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Given how he was basically overlooked at village, and with bikash now gone, I really wonder if Greg goes home at the end of his day with a nice smile on his face, knowing the general public is now seeing the positive effects and influence he (and half his team that ended up following him) has had since taking over the company. Must be really satisfying to help turn around a company that was close to insolvency, have a plan for improvements (not just recovery) and start to see the positive feedback from guests following investments in things like this. It looks fantastic, when the other reality could have just been another relocation of old cars running around on a track. It's refreshing to see some care and attention given to the setting and themed elements of a ride again, especially when it isn't a big budget thrill ride. Yeah, limited budgets, limited space are always constraints in Australia, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't at least try to deliver something that improves the overall experience. To me, it really shows intention to build zones or lands back into theme parks, something that at least makes an attempt at something cohesive instead of just plonking something down on a bit of land and calling it done. Makes me wonder just how constrained he was working under the village shroud, when this is like the polar opposite of how things are going over there.

Dear God man, experience some whimsy. I can assure you with 100% certainty the cheeky little joke on the sign is not going to affect DW's ride construction timeline in any way, nor will it affect VRTP's bottom line. It's just creative people having a little bit of fun with their jobs instead of printing out a boring old sign with the theming equivalent of Lorem Ipsum text. 99% of people won't even notice or understand, and the other 1% might smirk a little. This isn't a first time thing. Walibi Rhone-Alpes have voodoo dolls of the Asterix characters in Mystic's theming. Universal have several jabs and references to Disney across their resorts. It's just a detail that's there for some people to notice if they have a keen eye and the right understanding of the context. No one's getting hurt. Judging by your response to the Claw tribute in the theming as well, I'm getting the sense that hidden details in theming are not your thing. That's fine, but "potshots" and acting like this is some major indicator of DW's progress on improving the park? Come now.

As you'll notice, there's some pretty major changes to the forums today. Importantly, login is now via your email address rather than username. Your password remains unchanged. If for whatever reason you are unsure of the email account you signed up with, then I'd recommend getting in touch and we can look into it for you. It was a bit of an abrupt transition today; it was meant to be a bit more gradual, but a few things behind the scenes pushed it forward and here we are. The first thing you'll probably notice is the site is a whole lot faster and we won't be prone to those periods of painfully slow loading, which had become more frequent in recent months. There's also lot of new features that I've barely gotten my head around with this latest version of the forum software, but for now it should at least feel a bit more vibrant and down the track we'll be implementing a few new features. For the time being, the main site is down. It's a slightly larger project to get up and running again but it will happen. Today's rather sudden upgrade for the forums meant that it just wasn't possible to get everything done at the same time. There's no immediate plans for me to resume editorial content, but the site will be back soon enough and we'll hopefully find a way to breathe new life into the site and give new voices and content creators an opportunity to share more freely with this community. If anyone encounters any bugs or issues with the new forum then I'd invite you to share them in the Community Feedback forum.

Yeah, I’ve been through it 4 times now. The first time it growled at me because of my belt. But strangely, all the other times it let me through without an issue. It seems to be very hit and miss in that regard from what I’ve observed. As for the ride itself, wow, what an upgrade from the original Claw! The new restraints are a huge improvement over the original ones, super comfortable and they allow for quite a bit of movement. You feel so free in them. Pretty much everything that was great about The Claw has been retained and improved upon dramatically. The ride is ultra smooth, while still being extremely forceful with fantastic airtime.

The performer who played Mad Mike in Police Academy for 15 years, Michael Bennett, has been confirmed to be returning to the park this Summer to be part of the new stunt show as the warm-up artist. Hopefully this news means the arena show is going back to its roots and is closer to the style of Police Academy than of what HSD2 became.

He was looking on with pride at King Claw yesterday and taking some photos on his phone. he seems like a fantastic leader. Happy to jump in and help as Ash said serving in Jane’s (saw this many times), or helping ride ops in busy periods.

He actually seemed to care about what was going on. He used to frequently be seen walking through the parks at different times of the day, chatting to different people. Seemed like if he wanted to know something, he would just walk out his office and look for himself. In the event of any incidents, he was out there following what was going on, seeing if there was anything he could do but staying out of the way of people trained to respond and letting them get on with it, then debriefing in his office afterwards, making sure everyone who attended was ok.

If card is the only option they cant add a surcharge

SDSC Capacity boost really can't come soon enough for MW.

