campaign. "Texas has always been at the forefront of starting school early," said Tina Bruno, executive director of Texans for a Traditional School Year. TTSY is a grass roots organization that shepherded the bill through the statehouse. "What this shows in Texas, and probably the same is true across the nation, is if parents get involved early on, they're the ones politicians listen to."

Politicians clearly didn't listen to the tourism industry. That was the primary motivator for the bill's original introduction by State Senator Eddi Lucio of Brownsville six years ago, but the measure languished in the face of heady opposition from school officials. The playing field dramatically altered when TTSY formed in December 1998 and began gathering hard data on the shortened summers' negative impact on children and families.

At the time the organization launched its public campaign in August 1999 with a press conference it had about 50 members. Within a week of the press conference, that number was up to 3,000. "We had parents gather petitions with signatures from well over half of the parents in their districts," Bruno said. Parents started demanding meetings with school boards and contacting their state representatives. The media began doing surveys which consistently showed 80 percent of parents favoring post-Labor Day school starts. "Lawmakers started seeing that over and over and over. A week didn't go by that they didn't get a newspaper clip showing that parents hated starting schools early."

"The more people experience the disruption to their lives, the more they become active," said Billee Bussard in Jacksonville Beach, Florida, outgoing executive director of Time To Learn, a national school calendar watchdog group. She considers the Texas action to be indicative of a growing sentiment throughout the nation. However, she notes that for amusement facility operators or any other business, weighing in on the issue can do more harm than good. "Businesses are in the awkward position of looking as if they are against improving education if they oppose extended school calendars, which is not the case." Though politicians usually court businesses on most issues, the appearance of profit motive over quality education scares them off. "That is what's so peculiar about this issue," Bussard said.

Bruno, however, who will be stepping into the Time To Learn executive director position July 1, thinks businesses should get involved. Amusement venues in particular can play particularly key roles because of their family-oriented missions and status as important summer employers, not only of students, but teachers, too. "The thing most businesses forget is they don't have to go to the school board as a business person," she said. "They can go to the school board as John's dad and voice concern. But when they go they have to have a solution, a workable calendar, and they need to have the data in hand."

You can get some of that data from the web sites by TTSY (www.traditionalschoolyear.org) and Time to Learn (www.timetolearn.org).

Het Land van Sesame

On a scale of media mergers, this one won't rattle headlines like so many before, but that doesn't make the news that Het Land van Ooit in The Netherlands landed the first European rights to Sesame Street's characters no less significant.

Het Land van Ooit, which literally translates in English as "The Land of Whenever," is a 10-year-old family theme park in Drunen featuring live actors playing the medievalish residents of a fictitious land. Winning industry awards for its shows and the performances of its strolling actors, Het Land van Ooit became so popular in its homeland that its characters have spawned their own shows on Dutch television.

Also popular on Dutch television, and a staple for more than 25 years, is Sesamstraat. ITEC Entertainment Corporation in Orlando, Florida, holds the European licensing rights for the Sesame Workshop characters and promoted this fact at the Europarks Dinner, which ITEC sponsored, during last November's IAAPA trade show in Atlanta. Het Land van Ooit's management team, attending that dinner, jumped at the opportunity to pursue the license.

Though several larger parks were in the running, van Ooit won out, in large part because of the compatibility of the two entities' existing product, said Joanne Taminiau-Cook, the head of marketing and public relations at Het Land van Ooit, where her official title is minister of foreign affairs. Both organizations are geared to children (Het Land van Ooit's demographics are 0 to 12 years old), and both focus on education. For the van Ooit's part, Sesamstraat is a strong brand that could only boost the park's stature without intruding on the Ooit's near-mystical ambiance. "We see it as an additional offering to our product, and not in competition with it," Taminiau-Cook said. The park signed a 10-year contract with an option for an additional 10 years.

The park began a meet-and-greet program with the Muppet characters last week, and in 2004 will build a Sesame Street within Het Land van Ooit that will include a stage show. At the start, at least, the Ooit and Sesame productions will maintain their own identities, Taminiau-Cook said. "You'd only confuse people if you started mixing Sesame Street characters with Ooit characters." Ooit's residents even stay clear of the Sesamstraat costumed characters' three-a-day meet-and-greet sessions.

That Het Land van Ooit landed a gold mine with the license is evident in those meet-and greet sessions, Taminiau-Cook said. The Muppet players have existed in Europe only on screen and in merchandise; "This is their first physical outing on a large scale," she said. Audiences "are just sitting around waiting for them when they come out. There are beautiful reactions to them. They don't talk, but they are just so friendly, and there's a lot of interaction going on."

Ironically, in a park where children are literally given license to rule their parents, the Sesame Street gang could widen the demographics, not only to pre-school age children, but to parents, too. "The parents of the children who come here have seen (Sesamstraat) when they were children, and they want to meet Bert and Ernie and the rest," Taminiau-Cook said.

