Was Wonderland sold?

[FormerWonderEmp]

I heard through the grapevine that Wonderland was sold at New Years and that it would be closing after the holidays for a major re-development. I don't know who bought the park or for how much, but as I said I heard it through the grapevine so it's probably a load of crap but it will be interesting to see if anything does happen. ~Former

[rappa]

Sounds interesting...IMO would be for the best either way. However I'm very sceptical of anything like this and don't really believe it for a second. Perhaps if you could at least try to give an idea of where you’re getting this but otherwise it’s doing nothing for me. ...can't help but think its a bit more of the 'I’ve got a secret' game.

[Ian]

I have heard a bit of truth to the above. Basically alot of staff changes at the top happen in a lot of departments including a new GM, I was told all this from my boss at work so I take it all as fact cause I know who the new GM is. As for my thoughts on new ownership basically since Marvel has started to come into the park my feeling has been Universal has enter into Wonderland's mix, as Universal are the parks that deal with Marvel I have also felt that a big company like Universal may have seen that Sydney has over 4 million people yet the parks attendance is so low that they know if they changed the park it would be a potential goldmine down the road just look at attendance in cities with 4 milllion in the USA to see this.

[nezzur]

But Australia as a whole doesn't have a population of 250 000 000. But i do have to agree, Wonderland could draw larger crowds. Maybe not up there with the American parks but still quite decent.

[screammachine]

Just a quick question here guys.... When Wonderland got Involved with the Super Hero characters from Marvel. Did they sign a contract agreement with Marvel, or Universal?? Or is Marvel part of Universal and when a signed the contract they got the whole package deal with it?

[Nightshifter]

i think it's marvel, i heard on various places it was marvel, i'm actually not sure if marvel is part of universal.

[Daniel]

Hey Former, how's it going mate? Long time no see. Good to hear from you. What are you getting upto with yourself these days? As for Wonderland closing, the same rumour circulates this time every year. I don't think so. It's exactly what needs to happen though. The place needs to be gutted. Wonderland has categorically denied any rumours of their closure. I'm sure when it does come time to close (when the land becomes a little more valuable that is, prices are still going up), staff will show up for their shift, only to be turned away by security. Gates will have big chains around them and that will be all she wrote. As for closing after the holidays, nope. I personally believe they'd be well within their rights to close the theme park off season and just keep the Wildlife Park going all year. Something like that makes sense to me anyway. What does everyone else think? Just to get tongues wagging that little bit

[Bussy]

I agree with Daniel on this one, the same rumour goes around every year, and every year it stays open. Wonderland would not have to close completely to do a major refurbishment. They could work on each area at a time and open them progressively. E.g. Redevelop Gold Rush then Transylvania then HB and you could open them in that order and have a great new park without any major downtime. Of course the entry fee would have to drop over this time (YEAH RIGHT). BTW this is my 100th post. "The Bus is now leaving for Sold Rocks, Western Australia"

[Daniel]

Good work old son. We've all valued your contribution even if you did dribble crap at times :twisted: Thanks. Keep it up mate. Keep the posts coming and I love your 'sign-offs'.

[Bussy]

Me dribble crap? Never! I put a lot of time into my signoff's so im glad someone appreciates what I do, which by the way is not much. I love being a student. "The Bus is now leaving for Craptolite Gully, Victoria"

[ScReAMmachine!]

hey guys, These rumors surface EVERY year. Yet they're still taken seriously. Have we no other topic to all chat about?

[Slick]

Look at it from a DreamWorld season pass holder's point of view. Wonderland is going down. It's simple logic here folks. I'm not saying this because their rides are supposedly "not exciting anymore" but you like at Dreamworld right now, as in, Thursday 15th of January, 2004, and think, wow, the new theming and Tomb Raider is excellent, and everything is just so pretty where as you look at Wonderland and go "which mardigra character died here?" PS: love your sign offs wonderbus, keep it up!

[screammachine]

In my opinion Wonderland is the Grapevine. There has been nothing but rumors of new rides, or the park closing down goin about the park. I'd say the best thing to do in this situation is to sit tight and see what the final outcome of it all is. Wonderbus Wrote

Of course the entry fee would have to drop over this time (YEAH RIGHT).

