joz

Just as a quick add-on to AlexB's post about the ride sign: Check out the bit where it asks riders to check their suitability to low height and low speeds. Seriously, the OH&S person who insisted on that sign is smoking crack, its a carousel for crying out loud. As for the ride itself, woefully under done. It looks like a very similar model to DW's and SW's, but just has a horrible "unfinished" look to it. I think its the sort of ride that Village needed, but its not even well presented.

Mac Leisure has made a market presentation, which shows a concept art of the function area as well as a picture of the new slide: http://www.asx.com.au/asxpdf/20070914/pdf/314k6jd94rpkkp.pdf Enjoy!

I think its a great site compared to the old ones they used to have, though seriously, the photo on the Pirate ship page at SW must be at least 15 years old (The old Logo, and defunct attraction in the foreground give it away)

My guts telling me that Village would do well with SAQ. They already own SW, and someone like Trevor Long would be a great mind to have when managing something like Sydney Aquarium. As for Sydney Wildlife World, I think again that there are people within Village who know how to market this sort of thing. Think Paradise Country; there were people within Village then who could take an under performing attraction based on Australian animals to new heights, and I feel they could probably do the same again for SWW

When the doors are left open, they make contact with the main part of the wheel, preventing the gondola from spinning and remaining upright. This could not happen during normal operations, as the ride is run in 'auto', and the system when in 'auto' will not allow the wheel to spin with a door open. The picture depicts what can happen with the ride in 'manual' and the doors left open. The photo of the Korean wheel shows what can happen when pins are inserted the wrong way and the doors aren't totally closed. Hope this helps.

Indeed. The ‘Seals at Play’ exhibit is being removed due to some upcoming changes to Cartoon Beach (Hint: No new rides will go on the site). As for the Seal Stadium, the much-needed renovation is nearly done, and I'm not kidding when I say it was much needed. The back of house area was 25+ years old, and was just falling apart. They could have patched it up and kept using it for a bit longer, but have wisely decided to completely gut the sets and back of house and (for the most part) start again. The stadium itself is pretty much being left as is, aside from some seating on the Broadwater side of the stadium being removed for the extended BoH, so the only major difference most guests will notice is the new set. Once the renovations are complete, the next step will be rehearsal for the new show, and giving the seals a chance to settle in. While I can't say anything, the idea behind the show seems quite a good one, and should prove entertaining. The Penguins are expected to return, but not to the same area they were, and not to where the ‘Seals at Play’ exhibit was. We’ll see how this one goes, as the design process is still on going, and things could change, though the current thinking is that they will go to a low traffic area at the back half of the park.

Don't hold your breath.

Exactly what went through my mind. To be honest, how cheaply it was done makes me wonder what the plan is for the ride in the long term. My bet? I reckon whenever AVIS withdraws sponsorship, that ride is dead.

I love how big a secret it is

Its been a while since I've been to DW, but is that seriously a Skylink pole in the background?? Hasn't that thing been closed for like 3 years now?? Nice pics guys, love the effort. On those supports on the last pic, do they hang out over the lake?

As Richard said, its all a volume thing. When you have that many people going through the parks, unfortunate things will happen, and more often then not these things have nothing to do with thrill rides. In fact, browsing through www.rideaccidents.com reveals a couple of examples:

Djrappa is back of house, and thats why he can't post photos.

Attendance projections dictate how many trains are on the coasters. I think its something like 3,500 for two on RR, and its probably similar for others, so long as two trains are in fact available for service and not undergoing maintenance

Whats wrong with slow slides that kids might like? Why does everything have to be the most thrilling? If anything, I reckon a few more of those White Water Mountain slides would be great.

I wish I could add more to this then the one sentance thought but sadly all I have is: This would be great hotel to be on-site at Dreamworld.

Reading through this got me thinking, I wonder if part of Dreamworld's 'decline' (Is it a decline if attendance is up and revenue is up?) is the lack of a John Menzies type of guy running the show. Remember, Dreamworld has changed CEO's a few times in the past decade, and in the meantime John has been at with SW and WVTPs for 36 years. Dreamworld with all these high level changes, haven't had, I guess you'd call it passion, from a career theme park guy. The modern CEO is focused on the bottom line, not the 'show' as it were, and while I have the greatest respect for Greg at Dreamworld, I would love to see what would happen if John became CEO of Dreamworld for a while (I'd give the giant hot dog on main street maybe 25seconds). You have to remember John is a guy who decided some ugly looking trees near the back of Seaworld needed to go because they obstructed the view of the Corkscrew, which by the way is having its paintjob freshened up again. Obviously, WVTP's aren't perfect, there are several faults with the parks, but I don't think its anything they aren't already keeping on top of, otherwise this topic would be in the movieworld section, titled "The quality of Movieworld". I personally don't have a problem with Dreamworld (I didn't start the topic) but obviously people out there are seeing the quality of Dreamworld slip. Are there some good signs at DW? Of course yes. For one, I'm happy to see the vintage cars moved from under the tower of terror track. That was always a pet peeve of mine from when ToT was built. Now we just need to see what becomes of Rocky Hollow, Goldrush and Blue Lagoon and all the other more run down areas of the park.

