How do you start your own park?

[Ibot]

Hey, everyone! How do you start your own park? I want to start my own, small then hopefully grow. But i have no idea where to start. I have many ideas, but need help to sort them out. Is there a site decated to starting you park, or documents etc.

[tom]

As in a REAL park or a park based on your computer?? If its a real park, the first thing you should think about is having the land to build it on, and the money!! Ive always wanted to start my own park lol!! I reckon it would be WICKED!!!

[Dylaan]

Well I've always wanted to do that! Thing is that it's gonna be a hard thing to do by yourself. WVTP and MLE are both huge companies, good luck!

[Ibot]

Real park, yes how do you find the apporiate land space. for a park?

[Gazza]

Depends, just look around for land big enough to fit one in the area you want to build in. How are you funding it.

[Ibot]

OK, how big should the land be? (funding = none of your concern sorry!)

[goliath]

What type of park are you going to build? If you're only building a small family park with a few rides such as a ferris wheel then it's obvious that you would just buy a small amount of land. If you're going to build a larger park with multiple attractions and coasters, then you'd obviously want a larger amount of land. Just make sure you have enough money

[Gazza]

Yeah, just visit some manufacturers websites and check out the tech specs of the rides you want, and see the dimensions needed for safe operation, then sort of do a draft layout of the park and work out how much land it would take. Also have a look at some public buildings (public toilet blocks, kiosks in parks) and prehaps some paths in public parks to work out how much area infastructure like that would need. Sorry but you need to be less vauge in your description, we have no idea how big this park would be. Though a little suggestion, i would start out as a small waterpark, slides are cheaper and more reliable than most mechanical rides, yet are still popular.

[aidan]

first you have to have money( alot ) , second u have to find land , third u need to ask the council for permission . fourth make a good park.

Edited April 10, 2006 by aidan

[Dylaan]

Have you already thought of a name or are you open for suggestion? EDIT: And if you want good waterslides, visit www.proslide.com, they have a great range of slides! (If you want something smaller and less expensive try Australian Waterslides and Leisure. (Site: www.waterslide.net) (They made a few slides for WnW so they can't be too bad!)

Edited April 10, 2006 by WnW_Rocks

[Ibot]

thank you all, i've made a draft of what i want it to be. i want the park avaible for all ages, waterpark, mechanical rides etc.. I want to start it small but have land already avaible to expand. And no i dont not have a namefor the park yet.

[Superman escape]

coaster radio had a segment on it a while ago.

[aidan]

is just gonna be a park full of basic things ? like u could make a side full of water attractions then it goes to land with the mechanical things , and make it look like a bay, land to water

Edited April 10, 2006 by aidan

[Ibot]

your starting to get the idea, a family fun park. Also adian i had smothing simalar in mind.

[aidan]

it would be cool , and if it looked like a tropical bay with water slides then you turn around and its land with rides that were in a sort of dense rain forest , like u would buy the ticket and there would be two paths spliting up to the other section with two signs points in other ways , saying waterslides and another saying forest and palm trees making it look tropical

Edited April 10, 2006 by aidan

[Gazza]

Just another couple of ideas: 0) Try building a small attraction as your starting point, for example a 18/36 hole mini golf or something, make sure its high quality and start getting people through, and then go from there. 1) Actually visit some family fun parks, see what works/what doesnt and see how big the park is for some indication of the land you would need. You would need to do this regardless anyway since it would be stupid to jump headlong into building the park. 2) Use Maps, Google Earth Images of some parks to see how big they are etc. 3) Get professional advice, not just some of kids on the internet, i mean, someone with the presumably millions it would take to build even a small park would probably have the buisness sense to do this.

[Adam]

Building even a small amusement enterprise is a huge investment and shouldn’t be undertaken lightly (if you actually want to remain open longer than recent failures – Sega World). Often starting out small is the cheapest but not always the best way to go about building a park. If you don’t know anything about how to build a park, which this post suggests, then I wouldn’t bother. The amount of money, work and effort involved would be tremendous. Even if you have the money, you'd have to work out if this is the best way for you to invest? I have a mate who's a financial analyst; maybe you could have a chat to him about your various investing options. If you were to ask for my personal advice, I'd have to agree with Gazza. If you're really passionate about it, find some land and build a mini-golf course (heck, if it's in Brisbane we could even have an R-C.com.au meet there ). Run that for a few years and see how it goes. But just remember, after it's built you're going to be attached to all profits and debts the business has. You'll need to pay for upkeep, advertising, vomit removal... As for books, "Building your own Theme Park for Dummies" is usually a good read. Be sure to keep us updated on your situation.

[Dylaan]

Just wondering, where can I find this book?

[Gazza]

I saw it at Angus and Robertson next to "Interpereting Sarcasam for dummies".

[Dylaan]

Thanks!

[Bussy]

All you need is a lot of money, a lot of man power and some turnstiles. Thanks Ned Flanders for that bit of info. "The Bus is now leaving for Two Turners Reserve, NSW"

[shadowshadi]

Also you need Permission from the Government, the council and that Energy Australia can support the power you use.

[Ibot]

Thanks, also what are some good manfactures for equipment? eg: rides, construction, food supplies, ticketing software etc. That a park would need to run.

[Gazza]

Why dont you join the IAAPA ( http://www.iaapa.org/ ) and visit their trade show in Orlando Florida, it has everything you want to know about on display. IAAPA also has tons of info on their website regarding all aspects of park operation.

[Dylaan]

I have a feeling we might see loads of smaller parks pop up in the next 20 or so years.