 

The Elephant Child

Having yet another successful Asian elephant birth is never a mundane moment, even if it is your eighth one in 15 years. For African Lion Safari in Cambridge, Ontario, the one-month-old, unnamed son of 33-year-old Kitty is continuation of a highly successful breeding program of this endangered species.

Kitty's third baby expands African Lion Safari's herd to 13, five of them young males. The 750-acre wildlife park was founded in 1969 as a place where "visitors are caged in their cars as animals roam freely," said Karen O'Grady, director of marketing. Elephants first arrived in 1971, and in 1985 the AZA- and CAZA-accredited zoo launched its Asian elephant breeding program, focusing on the sub-continent species rather than the African variety because they are the more endangered, O'Grady said.

She attributes the program's success to the happy and healthy state of the animals. The elephants work out a lot, doing demonstrations for visitors. Twice a day the whole herd is taken to a 3-acre lake in the center of the park for a swim. They also get daily walks in a forest behind the facility, and otherwise they spend their time in their 5-acre paddock.

The focus is so intent on breeding that O'Grady didn't think publicity of the newborn would drive incremental visitation to the park, though the birth has received a lot of media attention. That cute picture will do that. Then again, even for the newborn bull it was business as usual. Within a day the boy was on display outdoors and swimming with the herd.

 

 

Lording over the competition

At first Angela Wright was flattered. The owner and manager of Crealy Adventure Park near Exeter, Devon, was entered by one of her staff, Brenda Hill, into the United Kingdom's Best Boss competition. The 2-year-old nationwide contest is run by PARENTS AT WORK with sponsorship from Lloyds TSP, one of Great Britain's largest banks. "I said, 'National contest, OK, we can have a go,'" recalled Wright, who had to submit a statement explaining why she thought she was nominated.

Even when she got the phone call that she'd been short-listed, Wright figured she was one of dozens. Turned out that she was one of a baker's dozen, and last week she learned she had been named one of the four winners of the competition. "They didn't say it, but there was a winner and three runners up. I was a runner up."

But nonetheless honored. The winners were treated to a lunch and ceremony at the House of Lords in Westminster. Angela and her husband, David, along with nominator Hill, took a train to London and made a grand trip of it: a show and dinner, and the next day entering the opulence of Parliament's upper chamber. "Very grand, incredibly ornate, lots of gold," Wright said. "We had lots of photos taken."

To eat lunch in the Attlee Room where the Parliamentarians dine, one must be the guest of a lord, and Wright's own representative, Lord Ponsonby of Shulbrede, was on hand to do the honors. "He was introduced to us as Fred. 'This is Fred.' We kept calling him Fred. We didn't realize he was my lord until later." After a tour of Parliament the trio went for a ride on the London Eye before heading back home to their own little family park, where Wright manages a seasonal staff of 300 and year-round staff of 40.

Wright received a "nice plaque" and flowers, and Hill received a bottle of champagne for the winning nomination, though Wright insists that was not the subordinate's motivation for entering her boss. "The champagne was a surprise." Though she was pressed hard to admit it, Wright is apparently a great boss. "Our team motto is 'Work hard, play hard.' Life's too short, so you have to enjoy your work because it makes up so much of your time. You need staff you're happy to see every morning. And I guess that goes both ways."

 

Days of elation

The film clip lasts only two minutes, but it left a lasting impression on the judges of the U.S. International Film and Video Festival who gave "Genesis" by International Tourist Attractions (ITA) a Gold Camera Award, which will be presented at the 34th annual festival in Chicago on June 8. "Genesis," a depiction of the world's creation that opens ITA's Amazing World attraction in Eilat, Israel, was one of 1,500 films and video clips submitted from 33 countries for the festival's competition.

For Tel Aviv-based ITA, the honors come amid the company's rapid expansion in product placement. Most notable are ITA's Time Elevator 4D theaters, combining film, motion platforms, and special effects to take guests on a time machine ride through the ages. The first opened in Jerusalem in 1998, and the company installed one for Walt Disney World's millennium celebration at Epcot Center in Orlando.

This month ITA is scheduled to open its second permanent Time Elevator installation, landing in Rome. Others are scheduled for Limassol, Cyprus, next winter, Philadelphia next summer, Athens, Pompeii, York (England), Baltimore, and Atlantic City. The latter two will be housed in complexes that also include ITA's other products, Amazing World and Oceanarium, and the Philadelphia project will be part of a five-story library and educational resource center, ITA's Marketing Coordinator Sharon Lanis said.

