joz

You have to remember that right next to Shockwave, there is an Enterprise themed to being a Submarine, and a Gyro Swing which is themed as a claw. Somehow I don't think the themeing for Shockwave will be cohesive, or something that's noticed by guests. Having said that, given the surrounds, I'm not convinced it really has to be, so long as it's well presented it'll fit the area well IMHO

Just have to highlight this. Best post on this site for a long time!

Wow I remember this thread! Have to make an observation; entry in $AU has gone from $11 to $28. Considering how much it costs to travel to Malaysia is $17 really a going to break the bank? Or is it a principle thing? Just curious, seems slightly odd to me.

It's just by the main entrance, I think it's fair to assume it's itsss for a new attraction

Photos taken today of a new attraction being built out the front of the park. Enjoy! Bet you didn't see that coming

^ I don't think the POVs of Bermuda do it any justice at all. When all the effects were working everything fit together really well, even the robot aliens fitted with the ride. Really though considering how much was broken or needed work it was a rather laughable attraction, and it's not a shame to see it go, and I'm looking forward to whatever replaces it. LTRR did see out it's days in more dignity than Bermuda, and towards the end of it's life the only effect that routinely didn't work was the tree. Unfortunately for LTRR though it simply wasn't popular, was dated, and whether or not they use it this year, the park needs the land to expand.

MW has had a few random shows that aren't advertised for a while now, but as far as I'm aware this is reasonably new for SW. FWIW I'm pleased that I'm not the only one who likes random shows that just come out of no where, really improves the atmosphere of the parks, and it's great that the parks are doing them.

OK this is going nowhere fast. If anyone does have photos of the Easter show at Moore Park, please feel free start a new topic. As an added bonus I'll even post a link here for the benifit of people who are subscribed to this thread, now isn't that nice of me? Thread closed.

As far as I'm aware there was a native title claim on the area South of the car-park, and there are still proposals for some sort of Aboriginal cultural center on the site, but this is outside the area highlighted in the link above (I think it's in the white lines, but don't quote me on that). It's been in the pipeline for 15 years now, and there still hasn't been any solid forward movement, so personally, I think it's time the idea for an aboriginal cultural center on the spit was permitted to die peacefully. At the risk of sounding racist, I also find it rather extraordinary that an area which has only been land for the last 100 years can be subject to native title.

Bringing this one a long way back from the dead: So there's been an update to the Spit development saga. Basically, early this year, the state government asked for expressions of interest in the "Northern Development Area" (see link below) but allowed only a 13 day window for submissions. The paper is speculating that the short window for submissions suggests that the State Government already has a preferred development in mind, and significantly, Sea World also confirmed today that they are in talks to expand the park. It's not as open and shut as that though, as there were other submissions made, and the government was expected to announce a shortlist earlier this month, but now says it will announce it's decision mid-way through the year after it had evaluated all the options. The area of land in question: http://www.dlgp.qld.gov.au/resources/project/gsdc/lot-plan-eoi.pdf So all in all quite an interesting little development. One thing worth pointing out is that the original plans called for the demolition of what is now Penguin Encounter, so you'd suspect that whatever they're proposing this time has changed since the first post in this thread. This is also the first time that concrete evidence has emerged publicly that the southern expansion of the park is still alive since the new management took over.

If they manage to reuse the volcanoes for the next attraction, fine. If not, they have to go. The idea of moving them somewhere else in the park is (to me) simply cringe worthy. Incidentally, when they built the ride, there was a lake running from the Train bridge all the way back to the resort, site access won't be a major issue. For me the big clue is that when the ride originally closed, it only closed for maintenance, and had a reopening date. From the outside looking in, it sounds like they found something very broken and decided it was either beyond repair, or so expensive it was pretty much beyond repair. I don't think they'd close a ride in the lead up to the summer holidays for no reason. If that's true (although it's all speculation), I'd go further and suggest they may not have a replacement in mind straight away, which explains why it's taking so long for any sort of construction to start. Personally, I'd be surprised if there was a new attraction in that building/location this year, and I'd be amazed if any new attraction was even on a similar scale to Bermuda. I do like surprises though, so lets see what happens

I guess DW have already come out and said they're building something this year, where as MW haven't hinted at thier plans yet. Not surprising that all the talk is what DW is building, compared to what Village might be buildinng.

