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Small News From The Theme Park Industry

Sounds like De Valkenier in the Netherlands is gone for good. The park's website has been removed and their Facebook page has been taken down also. The park was already in danger of shutting down due to housing proposals in the area, but the heavy damage it sustained from the floods this past summer appears to have sealed its fate.

 
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Sounds like De Valkenier in the Netherlands is gone for good. The park's website has been removed and their Facebook page has been taken down also. The park was already in danger of shutting down due to housing proposals in the area, but the damage it sustained from the floods this past summer appears to have sealed its fate.


It certainly looks like they knew it would be closing in the immediate aftermath. :(
 
It would appear that Rocket at Furuvik (the former Black Hole from Alton Towers) is up for sale: https://www.amusement-rides.com/en/product/jet-star-2-schwarzkopf

And there's also a crowdfunding effort to try and bring Black Hole back to the UK: https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-us-...ow-1&utm_medium=copy_link&utm_source=customer

It's raised £35 so far, out of a desired £500,000. I wonder what will happen if the campaign is successful?
How exciting. This ride would go perfectly next to my recent purchase of Blue Streak from Conneaut Lake Park.

Edit - Ordered. I guess I’m just a sucker for throwing money away when it comes to rehoming **** rides.
 
According to the local press, it would appear that Chile’s Fantasilandia park has been given the green light to move forwards with plans to pull an Elitch Gardens and relocate the park to a much larger site in San Bernardo over the coming years. Apparently they’ve been talking this over for years but are now ready to move forwards, which would see them leave their current 6.8 hectare site in favour of an 18 ha area. They hope to also construct a waterpark during the move, with an inauguration set for 2027. This is no FEC or kiddy park either, this is a full-scale amusement park that serves as one of the country’s largest.

 
How exciting. This ride would go perfectly next to my recent purchase of Blue Streak from Conneaut Lake Park.

Edit - Ordered. I guess I’m just a sucker for throwing money away when it comes to rehoming **** rides.
Comparing Rocket/Black Hole to Blue Streak is like comparing nails with glass! Blue Streak felt like it was going to tear itself apart voluntarily! Hopefully the far superior of the two gets a new home. A strange move by the park.
 
Ahh, the sad state of the Japanese amusement scene. They have so many parks with 5 or more coasters that seem to have struggled since the 1990s without seeing any investment. Outside of Disney, Universal, Fuji-Q, and Nagashima Spaland, there isn't much going on besides closures. That's really sad considering how much exciting stuff the minor Japanese parks were building until the 2000's.
 
The Huss Magic at Marineland is apparently undergoing renovation. Someone who has gone to the park reported that work is being done on it. Last year Amusement Tech reported that they were doing a Huss Magic System Refurb. Unkown if it's for Marineland's tho or if Marineland's is staying

 

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I don't know if this has been mentioned before, but Beast at Kings Island is getting approx 2000ft of track replaced, which includes making the first drop slightly steeper as a result of some of the reprofiling: https://www.visitkingsisland.com/blog/2021/december/beast-of-a-project-this-winter-at-kings-island
Just to jump back to this, as the Gravity Group work is actually quite extensive and major, Kings Island is both steepening the first drop (from 45 degrees to 53 degrees), and reworking the entire drop headed into the double helix finale. They have a weird description for the double helix work, but in essence the entire support structure is being redone to add more stability. KI maintenance staff are also busy with other track TLC replacement as standard wooden coaster affair. Photos of the work:

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Will be interesting to see how all the rework shakes out!
 
Super sad. I got to meet him at IAAPA back in 2003 ...and even as a stupid teen, he actually took the time to talk a bit to me and was genuinely a cool guy, even gave me the TrustAir2000 promo pamphlet, autographed. ♡
 
Yeah, that is a real shame. Truly one of the pioneers of the industry.
 
Not sure where else to post this but I thought this was quite a good backyard coaster. its 300m long, 12.3m high, does give off jungle mouse vibes but the coaster generally looks well made.

Link to Video (Playback unavailable on sites other than YouTube) www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5-V3WNpLZs

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Jesus christ.

At this point I bet within 10 years there will be some company that makes backyard coasters.
 
I said this on Reddit already, but I highly doubt this is an accident. Todd wanted this coasters gone, and by god he saw it was gone.

Todd, I know you like to read things online, so read this. No one likes you. You are cowardly piece of **** who gets mad people love things you hate. I hope the state finds everyway to charge you for destroying the ride.
 
Oh dear… I guess that means the ride won’t be coming back, or not coming back in its original form, at least. At least no one was hurt, though; that’s the main relief here.

Blue Streak is a big loss, though… any coaster, especially one as historic is this, is definitely a huge loss to the industry. While I admittedly don’t know how it rode, it’ll be missed, for sure.
I said this on Reddit already, but I highly doubt this is an accident. Todd wanted this coasters gone, and by god he saw it was gone.

Todd, I know you like to read things online, so read this. No one likes you. You are cowardly piece of **** who gets mad people love things you hate. I hope the state finds everyway to charge you for destroying the ride.
As for whether the park owner burned this down on purpose… I’m extremely doubtful that that would be the case, personally. Even if they weren’t the most fond of the coaster, I think starting a fire to get rid of it is a very extreme course of action to take, and an incredibly risky way of eliminating it.

I’m admittedly unsure of what policies surrounding historic structures are like in America, but surely they could have just filed permits to demolish it, or if that would generate enough uproar for people to chain themselves to it or go to other lengths to save it, then maybe they could even have torn it down in secret like Blackpool did with the Mouse a few years back? Burning it down carries all kinds of risks; the fire could spread to other areas and cause more damage, it could hurt people, it would cost a huge amount to clean up when it’s put out, and the owner could even be charged with arson and thrown in prison, potentially for life if the fire harmed anyone or caused significant harm beyond its intended scope… would they really have hated the coaster enough to take those risks over keeping it standing?

I don’t really know, to be honest, but I’m just saying; there are many less risky and less extreme ways of getting rid of a coaster you don’t like than burning it down, so I highly doubt that the park owner burned Blue Streak down intentionally. My personal belief is that this was almost certainly a tragic accident; I’m pretty certain that regardless of their opinion of the ride, the park owner would have attempted many, many other courses of action to get rid of Blue Streak before resorting to burning it down if they wanted to get rid of it so badly.
 
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