Education is a key element to the choice of sites for Time Elevator, which ITA establishes with local partners. Using leading historians to help with the scripts, each film is customized to that location. Thus, rich local history is a necessity—a reason to travel through time. Why Atlantic City? "It's a developing market," Lanis said. Also, the elevator there not only will take travelers through the strange but nevertheless rich history of the Jersey coastal resort but also America in general.

 

Have stuff, could travel

If the "legitimate" art and history museums around the world can do—and drive attendance with—temporary traveling exhibits, than why shouldn't the chain of Ripley's Believe It or Not! Odditoriums?

That is the thinking behind a test project at the Orlando Ripley's which, as part of renovations over the winter, set up a gallery for temporary exhibits. Its first show, which began May 1, is "Dog Gone Weird," with items ranging from pooches with two noses to the story of the dog that inspired Charles Schulz to create Snoopy. The exhibit will run into autumn, said Todd Hansen, director of sales and marketing for the Orlando Ripley's. A new temporary exhibit will move in then, though he's not sure what.

"We're talking about creating a whole series of them. We're thinking of something with dinosaurs. We're looking at one called 'Crazy Cuisine.' We may do something on silly sports. One idea is 'Beauty in the Eye of the Beholder' about body art, from tattoos to piercings to self mutilation." Though the exhibits would mostly draw from Ripley's own archives, the museum could display other collections, too. Hansen said the museum is "looking at the possibility" of doing an exhibit on lightning featuring the photography of David O. Stillings.

Because Ripley's corporate headquarters and warehouse are located in Orlando, the company's museum on International Drive is a perfect laboratory to test the concept. "Not every Ripley's will want to participate in this, but I think many will," Hansen said. One month into his first temporary exhibit, he has no hard data on the concept's attendance impact yet, but he did garner strong press coverage. "You just have to get people used to the idea that there's something new and different here," he said.

 

Return visits

Cedar Fair's purchase of Michigan's Adventure Amusement Park in Muskegon, Michigan was concluded today (LOOP May 18). The transaction was valued at approximately $28 million, according to a Cedar Fair statement. Cedar Fair also completed its purchase of Oasis Water Park in Palm Springs, California, Tuesday with an announced purchase price of $9.1 million. Hershey Entertainment and Resorts Company is still in the due diligence stage of its purchase of Dutch Wonderland (LOOP May 4).

Universal Studios Japan, which opened in Osaka March 31 (LOOP April 20) reached one million in attendance in just 37 days, company officials report. They claim it's the fastest million gate in theme park history.

Mick Foley, the professional wrestler (a.k.a. Mankind) who helped Six Flags Great Adventure open Nitro (LOOP April 6 and 20) last week saw his second book, Foley Is Good, reach Number One on the New York Times bestseller list for hardcover nonfiction. The memoirs include discussion of his roller coaster enthusiasm.

Our story about clown phobia (LOOP May 18) that worried Santa Cruz Beach and Boardwalk Communications Manager Jan Bollwinkel-Smith, prompted several compassionate responses from her colleagues. Linda Buckley, director of publicity and public relations at Universal Studios Orlando, also told us that during her park's Halloween Horror Nights event last year, which featured demented Jack the Clown, she learned that the medical term for fear of clowns is "coulrophobia." For a report on the opening of the fun house that gave Bollwinkel Smith such trepidation, see the New Arrival in this issue.

 

Rebirths

 

It's a roller coaster!

Kennywood in West Mifflin, Pennsylvania, announces the rebirth of Phantom's Revenge, May 18, 2001. Measurements: 3,365 feet long (1,020 meters), 160 feet high (48 meters), 232-foot drop (70 meters), 85 mph (136 kph). Delivered by Morgan Manufacturing.

Typical Kennywood: why waste time—and ridership—waiting for a celebration. The Phantom's Revenge was decreed fit for service at 3 p.m. Friday; at 4 p.m., the public was riding. Publicity Director Mary Lou Rosemeyer barely had time to email notification of a "Breakfast With the Phantom" media event 40 hours later. Sunday morning, about three dozen members of the local media and American Coasters Enthusiasts showed up for the first "official ride" on the re-designed steel coaster.

It was not hard to improve on the beat-'em-up original Steel Phantom, but Revenge is truly sweet. It interacts twice with the wooden Thunderbolt (still closed as the park re-assembles it's track) as well as the Turtle Tumble Bug. Though lacking the inversion of the original, the last third of Revenge is a buckin' bronco-like ride with air time even heading into the brake run. "I was surprised at the little lifts," said 66-year-old Bill Linkenheimer Jr., Pittsburgh resident and father of ACE president Bill Linkenheimer III. He had ridden Steel Phantom several times until, he said, "I started to get an aversion to inversions." The new look, he felt, was just right. "This is going to attract more people than they thought possible."