I don't have anything to add, but: 14 month soft opening. lol

What's this supposed to be though? The rumour is for a family attraction and a thrill ride. Surely this would be the 'family friendly' attraction? If so, sweet! Disk'Os are by and large well reviewed, seem interesting enough, and just have that all round good ride vibe to them; remember not every ride has to be a world beater. Having said that, if it turns out that this is the rumoured thrill ride for this year, I too will be questioning DW's ride selection skills. The thought of this and Motocoaster making up a 'Big 7 thrill rides' list does turn my stomach a bit. Edit: Also, Mini Disk'O = LOL!

If it was in the middle of the city, MAYBE

I thought that the cheap passes were a good way to get themselves through the economic crisis, and pretty sure I said something to that effect when the passes came out. You have to remember that 3 park year passes were about $250, so the locals $70 pass for a couple of month pass was a good deal to get themselves out of trouble, and I believed there was room to discount the tickets. I think they were over priced, but I think they went to far, which has hurt both the parks and the bottom line. Simple as that.

^ I'd suspect that will happen, the releases have hinted at cooperation with Merlin, but really I think WnW will stand on it's own, and indeed I'd suspect WnW will be more of a boost to the other attractions than the other way around. I mean lets face it, Wet 'n' Wild on the Gold Coast had Sea World and Movie World on it's side. WnWS's support acts will be an Aquarium, Aussie native animal park, and an observation tower and maybe a Madame Tussauds. I think it's fair to say that WnW will well and truly be the big item on any combined ticket. On a similar point, yes, Sydney does have a heap of international tourists, but I don't think there's much chance that many will go to a water park in the western suburbs. IMHO, the only way they'll get 900,000 in the first year is if they do a stupidly cheap season pass. Personally though I'd like to see Village try a new strategy in Sydney, and actually charge people to enter the park.

There are a couple reasons why I don't think they'll hit the target, and I'll go through them one at a time: * Wonderland, a full blown theme park didn't draw a million in it's first year. That may have been a long time ago, and the population of Sydney has increased, but from memory Wonderland was projected to attract 1.6million so it missed the mark by a fair margin. Sega World and Fox Studios also fell well short of their projected attendance. * In press releases, Village have talked about using the formula from Wet 'n' Wild on the Gold Coast as a template. What's missing though is WnW has had nearly 30 years to build up attendance, and a significant amount of that growth came from ticket deals with SW and MW, which WnW Sydney won't have. * As on the plan, WnW Sydney is very impressive. Unfortunately if you read through all the documents you find that not all of it will open with the park. A fair chunk of the plans are 'stage 2', so as far as scale goes, WnW will probably be somewhere in between the Gold Coast parks. There are other reasons, but those 3 above pretty much sum up why I think it'll miss it's projections. Unlike Sega world and Fox studios however, I don't think that the shortfall will be anywhere near fatal to the park, and it will be a success.

No theme park is viable without continued investment. It's a capital heavy industry, so to say it wasn't viable because the owner wasn't willing to invest in it is like saying my car is a lemon because I refuse to put oil in it. Incidently, I agree with Wazza, I don't think it'll pull in as many people as they are predicting, I think 900,000 isa bit high. I still think it'll be very successful and profitable, but I don't think it'll get the numbers they think it will.

That wouldn't be something different. They've done the the walk through thing 3 times in the last 10 years, they've added 2 thrill rides in the same time frame. I think the thrill ride for DW thing is pretty much locked in.

Just putting this out there: There isn't the correct amount of room under the screen yes, but given the limitations of RCT3 is that really a huge deal? In recreations in RCT3 everything has to be sort of stylised to fit in anyway, so as far as I'm concerned a gap slightly smaller than it should be isn't a worry. For me me I think it looks pretty good, but must ask: is the brickwork around the screen 3D or 2D?

Village lists it's debt in it's asx reports, and while I don't have the numbers on me, I believe it's somewhere around the $300mil mark but I'll have to check back later. As for the others, Six Flags had something like $1.6B debt, Cedar Fair is something similar. Universal Orlando I think also has about $1B worth of debt, but again, I will have to check since it's been ages since I checked this stuff.

Nothing in the release about WWW this time around. As for the family ride, early rumours were suggesting a replacement for Dora, but in the last few months there was talk of a kiddie coaster, though speculation is rather pointless since we shall all know in a couple months.

$4B investment and they tell the media before they tell the government? I don't know why, but I'm skeptical

^ Couldn't agree more with the last 3 sentences. F&B should (and has been shown overseas, could) be an attraction in it's own right rather than just a source of revenue.