HA! Totally Agree!! I would like to see them do that! ScReAMmachine said

These rumors surface EVERY year.   Yet they're still taken seriously.  

And I Totally Agree to that. Maybe if we take it with a pinch of salt (Like ol' Gran used to say) we wouldnt get as carried away with it. Screammachine....

[Slick]

I do actually believe that "if" Wonderland was refurbished accordingly, they would have a multi million dollar profit. That means that they could reconstruct Hanna Barbera Land and change it to MarvelWay or something corny as such. Now come on, now you don't need an iq over 120 to realise that (mind you, my iq is 121!)

[Richard]

Wonderland's certainly slipped a lot since 2002 when they got rid of the former Hanna Babera Land, but they do a lot of things better than Dreamworld. To call Wonderland an ugly park compared to Dreamworld is strange. There's not a park out there that's more inconsistently designed and themed than Dreamworld (hate to break it to you, but Movie World comes close, just their theming is of a higher standard, so it's much overlooked). At least do us a favour and compare it to something that deserves the recognition it gets like Sea World.

[Nightshifter]

alright if i had to give awards out it would be: best rides: dreamworld best theming: wonderland: best water park: wet 'n' wild best scenery: wonderland and not to mention the really bad thing about dreamworld is, i think it's to cramped up, like it's very packed, i mean it's good in another way as it's easier to get to rides, but i tend to like it when things are more spread out like wonderland's. All wonderland needs now is to fill in those gaps, they have so much land p to the freeway behind the demon and the space probe, more behind the river rampage, they still have hanna babera land, in between the bush beast and the beach area, and small gaps between rides mainly in the goldrush area such as from the great balloon escape and the action arena there is so much land there to be used. my park would be planned with rides to too close like dreamworld or not to far like wonderland. the only part of wonerland and dreamworld that suceeds is the ocean parade area and transilvania. thats my opinion.

[rappa]

I'm afraid I would actually disagree with that. I would say best rides would go to MW because all of their attractions are pretty much first rate. Best ride package I would give to DW as individually its rides aren't quite up there to the MW standard when put together it makes for a pretty awesome ride park. Best theming easily MW, how can you even compare the quality here with WL?? Best scenery is easily SW as its without a doubt the most aesthetically pleasing park to spend a day in. IMO the nice packed park is the way to go. Look at Disneyland Park, with wall to wall attractions it makes the park seem to offer so much more. I don't think DW would be all that much smaller than WL its just it fills the space with so much more. Wonderland has always had a lot of sprawled out attractions dotted around the place which is no where near as user friendly IMO. Wonderland will never fill in the gaps, its actually making them bigger by the week!! As for WLs theming with the exception of Transylvania I think most of it has always been fairly cheap and nasty. HBB was pleasant but not very highly themed. As for Gold Rush I think that its about the ****tiest attempt at theming everywhere. Just because its an old world theme doesn’t mean you can just throw some old bits of timber and iron around the place and fill it with the usual crap stores, games and asphalt everywhere. In contrast everything at MW is themed down to the end with a fair bit of attention to detail as well. Just my 0.02c...everyone can have their own opinion.

[Nightshifter]

dreamworld has cyclone, giant drop, tower of terror, eureka mine ride, wipeout, rugrats runaway reptar, thunder rapids and many other thrill rides and niormal rides including a wildlife park and a water park area. Movie world has lethal weapon, scooby doo, roadrunner and wild wild west as their thrill rides, thats it, when i went to movie world we completed all rides and attractions and was home by 2:00 in the afternoon. Dreamworld, we didn't have time so we payed the extra $10 and went the next day. Wonderland can be completed in a day

[pyro_man]

Well I'm not reading all those post, I just want to know is the park being sold or is it just a rummer and my downloads are about to run out and you wont here from me for the rest of the month.