Which park officials still see as a challenge. They must convince those who loathed the original that this is a different ride (though the park has the Pippin-cum-Thunderbolt tradition on its side). For those who worshiped Phantom and consider any redesign sacrilege, the park must prove the ride's resurrection keeps the best of the old (again, the Pippin-Thunderbolt tradition holds true).

Utilizing another Kennywood tradition, however, word-of-mouth was already carrying the campaign forward. As Pete McAneny, the park's Vice President and General Manager, watched the first weekend running of Phantom's Revenge, he gauged rider reaction. "I didn't see a single person say it was not an improvement over the original ride," he said.

 

 

Eric’s Turn

Mummy's the word

The guy in the mirror didn't look particularly fearsome; just fierce. He was an Indiana Jones-type who had just come out of an encounter with an angry jaguar, his face bruised and slashed. In adventurer's wide-brim hat and filthy flak vest, I headed out to make my debut as a haunter in The Mummy-LIVE, a highly themed haunted maze at the I-X Indoor Amusement Park in Cleveland in April.

With instructions from the show's creator, Lynton V. Harris, I stood in a corner next to a room's entrance. Down the path and opposite to me a mummy crouched behind a wall. I was to yell upon the guests' entrance, and the mummy would jump up at them. My yells, though, resulted in more laughter than fright. One teen looked me over and said, "Are you supposed to be scary?" Retaliation was, of course, out of the question, so I just stared at him, and he walked away watching me with increasing wariness.

Ah, new tactic. I stared silently as people walked past, a strategy that resulted in some true yelps. When one couple turned the corner, the woman saw me and doubled up in screams. Her male companion laughed and gave me a thumbs up as if to say, "Good scare," then jumped three feet sideways when the mummy hissed at him. Perfect double-whammy teamwork. It was the peak of my 45-minute career as a haunter.

This bit of participatory journalism came courtesy of Lynton, president of The Sudden Impact! Entertainment Company and mastermind behind Madison SCARE Gardens in New York City, a haunter I featured in a Psychology Today article on "thrills and chills" psychology (June 1999). He secured the rights to The Mummy as a haunted maze, and the I-X Indoor Amusement Park was his first test of the product in a non-seasonal venue. This month he will open a 3,000-square-foot (909 square meters) Mummy's Returns at Dreamworld Theme Park in Queensland, Australia, for a two-month run. Fortuitous timing on his part because the attraction opens within weeks of the cinema version's blockbuster premier Down Under.

And we are fortuitous to partner with Lynton on a special $1 million promotion just for THE LOOP readers. He is waiving the license fee for the first 40 readers who obtain from Sudden Impact! Lynton's short Halloween film "FREAKSHOW." Lynton produced the film, featuring Alice Cooper, for his Madison SCARE Garden venture. This is a perfect opportunity for those of you planning Halloween events to turn your facility's theater into a haunting experience, a free (for you) add on to your mazes and rides. And if you aren't planning your Halloween events, you better get started.

For more information, see the FREAKSHOW Promotion page on this web site.

 

New Arrivals

 

It's a waterpark!

NBGS International announces the arrival of Schlitterbahn Beach Waterpark on South Padre Island, Texas, May 25, 2001. Measurements: 26 acres, four Master Blasters, one lazy river with conveyor belt, locks, wave maker and rapids, two rapid river chutes, one flow rider, three waterslides, one interactive play area in a kiddie pool, nine eateries/bars, two retail outlets, two shows, 5,000 total capacity. Delivered by NBGS, Aloha, American Turbine, Anchor Industries, Azusa, CA International Conveyor, Gateway, Hydrotech, ITT Flygt, Precision Dynamics, Sevior, United Industries, Van Stone, Wave Loch, Wunsch & Associates.

Andrew Welch described the moment as resembling the start of a Le Mans auto race. Upon word that the park's Rio Aventura lazy river—featuring NBGS' patented transportainment system—was open, guests poured into the water grabbing tubes and parking at the foot of the conveyor belt that lifts river riders from the Rio's lowest to highest elevation. "People were running from everywhere," said Welch of Biwater Leisure, who was on holiday at the park. "It was a spectacular sight."

So was the park for Island residents and visitors from the Rio Grande Valley and over the Mexican border. Though heavy construction continued to move the park toward it's official late June grand opening, the gigantic, thatched palm-frond roof shelters, called palapas, and life-size sand castle—the park's centerpiece structure which eventually will boast 200 interactive elements plus fireworks for a nightly show—left jaws agape. The fabricated concrete sand castle looks so realistic, NBGS CEO and Schlitterbahn Beach visionary Jeff Henry said, that "Yankees (anyone living north of the Rio Grande Valley) keep asking us, 'How do you make the sand stay up?'"

