joz

Of course the obvious answer (Mixed with Gazza's use of the CP) is to move Dugong Discovery and HR to somewhere else and use the entire area between Guest Relations and the monorail station as a loading area. Everything else in that area can totally be moved

You know I've just recently starting thinking the exact same thing thing. Those spinning rides are seriously cool, and if you can get one that loads as efficiently as Scooby then there's some pretty serious fun to be had with one of those.

What type of training to be a ride op? Grade 10. Nah j/k. Depending on the ride it can vary from a couple of hours to a few days of training, though generally one full day is all you need to be competent to operate a ride. I'm pretty sure Scooby is one of the more intensive rides and requires a couple of days plus some after hours stuff doing mock e-vacs from the high section.

I'd say SW and MW would each be around the 1.2 / 1.3 mark with WnW around 800,000.

What do you mean by that phrase? It sounds like your against WnW. I do think its a shame that the $20mil that went into WnW in the past 3 years probably won't pay off as well as if was built at pretty much any other time in the past few years. I want to see our parks succeed, WWW included. Besides the bottom paragraph there mentions how (I think) the waterpark will effect DW, so I can't be totally evil about the place.

As far as I understand it from the various releases floating around: MW attendance was up 9% in the second half of the financial year, so post January saw a pretty decent increase you'd say primarily on the back of Superman, given Shrek had only a minimal effect on the first half. I'd think we can probably look forward to another similar increase next year (somewhere between 5-10% seems reasonable) with Batwing, particularly given how new Superman still is and the great word of mouth that ride is getting. Wet 'n' Wild was also up with Buccaneer Bay, though the full effect of H20 Zone probably won't really be felt till next year, which is a shame given its also when WWW will cut into the market. Seaworld was down by a pretty big margin, and the great profitability the park had built up over the past couple of years seems to have have been diminished, so its something of a double whammy. I think there is a perception out there that SW is a bit stale, and the place probably just as much as the place needs the new attractions needs a bit of a refresh(I'm aware of one such change supposedly happening next year which is pretty over due). You'll see the park will have a big attendance number next year, even without any new attractions, as the park has been nothing short of packed this year, but that is on the back the sale of 200,000 half price annual passes, so profitability won't be anywhere near former levels. Paradise Country is still plugging away. Another increase in attendance and profitability, put it down to better marketing and awareness. Put next years increase down to the same thing. DW is up 2.5% on last year, and WWW will probably help attendance again next year as DW will now be able to offer an alternative to the 3PSP, and the novelty of a new water park will probably be more then enough to make the DW alternative very appealing.

Wow - this thread, talk about a blast from the past . If you haven't read over this whole topic I'd highly recommend it, Djrappa at his pre-Aussie Outback best. Beyond that, I have nothing to add since I know absolutely nothing about PLCs

I'm sure I speak for everyone when I say we're glad to help, and trust me when I say if you haven't been to the parks for years, then you and your kids are going to have a ball. How old are the little ones BTW? Be sure to fill us in on how your trip goes Just going to give you a game plan for SeaWorld, since January is going to be VERY busy this year with all the annual pass holders: Get a couple of laps in early Bermuda, Corkscrew and the Flume ride first thing, then check out the shows and animal attractions during the afternoon. As a rough guide, do the rides up till 12, then make your way down to the front of the park for the ski show and lunch, and check out all the other shows and animal exhibats till about 4 in the arvo. At around 4 the queues will/should have died down enough to allow you to get some re-rides in.

Could be another one of those scary walk through attractions like tomb raider.

You'd think another hotel would be somewhere on Village's long term plan, the only thing they have to do before building a hotel out at Oxenford is give people more to do out there besides the parks. I don't think its going to be easy filling a 400room hotel so far away from Surfers based purely on the parks. Nara gets knocked by how far away it is from Surfers, and its literally a 5min drive from 'downtown', and I just feel that people will want to do more then the theme parks when they're on holiday. Aussie Outback is the kind of thing I mean, something to give the area a bit of substance beyond the parks, because again, I'm not sure people want to shun the beach for the parks in any significant numbers. Good on them for buying Nara, hopefully that'll mean more of an intergration between the hotel and the park in the future. Its always struck me how segregated Nara and SW are from each other, the only common link between the two is the monorail station, and the name. I mean how great would it be to see the water park open after park hours in summer exclusively for hotel guests, or even just having staff being interchangeable between Nara and the other 5 properties. I don't think most SW staff know any Nara staff, or even anything about Nara, and I suspect most of Nara's staff don't know a huge amount about the park. Again, I think Village taking full control is great, hopefully they take the chance to improve things there.

... and I bet they're excited to be able to steal off someone else now! Nah, This is pretty exciting, good luck to them, as far as Aussie water parks go, the number 3 spot is there for the taking, and they've got daylight between them and Adventure World.

Half-pipe demos? Live music? Sounds kinda like Xtreme World at DW, which was a huge success, so much so that it came back 3 or 4 years in a row. I think the market will respond (so long as there is a heap of TV spots and posters in Surfers) and going after schoolies will succeed. As for the website, well its a huge step up from Superman's website and seems pretty well targeted. The Wez 'n' Will thing is a bit weak, but the park doesn't have a real mascot (besides Matilda), so why not just make it a couple of guys? Its pretty original, I can't see it costing a heap of money, and it makes WnW look more like a social place to hang out rather then just a place to go on slides. On something of an unrelated side note; whats wrong with kids these days if the fact that WnW is a good place for a perv needs to be pointed out? I mean I knew the education system was failing but damm.