If the photo was taken from a public place, then Ian owns the copyright for those photos. On private property then I believe it gets somewhat iffy.

I should point out its financial year, not calender year. Interestingly, the competition did congratulate WnW on the succuess, with just a hint of being smug that Whitewater World WOULD grow the attendance of both parks.

Like mattcrombie said, it was just a trade show on the Gold Coast. The great thing about it is that in the media coverage they were all pretty much second teir companies who were featured. Zamperala were there flogging off their Flying Coaster (hopefully this year will mark the 5th straight year that no one has bought one in Australia) and "Disk-O" concept, some fountains guy was there talking about how his product hadn't taken off in Australia and some virtual queueing company (not Lo-Q) was there talking up his product to the media. Dreamworld's CEO was there and just said there was a new attraction coming which we all know about anyway, so nothing really that exciting in the media coverage.

Think you got it on an off day, I went on the ride no less then a week after you and found the ride to be running well. I did read your post before hand and the only thing that seemed to not be working was one of the lights on the "Death" animatronic. It didn't really detract since as you were traveling around it, it appeared to get brighter and brighter, as it was only the light on one side that wasn't working. The mist in the Wild Mouse room worked really well the day I was there, and in fact I like the mist effect better then the fog, mostly because the mist doesn't smell as much as the fog did, and I couldn't tell any difference in the overall effect. I agree about the red light over the drop though, it doesn't do well enough to hide the drop. I know its not something that can easily be done, but if it were possible to cover up the sensor lights on the track so they aren't visable from on the ride I suspect that would go along way to restore the surprise effect of that drop.

Since when has the Easter show been a theme park? And since when has DW not been a theme park? Anyway, this thread is not about your site, this thread is about the SW Eye. Well the Gold Coast Bulletin have really taken this one to heart, with a follow up story today, as well as an opinion peice, and a poll on their: website www.gcbulletin.com.au Since the Gold Coast Bulleting only keep stories on their website for a couple of days:

The Gold Coast Bulletin has run a few stories on the issue, and this is the latest (I've highlighted parts which are important to my post): Personally the more and more that comes out about this, the more I'm supporting the park. I must say that originally I didn't care one way or the other, but to hear there have been no complaints about the ride in Southport, and some council members support the ride, to me makes the whole story about why it should go pretty much null and void. After all, you can barely see the Eye from Main Beach. If anyone has a good reason to complain about the view, its the people of Southport, who haven't been vocal on the matter. Indeed, if you look at real estate ads in Southport, the Eye is front and center of the pictures of the view. As far as a wider "How do you stop other taller structures if you let this one stay?" argument, the point about it not being a problem in Coomera to me would indicate a valid precedent for future applications.

Well if you were planning to buy the Maga Cop bag with your hard earned cash, your outa luck:

Universal Citywalk is pretty much nightclubs and bars and the like. Citywalk on Coomera as it was proprosed in stage one is a anywhere planet Earth shopping center, so no, it was nothing like the overseas version. Thats not really a bad thing though, Universal's Citywalk is designed purely for tourists, and the dynamics of Coomera suggest this may not be the best model to go with. Its probably possible for Coomera to be the sort of suburb that attracts tourists, but its going to take more then DW and WWW to bring in enough tourists to support a nightclub area geared for tourists. Plus given the councils reply on the Citywalk, they're vision for Coomera is for a new Robina. I can see where both sides are coming from on this one. I must say thought the idea that they'll be modeling Coomera after Robina worries me, as Robina feels so poorly thrown together and thought out. Robina is pockets of public space seperated by large expanses of call centers, offices and what will one day be government buildings and more offices. Personally though, I'd love to see Mac. Lesiure try and go for the tourists in a way that can also be used by the locals. More smaller attractions (Bowling, arcades) with bars, resturants, and hotels. That to me would be so much better then building yet another generic shopping center that doesn't hold a candle to Pacific Fair.