As artistically stunning as the visuals are in this park, it's the technology that sets it apart from all that's gone before. Guests can spend the entire day playing on the interlinked river, chutes, and Master Blasters without ever touching ground. The transportainment system uses a patented conveyor belt and a four-lock structure that allow riders to circumnavigate the multi-level river without leaving their tubes. Each Master Blaster has its own "floating queue" which, combined, amount to 1,000 feet (303 meters). Though the Blasters and lock were not yet operating on Day One, the conveyor belt drew a happy crowd, none happier than the first official rider: Henry himself.

"The highlight of my day was riding that belt," said Henry, his inaugural ride coming after an all-night blitz to clear the parking lot of building material and the wayfares of dirt and equipment. While it may have been a race to get the park ready for the advertised opening day, the sight of guests racing into the water at the opening call made everybody's day.

For a complete profile of Schlitterbahn Beach Waterpark, see the next issue of Amusement Today.

 

It's a waterslide tower!

Six Flags New Jersey's Hurricane Harbor in Jackson, New Jersey, announces the arrival of Hurricane Mountain, May 26, 2001. Measurements: 49 feet high (15 meters), six slides, 2,227 feet of total slides (675 meters), 2,300-square-foot loading platform (697 meters). Delivered by Whitewater West Industries.

Another Memorial Day opening, another rain-soaked weekend. Dating back to her Jersey childhood that is the way Kristin Kocher, Six Flags Great Adventure's public relations manager, always remembered it. Why should it be any different opening the waterpark's second season, and with it a multi-colored slide complex featuring two four-person toboggan slides and four innertube slides with motion-sensor-activated water gauntlets that riders descend through? On days like this, the best guest comment you can hope for is that the water is warmer than the air.

Kocher and her crew chose to make the best of what they knew would be a soggy situation and show the press and public on opening day that they were positive the summer of 2001 would be dramatically better than the incessant drench of 2000. They enlisted Hurricane Harbor's own King Kukookachoo to do a "sun dance" with five Tahitian dancers and a fire dancer in ceremonial garb. The king read a poem describing the founding of Hurricane Harbor and how rainy the first year had been, then summoned all the weather gods for their blessings, which came in a pyrotechnic flash. The ceremony would at least demonstrate a sense of humor on a day forecasters predicted would be shower-laden.

However, after the dancers finished, the clouds started parting. The day remained partly cloudy until after the park closed, when the rains finally came. "We just shook our heads and said, 'We need to do this more often,'" Kocher said. "We're confident the King Kukookachoo sun dance will prove effective, and we may do it every year." Perhaps she could entice the king to next fall's IAAPA show to do a fair-weather dance for the whole industry.

 

 

It's dueling waterslides!

Noah's Ark Waterpark in Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin, announces the arrival of Point of No Return, May 26, 2001. Measurements: 100 feet high, 300 feet long each (30 and 91 meters). Delivered by ProSlide Technology.

Noah's Ark decided to forego tradition and not plan an opening ceremony for its new racing speed slide complex. "The thought in the back of our minds was we might not make it," park manager and vice president Dan Gantz said of the construction crunch as the Memorial Day weekend neared. "It was down to the wire and we were getting concerned."

Finally completing the slide on Friday, management asked some of the staff if they'd be willing to pace the slides through their first 100 uses. "They loved it," Gantz said of the opportunity. "When I told one guy he would be the first one down, he thought he'd gone to heaven." The launch tower's proximity to the heavens kept Gantz from being among the slide's testers: "It's intimidating up there." As impressive as the slides' height is their technology. Racers are timed by a clock triggered by their passing through electronic eyes. The winner ends up sliding through a series of water jet fountains, a liquid arc de triumph.

After thorough testing Friday night, the ride was available to the general public on Saturday, and proved as popular as any ride could be on a dismal, cold, rainy day.

It's a maze!

Premier Yachts in Chicago, Illinois, announces the arrival of A*mazing Chicago, May 25, 2001. Measurements: 4,000 square feet (1,212 meters). Delivered by Jack Rouse & Associates, Adrian Fisher and Chicago Scenic.

Navy Pier wanted a year-round family attraction to supplement its mostly seasonal recreational activities. So, one of the tour boat companies spent 2 1/2 years developing a maze that starts off with mirrored passages and continues through a rendering of Chicago's famous buildings and landmarks. Though the press introduction is not scheduled until June 19, the soft opening that began Friday attracted about 800 people a day. With a target demographic of 7- to 12-year-olds, the maze also has an audio narration recounting historic facts and cultural events of the city, a bid to attract school groups.

It's a fun house!

Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk announces the arrival of 3-D Fun House, May 25, 2001. Measurements: 2,600 square feet (788 square meters). Delivered by D.O.A.