That was the intention. Originally the park was planning on getting all electric vehicles, but after they experienced the ones at Universal Singapore they opted to refurbish the existing vehicles. They had planned to buy at least more electric vehicle which would be accessible, allowing guests in wheelchairs to ride. To my knowledge this vehicle is available, but isnt used unless required by an accessible guests. It’s stored to the side of the load area and is transferred onto the turntable when required.

Here’s a detailed look at the attraction. For the best themed flat ride in the country. Well done Dreamworld. They were also running the ride every few minutes for a lot of yesterday, so I think we could expect a soft opening any day now.

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Given back in the day when roadrunner had the original trains, myself and one of the supervisors actually managed to beat the capacity that the ride was stated in the manual (700 a hour with 2 trains) I very much doubt it. I was pretty much running down the platform to check those lap bars and doing our best to make sure that by the time the train was coming into the brakes we would be dispatching the next train. Was certainly a work out back in the day lol. It was even funnier when the ride then faulted because we were dispatching too fast and the computer crapped out lol.

I don't care who you were replying to, and i'm not assuming your comments were in response to mine. However the moment you made the argument that the WNW tagline was ok because it was true - I knew at some point in the ongoing debate you would reference TRRR... and you did exactly what I knew you would. But it's ok if it's true - you said so yourself? The point is there's no difference and it's all semantics. By saying "look at us we are the biggest and we are the best" they are saying "look at the competitor park - it's smaller, and shit" I call both parks out on their shit, and I have no links to either park. I play devils advocate when you unreasonably shit on the very company you bought shares in, but I have always called it like I saw it. On the contrary, a little friendly rivalry and one-upmanship is the most likely way you will get your wish. In the same way that one park offering a $99 annual pass forced the hand of the other to do the same, the same vein that one park building a big thrill ride to attract guests leads the other to respond. The joke about Village always being closed for maintenance rings true. Because it is and has been for some time. It should spur them to be better. At any rate - like your argument on WWW - you've made your position abundantly clear that you don't like little theming details (at this rate your version of a dark ride would literally be a carousel with no lights in a dark room) - So in short, we get it, we understand what you're trying to say, most people in the discussion disagree with you, and its unlikely either side is going to change their mind - so let's just stop going round in circles now - given we're likely going to see technical rehearsals any day now, k?

Sorry, you might have missed that I was being ironic. You validated WnW's Biggest N Best tagline by saying it was true. I simply pointed out that it's also true to say Village's ride uptime is poor. I do not *actually* believe that accuracy is the only benchmark to whether a dig is acceptable. Can I ask why this is so serious to you? It's a cute little theming detail that those in the know can have a little chuckle about. It doesn't stand out or affect the theming in any way. Designers love doing this kind of thing. I dare say there's probably references and inside jokes including in some of our parks' theming that are for even more niche audiences and would never be understood by anyone in these forums - things like staff members' names or references to running jokes among the management staff. If you didn't like it, it probably just wasn't for you. But what did they lose by doing it? Did it affect the theming? Did it cost them any extra than if they had just printed the sign with no references or jokes? Anyway, back on the topics that matter... I actually am a little disappointed to see this. I know the restraints are going to be so much better than the old Claw's for comfort and thrill, but the OG Claw was a very good entry-level thrill ride, so it's sad to see the overall ride lineup become slightly less accessible height-wise. It's only 10cm so not the end of the world, but it would've been nice if they could have kept it at 120. Oh well.

Quite a funny little jab at MovieWorld within the King Claw theming, a ferry departure sign stating Village Road is closed for maintenance. 😂 seen it on Themepark Ogres video, also technical rehearsal signs are within the ride envelope. We could be riding very soon