Richard's posts pretty much sums up my feelings on her article. She's done a great job of getting her name out there by talking about stuff she really has no idea about and just, well, having a dumb rant. I mean whats with blaming Steve Irwin for everything from habitat loss, to animal cruelty, child abuse (and a bizarre conspiracy theory that goes all the way up to John Howard thrown in for good measure) and being mean to chickens. Give me a break. Steve was a great man, and before you start claiming animal abuse, understand some stuff about animal handling. If taking an animal on a TV show is animal abuse then I want to know why no one had a problem with it before his death, and why Ranger Stacey hasn't been brought to justice yet (seriously, she's been taking animals into studio lit environments as long as I can remember). I don't think much of the 6.30 time, (along with any news source which can't work out the difference between a Stingray and a Manta ray; ones kinda big with a stinger, one's huge with no stinger, not hard to get people), and I think even less of people who try and leech of someone Else's fame and tragic death to get their deluded face on said 6.30 time slot. RIP Steve, one things for sure; if there's a heaven, it'll never be the same again.

While not strictly speaking Dreamworld news, I think this from Screamscape is quite interesting: Wonder if the Big Red Car ride will get cloned over there. It'd be the first time a Dreamworld original ride got cloned overseas, and what a great ride to clone too!

Though its unused in the photos, I think Paradise Country is now in that general area. One thing I don't think I fully realised is just how big the area between Lethal and Wild West is. With clever design you could fit a couple of big rides in there, and when you combine that with area 'C' and the Western Arena then there is really an abundance of space. I think we'll see a few more replacement attractions before any size able chunk of that land is used. Matrix would have to be due for replacement some time soon, Batman is (debatable) past its use by date, and River Ride, while being a very solid ride just takes up so much darn space. Personally though, I stand by my idea of putting a ride in Lethals preshow room. Maybe something Harry Potter related and re-theme the Chinatown themeing to look like Digon Ally? Or perhaps theme it to Happy Feet, since its going to be such a big movie and all

If you know where to look you'll see the transfer track pretty easily, and if you don't know where to look you'd probably notice it after a couple of rides, though you won't be able to see the other train sitting on the track like on Road Runner or Lethal. When your on the ride you can see it on your left between the fake station and the stairwell.

Just to ruin the magic of TV: the people in WnW when Grant was there were park staff + family. There was only 30 or 40 people, so they had to follow Grant around and make sure they were in the background of each shot.

I don't think its a MW thing, or if it is they've gone halves with the organisers, otherwise MW would be selling tickets instead of Ticketek handling the whole thing (lame). Besides that, tickets on ticketek are $40 rather then the $35 MW has on its main site, so yeah hard not to get the feeling that MW is more or less just playing host here. Still, hopefully if its a success then the people with the power will see it and try it again. A whole heap of parks put on concerts and it works for them, so why not make it work here and bring in the extra cash.

You know what, I've defended the new Luna Park, but wow you've got to be kidding me. This is the same company that has stated that the park revenue is ahead of expectations, and leases the site for $1 right?

Thing is the colours of our Tornado and the mystery one in the press photos are the same, and since its always photos of the funnel rather then landscape I can't see a problem with it. They did the same thing with Superman (showing an Xcel vid) and changed it as soon as they had their own footage, same will probably happen here.

What do Vekoma even sell these days? In-vertigo - Vekoma haven't built one for a few years but from memory they tend to work pretty well and are pretty popular. SiB - You'd think that one unlikely since they've been so much trouble for the few parks that did buy them Flying Dutchman - Again, haven't been sold for a long time, and only ever sold 3. Don't think they they'd be able to offload one on DW that easy Launch Coaster - I don't think DW is stupid enough to get one, aside of course from the aforementioned Booster Bike, which already have 3 installations. Tilt Coaster - Nice gimmick, can't see it happening though Wooden Coaster - Haven't made one since 2001 and only made 3, but wouldn't surprise me to see one of these grace DW Boomerang - Don't laugh - you won't be when DW builds one.

Not all rides are $1million, but its a bit naive to say that none are. Rides aren't cheap, neither are the things Ozshowkid mentioned, and the thing is its not just about making a return on the investments, but also running them at a decent profit, and on a ride like Vomitron (or whatever the traveling version is called) or any other low capacity ride you simply aren't going to to that at $5 a pop.

I'm really digging this new ride from a "What a great ride systems" standpoint. Unlike the older vertical drop rides this is 10 across. I mean wow, 30 people per train, and with such short block sections its ganna be one hell of a people eater. 1,400 isn't the highest capacity out there, but I bet they have very little trouble meeting that. Plus it looks like a hoot as well, so very solid addition.

Lethal Weapon 4 came out in 1998, Lethal Weapon the ride came out in 1995. I think you'll find the themeing for the ride has little if anything to do with the 4th movie.

Thread doesn't just deliver, its the post with the most!