On Friday morning, staff were still painting Santa Cruz's newest dark attraction, a walk-through, mirror-and-clown themed maze. At 3 p.m., the attraction opened to the public. Throughout the three-day weekend, cold and foggy though the outside climate may have been, crowds came by in steady numbers to traipse through the 7-minute course. Despite little fanfare, three local television stations, two radio stations, and a newspaper came out to record the attraction's opening. "For us, that's good," said Jan Bollwinkle-Smith, the Boardwalk's communications manager.

Even Bollwinkel-Smith ventured through the maze, despite her intense dislike of clowns. Led by her boss, Marketing Director Marq Lipton, who knew where the clowns were located, she received adequate warning to cast down her gaze whenever a harlequin reared its painted head.

 

It's a roller coaster!

Six Flags Great America in Gurnee, Illinois, announces the arrival of Vertical Velocity (V2), May 24, 2001. Measurements: 630 feet of track (191 meters) on two towers 185 feet high (56 meters), 28-seat train, 70 mph (112 kph) in four seconds. Delivered by Intamin.

To emphasize the installation of Six Flags Great America's first Linear Induction Motor thrill ride, the park looked for test riders who could best appreciate launching from 0 to 70 in four seconds: drag racers. Drivers from Route 66 in Joliet brought their dragsters with them to the Thursday morning media unveiling and public debut of the U-shaped V2 and were among the first to try out the track.

"They said it was an awesome ride," said Michelle Hoffman, the park's public relations specialist. "It really does compare to the acceleration of their cars. Except we've added a unique element to that." Like shooting forward and straight up a spiraling track, then speeding backwards up the opposite tower, where the train hangs up for a second before accelerating back through the station. No dragster ever drove that way, at least not intentionally.

But coaster enthusiasts perhaps do: one fan rode V2 61 times on opening day, Hoffman said.

 

It's a roller coaster!

Six Flags Worlds of Adventure in Aurora, Ohio, announces the arrival of X-Flight May 22, 2001. Measurements: 115 feet high (35 meters), 3,340 feet long (1,012 meters), 51 mph (82 kph). Delivered by Vekoma International.

When Six Flags Ohio's general managers past and present returned from the first official run of the world's second "flying coaster," they looked like they had gone through the spin cycle in a washing machine. Current GM Joe Costa and Jack Bateman, now vice president of business development, debuted X-Flight during a day-long rainstorm. Despite the dousing, Costa arrived back in the station to offer a thumbs up. "You ride with your stomach to the ground, which is really cool," he said.

A glistening gold robot "remove(d) this festive blockade so you can take your position on X-Flight" (in other words, he cut the ribbon) to officially unveil the coaster for an invited gathering of media, local dignitaries and coaster enthusiasts. The day's theme was flight: songs about flying played over the loudspeaker, attendees received wing pins, and invitations came with a vinyl travel kit which included earplugs, a propeller toy, a bag of X-Flight peanuts, and a sewing kit for "rip-roaring excitement."

However, on this blustery Tuesday it was the earthly elements which dominated conversation, as riders swooped down low over the yet-to-be landscaped ground. "All I noticed was mud at one point," said Kristi Hoffman of WMMS radio station. With her and most of the enthusiasts, that was a good thing. "The rain made it that much better," she said. "It was refreshing."

 

It's a seahorse exhibit!

Monterey Bay Aquarium in Monterey, California, announces the arrival of "Saving Seahorses" and "Vanishing Wildlife: Saving Tunas, Turtles and Sharks," May 19, 2001. Measurements: 1,000-square-foot "Seahorse" gallery (303 meters), 250-square-foot window for "Vanishing" (76 meters) at a 60-degree angle.

Public Relations Manager Ken Peterson did not put together any big media splash for the opening of his aquarium's latest exhibits because of their modest scale. Then the seahorses started having babies, in big numbers. "That was a sufficient news hook," Peterson said. "And we had no control over that. We didn't know they were pregnant." Seahorses also are popular draws in themselves, and despite a low-key publicity campaign, lines formed on the first day.

Meanwhile, the "Vanishing Wildlife" uses an existing aquarium treasure too long shut off from the public. The famed million-gallon Outer Bay tank already featured the largest window on the planet at 54 feet long and 15 feet tall (16 and 5 meters), through which visitors could watch sharks, turtles, and schools of tuna. Unbeknownst to most visitors, that window extends downstairs, where it angles in allowing a stunning view up into the tank. Previously set aside for group events, that ground-floor room has now been filled with interactive exhibits explaining the threat to sea turtles, tuna and sharks in the wild. Peterson said the initial popularity of the exhibit is hard to gauge, especially compared to the enthusiasm generated by the seahorses: "But people seem to like that window."

 

 

It's a roller coaster!

Indiana Beach in Monticello, Indiana, announces the arrival of CornBall Express, May 18, 2001. Measurements: 2,260 feet long (685 meters), 59-foot lift hill (18 meters), 73-foot first drop (24 meters), 46 mph (73 kph). Delivered by Custom Coasters International.