ADD IT TO THE LIST

So, I did a little more digging around the websites. Apart from the many spelling and grammatical errors - including in the company name, I've noticed the following: The business website - https://rhccity.com.au/ The 'Leadership and Management' section only has one name - Ramin Ahmadi. Here is his LinkedIn page:https://www.linkedin.com/in/ramin-ahmadi-29a85215b/?originalSubdomain=au He has 50 connections on LinkedIn. His current business Neguin Pty Ltd. has only 3 people associated with it on LinkedIn (including himself) - one is a retired marketing executive Vernon Tang who left the business in 2008. The other is an Auckland based writer/architect Noushin Ahmadi - possibly a daughter or other relative who left the business in 2016. The business seems to spruik residential apartment buildings as it's most successful and most recent accomplishments. The listed address: Level 38- 71 Eagle St. Brisbane, Qld 4000, seems to be a co-working space that offers 'virtual offices'. https://www.myspacesworks.com/centre/5486/details There is no contact information other than an email address on either the infinity planet or RHC websites. The theme park isn't actually listed on the 'Sections' page of the infinity planet site when you click through to it. There is no way this concept - with its complete lack of detail on any attraction - including for the business/tech park, lack of any leadership team, board of directors, anchor tenants, publicly named investors (including private equity), or established intellectual property licensing, has attracted $2.6Bn of investment. I get that big ideas can come from ordinary people. Everyone starts somewhere and I don't want to crap on anyone for trying to punch above their weight. But this isn't a big idea, this is no idea. There's no substance to this. Maybe he should put a little more effort into the actual attractions, theming, and functions of the spaces before launching this thought-bubble to attract investors.

Totally agree! Such a major water park should be adding attractions that are somewhat unique and special, not something you could find at a council aquatic centre, or the Big Banana.

Not long exposure

...and a water ride, and eureka mountain and probably half a dozen other things that were removed without replacement. they're still doing great - but there's still a lot of holes in the lineup.

Seeing Greg serve drinks and food when Rivertown opened last year was refreshing too see, he and the team have definitely turned this park around and now with the theming on “just a flat ride” is second to none once again.

Photo op is back with soft-fall now all around it

100% this! First cycle I went on it was lacklustre. It definitely didn’t go full height and the brakes/magnets were engaging as it went past the middle, so it was fairly slow. Second cycle however… WOW! They’ve nailed it with ride choice. Absolutely improved every aspect of The Claw. Got another 2 cycles in by the end of the day… Props to DW ops too! Silky smooth boarding for the first public soft open.

The Plantation Coaster is very close to opening and there has been a flurry of media content surrounding this. Australia's second Alpine Coaster installation should open just in time for Xmas! Who is going to ride it? https://www.facebook.com/share/v/17dBQawogv/ The website has also been updated for the opening of the new attraction. https://bigbanana.com/rides-attractions/plantation-coaster/ The park is auctioning off its very first ride of the new attraction and the below article states that it will open Saturday the 13th December. https://media.destinationnsw.com.au/media-releases/final-section-track-installed-big-banana-fun-parks-58-million-plantation-coaster

Now imagine what they can do on a dark/water ride in the future. They are definitely doing an amazing job as of late with the theming

The cost of staffing the park and the operating costs of running rides (energy/cycles/etc.) is almost always going to be greater than the additional money visitors spend in the park in those final two hours. They already opened the restaurant on Saturday nights from 5-9pm. If the goal is to get people to eat dinner and spend money, then they just need to open the restaurant, not the entire park. Parks know when and where people are spending money. If it were profitable to extend operating hours, they would.

I feel like shutting at 6pm during holidays is missing out. Kinda like "thanks for enjoying the park, time to eat dinner but not here". Extending to 8pm is good.

Finally a 3d sign in the park

I'm sure there will be some productive and insightful discussion on Facebook over this

I was recently down in Melbourne and went past the park while I was there. It hasn’t opened for the season yet, so these are the best photos I could get from outside the property. The new slides do look impressive and are a great investment for Adventure Park (who haven’t added any major new attractions for quite a few years now).

It’s worth noting the 130cm height has been applied to all Intamin gyro swings world wide including older smaller models. Goliath at adventure world has been changed from 120cm to 130cms and they reported this as an updated requirement from Intamin. Making it safe to assume if the Claw was still operating it would house the 130cm height as well.

If the benchmark for good-natured digs is that they need to be true, then you should be totally fine with the King Claw joke. Movie World has 5 major rides under maintenance as of today, and that number has been higher recently.

probably need to wait and see how they operate it. When they got new ride vehicles and operating systems for WWF it totally destroyed loading and capacity - i'm hoping they haven't done the same to scooby

Private Equity Baby!

That's some of the best news. The guy is an absolute talent.

Take this with a grain of salt obviously, but I had a source inform me that it was potentially getting moved to a different location in the park. Not sure if this is still going ahead as I was told this several months ago.

