Custom Coasters International (CCI), was founded in 1991 and exclusively build wooden roller coasters. Their first coaster – The Sky Princess at Dutch Wonderland in Pennsylvania, USA – opened in 1992. It took a few more years for their coasters to hit their stride, but in 1995, CCI opened two top coasters in the USA – The Raven at Holiday World in Indiana and Cyclops at Mt. Olympus in Wisconsin – that took the public and enthusiast community by storm. They were fast, twisting, and exciting due to the close proximity in which they were built to the terrain. This led the way for CCI to break out and own the wooden coaster market. It could be argued that CCI was the driving force behind the resurgence of wooden coasters in the late 1990’s. Rides such as Megafobia in a then-unknown park in Wales (Oakwood) and Tonnerre de Zeus at Parc Asterix in France went straight to the top of enthusiasts’ favorite lists, and they still rank highly today. Shivering Timbers at Michigan’s Adventure is the tallest and longest coaster the company built, and GhostRider at Knott’s Berry Farm in California still holds the record as the longest wooden coaster on the USA’s West Coast. CCI hit its zenith in 2000, opening seven coasters that year, including Medusa at Six Flags Mexico, The Boss at Six Flags St. Louis in Missouri, and The Legend at Holiday World. However, it was Boulder Dash at the little-known Lake Compounce in Connecticut that went on to rule the rankings, still taking the Golden Ticket Best Wooden Coaster award some 15 years later (2013-2015).