Corny as they could be, the folks at this family-owned lakefront park in the heart of Indiana corn country celebrated the opening of its fourth coaster and second CCI woodie with a heavy dose of self-deprecating humor. Bill Robinson, who handles Indiana Beach's publicity and marketing, presided over the festivities in a green hillbilly hat bearing a feather and corncob pipe. Indiana Tourism Director John Goss, Indiana State Representative Clare Leuck, CCI President Denise Dinn Larrick, Dick Young of Coca-Cola, and park owner Tom Spackman drew names for the first-train ride, and Robinson led the estimated 600 local dignitaries, coaster enthusiasts and media members in a sing-along of the park's latest television and radio jingle. Five times they had to sing the hokey tune until Robinson approved of their efforts. After costumed characters I.B. Crow and Cornball Jones, and the "American Gothic" couple Marion and Arthur lobbed popcorn balls into the crowd, it was time to ride.

The moment was like stepping through the farm into Oz. The steel-framed, wood track CornBall Express proved to be a top-class ride in smoothness, pacing, elements and extended—and unexpected—air time: gentle and thrilling at the same time. Coaster enthusiasts rolled back into the station with expressions of shock. Even Robinson, riding the front seat with Young, came back nearly hyperventilating. "You get no chance to catch your breath," he said. "From the time you leave the lift hill, you're into something else." Then, referring to his own marketing campaign pushing CornBall as a family-oriented coaster, Robinson said, "They may have to change their advertising." Nope, nothing corny about this ride.

 

It's a tower drop!

Funtown Splashtown USA in Saco, Maine, announces the arrival of Dragon's Descent, May 18, 2001. Measurements: 198 feet high (60 meters), 12 seats. Delivered by S&S Power.

Heavy snowfall during the winter forced Funtown Splashtown to delay its season opener by one week. Never one to buck tradition without a good cause, the park therefore moved Mother's Day back a week, too. The delay did have an upside. The Friday before the adjusted opening day was also traditionally Physics Day at the park for state high school students, which provide the new Turbo Drop the perfect audience for its debut.

"That was a great ride for students, I tell you," said CEO and President Kenneth Cormier. Students studied the ride's centrifugal forces and negative g's, taking glasses of water to the top and watching the still-formed water suspended in air for a split second as the glass-holding students dropped faster than gravity.

Cormier decided not to schedule a big opening ceremony for his new ride because of the time constraints. "I just felt, 'Let's get opened and see what happens,'" he said. What happened was instant popularity for Dragon's Descent, where queues reached a park record 45-minute length the following Memorial Day weekend Saturday. Cormier himself has yet to try out his newest attraction. "I'm trying to build up courage," he said. "If I see someone older than me go on it, that will be my key to go on it."

 

It's an Irish village!

Busch Gardens Williamsburg in Virginia announces the arrival of Ireland, May 18, 2001. Measurements: two acres, one ride, two shows, two eateries, three retail outlets, one animatronic leprechaun. Corkscrew Hill 4-D motion theater delivered by Kleiser Walczak and BA Systems.

Busch themers selected the name Killarney for its new Ireland neighborhood in large part because the name is so elegantly Irish. (Perhaps not coincidentally, Anheuser-Busch is producing a new Irish malt lager called Killarney, too). It also happens to be the name of a tourism-besotted city in Ireland that is arguably the most hospitable in all the world. That is why Busch Gardens researchers on visits to the real Killarney ended up meeting the town's mayor, Sean Counihan, and from the relationship they formed invited him to help open the faux-Killarney version in Virginia.

On an overcast Friday—what Counihan described as "a soft day" typical of his homeland—the mayor and park General Manager Dan Brown presided over the media unveiling in a ceremony that featured third grade students from D.J. Montague Primary School, whose class had been studying Ireland. "(School officials) called us early in the school year because once they started studying Ireland, they knew we were building Ireland and wanted us to do a presentation on our research," said Diane Centeno, Busch Gardens public relations specialist. The students attended the media day dressed as Irish characters, like farmers, bakers, and lacemakers.

The public descended on the new area the next day and, caught up in an Irish spell, lingered in the themed town. Despite the high-tech motion theater ride Corkscrew Hill, the emerging favorite attraction was the 30-minute step dancing show "Irish Thunder"" which prompted standing ovations, evidence again that super technology can't topple pure Irish soul.

 

It's a waterpark!

Dollywood in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, announces the arrival of Dolly's Splash Country, May 19, 2001. Measurements: 25 acres, five body slides, four tube slides, one family raft ride, one 25,000-square-foot wave pool (7,576 square meters), 1,500-foot lazy river (455 meters), interactive children's play pool with slides. Delivered by ProSlide Technology, SCS Interactives, and Aquatic Development Group.