I got on on Friday - Kudos to the opening crew - still ironing things out but the process was quite smooth. I'm not sure they're getting the full value out of the metal detector though - I walked through, beeped, pointed to my belt buckle and they just accepted my word on it. In a US park where metal detectors are used, they'd wand you to make sure. The park is looking good again (my last visit it was showing some signs of neglect). The ride itself looks great, the theming work and queue house is top notch. I heard the ambient sounds in the queue but i'm not sure if they were playing the soundtrack during the ride as I didn't hear anything different when riding or observing. It sure packs a punch though. I was absolutely once and done, my son went for a second round while I watched but even that was enough for him. He used to be able to do back to back cycles on The Claw - but two was enough for him... i'm hoping this ride isn't too polarising for guests - if it isn't repeatable, then the park has done their capacity a disservice. @Spotty I feel you on the restraints - Since 2016 I couldn't get the restraints over my shoulders either - but King Claw's restraint is a much nicer fit.

I could be wrong but I don't believe this has come to fruition, the turntable at load is there but I have never seen an accessible vehicle on the tracks (or next to it).

Yeah my understanding is that parks would LIKE to extend operating hours but the cost-benefit just doesn't add up in most cases

As an ex loader... I've seen people trying to cram all sorts of things into those cars and it's caused delays including the "must send" light going off. I'm all for loose item boxes if it's done properly. One way I could maybe see it working is before going up that little ramp to the load station they might have an area to store loose items in the main room. If they re-route the exit path it could end up going into the second half of the main room maybe. We still have no idea on the final layout of the main queue building and it could easily have been implemented. Only time will tell, but I'm curious about it.

It might not be the last thing thats done as guests are sitting down, but to my understanding it’s part of the boarding process. So maybe there’s are loading/boarding area, where people wait and go through metal detection while the ride is cycling. Therefore that wouldn’t slow down the boarding process and keeps things as efficient and safe as possible.

Spy Chase Stunt Show 1 looks too intense for me.

😂😂😂 surprised? Movieworld needs to shut down for 6 months and spend some quality time fixing the place maintaining all their rides etc.

The park has constructed a new tree kangaroo exhibit alongside the pathway between the kangaroos and cassowary. They used to be in quite a small habitat within the aviary (which is also no longer an aviary). Photo posted by Jaggs Journey.

It will become mixed-use residential and commercial offices with some retail. Disney couldn't even get a 'permanent world expo' to work at Epcot beyond the early 2000s and it's just turned into another theme park with rides themed to Disney IP. Brisbane doesn't get the tourist numbers to justify something like this as a permanent attraction. Also, a 'business and technology park with retail' might work since Northlakes isn't too far away and it's a shorter commute for residents there than going into the CBD, but a theme park and a 700 room hotel just up the road from Caboolture isn't going to happen. There is no demand for it. Aussie World can't even sustain 7 day operations or being open for more than 6 hours a day and it's right by the Glasshouse Mountains. I don't have a problem with people dreaming big and wanting to build something impressive. Dreamworld was built on a patch of land in the middle of no where with no public transport and it became a destination that arguably drove the placement of Coomera Station and ultimately Westfield. But this is just being pitched as a weird combination of business park and theme park. If the developers were talking about building specific attractions - rides that don't exist at the GC, animal experiences that don't exist at Australia Zoo, then we'd probably take this more seriously instead of ridiculing it. But they're not. They've not mentioned a single attraction other than '10,000 car parking spaces' and the concept art just shows duplicate 1980/90s rides. It tells us that exactly zero thought has gone into what this could be beyond 'spaces for stuff'. Honestly, I could see a version of this working somewhere like Hamilton/Northshore with a LPS style park (possibly slightly larger) and cultural performance spaces/theatres, Television Studios and a hotel... functional spaces that would get used, close to where people live. These people aren't interested in building a destination. If they were, they'd choose a more appropriate location. They've just got a plot of land they want to develop and they're pitching an idea around 'tourism and culture' to attract government funding/subsidies instead of just building an office park/shopping mall with their own money.

What a shame if it goes. Best drop tower in Australia imv, it is very intense. If its time is up I hope they can replace it with another drop tower however I know the park have pretty strict height limits to work with. Would love to see an Intamin sky jump on our shores

I tested that theory last year by visiting before Christmas. It was wrong. Sure - holiday traffic doesn't arrive, but the local passholder crowd are there in droves.