The theme park's namesake, Dolly Parton, known for her wide-ranging, tasteful wardrobe, selected a most sensible suit to wear for the opening of her first waterpark: a blue and black wet suit. But, then, only Dolly could make a wet suit look suitable for any occasion.

After a low-key media introduction to Dollywood's new gated addition on Friday, Parton showed up for the public debut at the start of a fittingly hot Saturday. With her were Olympic swimmers Brooke Bennett, Jason Lezak, and Ed Moses, plus Olympic diver Mark Ruiz. They led the crowd of Dolly devotees in a countdown that unleashed a bash of fireworks and the splash of a 20-foot-tall (6 meters) waterfall flowing into the Downbound Float Trip lazy river.

Dolly makes no public appearance without singing a song, and she dueted with brother Randy Parton in an appropriate selection: "Islands in the Stream."

For a complete profile of Dolly's Splash Country, see the next issue of Amusement Today.

 

It's a tower drop!

Six Flags Over Georgia in Atlanta announces the arrival of Acrophobia, May 12, 2001. Measurements: 200 feet high, (60 meters) 161 feet drop (50 meters), 62 mph (100 kph), 30 passengers. Delivered by Intamin.

Ride testing always draws public attention, but the North American introduction of the freefall ride that features passengers extended at a 15-degree forward tilt really drew eager guests. One man, who entered the park at it's 10 a.m. opening, waited at the front of the queue all day on the mere chance that testing would give way to riding. His perseverance was rewarded when the ride was deemed operational at 6 p.m., and he became one of Acrophobia's first riders.

The official ribbon-cutting opening came a week later and featured a group of local extreme sportsmen and members of the Great Russian Circus who had just rolled into town the day before. The high-wire artists, contortionist and acrobats had never been on any kind of thrill ride before, and not surprisingly loved this experience, said Marcie Tanner, the park's public relations manager. "They had to go back and practice for their show, or they would have ridden it twice," she said.

Just as well. After the 11 a.m. ceremony and first official rides, the public was finally allowed into the queue station, but a sudden toad-stranglin' Georgia storm shut Acrophobia down for two hours. Despite such interruptions, the ride is proving immensely popular. In its first three weekends it had already dropped more than 40,000 riders.

 

It's a Downdraft!

Knoebels Groves Amusement Resort in Elysburg, Pennsylvania, announces the arrival of Downdraft, May 12, 2001. Measurements: 30 feet tall (9 meters), 60 feet in diameter (18 meters), 30 seats. Delivered by Dartron Industries, Inc.

The contraption is so bizarre looking a queue for it formed immediately on the day it was ready for public consumption. Aside from what it does, it draws attention with how it sounds. "It makes a really loud noise, a big burst of air, POP!" said Joe Muscato, Knoebels' marketing director.

Riders sit in five-seat platforms, three passengers behind two, that rest at the end of large arms coming out of a center pole. As the ride starts, the arms extend and raise to the 30-foot height of the poll. Once it reaches 15 rpm, Muscato said, "It does its trick:" the arms individually drop and raise, giving guests the negative G's they crave.

"The re-ridership has been good. That's always the test," Muscato said. "There was a little concern there because you can be a little wobbly when you get off it, like stepping from a boat to land. But people like wobbly."



It's a slide tower!

Paramount's Carowinds announces the arrival of Pipeline Peak, May 12, 2001. Measurements: four slides of up to 80 feet tall (24 meters) and 495 feet long (150 meters). Delivered by ProSlide Technology.

Although its new tower boasts the world's tallest enclosed body slide at 80 feet with Night Slider, Carowinds debuted the complex to the media by focusing on its two enclosed two-person tube slides, the 45-foot-high (14 meters) Turbo Twister and 495-foot long Rip Slide. (The fourth slide is the enclosed body slide Power Plunge).

In a competition titled "Beauty vs. Brawn," the park enlisted the cheerleaders for the city's two major sports teams, the football Panthers' Top Cats and the basketball Hornets' Honeybees, and the professional Charlotte Eagles men's soccer team to race for charity. The relay race featured teams scurrying to the launches, sliding down to the bottom, handing the rafts off to another pair to race up for the second slide. Despite a number of hijinks hindering all the competitors, the competition was weighted in favor of the brawn: literally, the men slid down faster because they outweighed their female counterparts. That earned the Eagles a $1,000 check for their chosen charity, whereupon park General Manager Watt Burns stepped up and offered $1,000 checks to the cheerleading teams, as well.

The next day proved the park had its own winner. On a perfect, hot waterpark day, guests lined up at the Pipeline Peak from the moment the gates opened, and did a daylong relay race of their own: slide down, scurry back to the top, and ride again.

 

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