[mx5_boy]

Hhhmmm, I have been reading all these posts with interest. I know there are people who contribute to these boards that have had the opportunity to visit overseas theme parks and can make an informed opinion about such things. The interesting thing is that I note how diverse and intersting we all are. Some of us like themeing, some of us like shows and most of us absolutely adore thrill rides. We might drool at the thought of American style theme parks but we simply don't have the head of population to support them. The margins made at our own are not really that big. And you know what? Our parks are a darn site better than most North American ones. They are cleaner, have less awful people and our queues are by far shorter. I remember back in 1990 when I was just 20 and visited the *very new* then Universal Florida. We had queues of 3 hours just for the King Kong ride and 2 hours for the Earthquake ride. And it was hot. But I will add that it was also a class act. A recent visit to Universal in LA painted an even worse picture. Universal Walk was just plain nasty with over-themeing to the max and expensive food. The worst thing I found was the dual queues.. One for English speakers and one for Spanish speakers. And please don't get me started on the terrible awful people that inhabit SFMM. It's not a nice place to visit at the best of times. Crowds of nasty trashy teenagers who make the trip there seem so threatening. And we won't go on about the humongous people that seemed to be nasty regulars at Cedar Point. Ditto to Alton Towers in the UK. I grew up with DW and SW. And as I was a little older WLS. I have taken many an overseas friend to DW/SW/WLS and they have always been impressed by the cleanliness and quality that we have. But again always found it quite strange that there was never a huge amount of people to deal with and the very short ride lines. For a small country like Australia the big theme parks on the GC are quite an achievement. Ditto to WLS who manage to have world class rides for a little city of 4 million people. They might not be the latest and greatest but they are still world class. If a theme park in Sydney can build a world first ride, followed by DW on the GC and MW then we are very lucky that such money is spent. Instead of bitching about what we don't have.. How about we be thankful for what we do have? I love Cyclone (former big dipper), the Bush Beast, Giant Drop, Lethal Weapon, Wipeout, Space Probe, The Demon, the former Thunderbolt, The Corkscrew and of course the Bounty's Revenge. ToT doesn't interest me as there is no real thrill value there for me. But each to our own. I think the point I am trying to make is that for a little place in the middle of nowhere we are not doing to bad in the theme park stakes. And of course the quality people that work at our parks. I cannot ever forget the dreadful people that I have encountered at American theme parks. The have a nice day bull**** is exactly that.. You can say it but do you mean it? Take care guys and gals, mb

[Richard]

I've split this thread, because the whole Disney and theming discussion wasn't exactly sticking to this topic. I've moved it to General Thrills, and you can see the thread here. Let's see if we can bring this topic back to the original topic, and anything to do with the since-moved topic should be posted there.

[GoGoBoy]

I am re-posting the following as it got moved to the theming discussion but it was intended for this discussion. Feel free to delete my other post Richard. There is no doubt in my mind that Wonderland is doing really well in terms of visitor numbers. It seems they can do anything and still draw a crowd. The wildlife park is constantly filled with asian (and other) tourists. There is not a day that goes by without large numbers of tour groups. The theme park itself still draws in loads of families over the holiday periods and then there's the massive amount of school groups that visit for weeks before xmas. I would find it very hard to believe that Wonderland is not making a lot of money... they are just taking every last cent and not putting anything back in. In terms of the theme park I'm sure the Malaysian owners would have been very happy with the Marvel contract... it allows the park to advertise the association heavily which appeals hugely to a lot of people. The best part for them is they have been able to do it on the absolute cheap. No new themed area, no new rides. Just a couple of costumed characters standing around. It's been an absolute minimum expenditure for them but it has still managed to pull in thousands and thousands of families and kids who want to meet spiderman and the others. So in summary... I hope the park HAS been sold (although I highly doubt it). It might be good for a new company to come in and shake things up a bit. With Sunway owning the park the chances of a new attraction or major capital investment are incredibly slim. Just look at their own Sunway Lagoon park in Malaysia... it hasn't had any significant new attraction since it opened years and years ago. That is obviously their theme park policy

[willsy]

They should just work on sections of the parks and fixing it up, Like where the old Beastie is and chair lift, Than open that up again ....... so on....

[joz]

Its not been sold, but I'm told Steve Peet, Tony Braxton Smith and John Menzies are driving the parks future development. So far all 3 are really happy with how the park has performed since attendance at the Gold Coast parks is at close to all time highs.

[GoGoBoy]

Joz are you referring to these guys actually being involved with Wonderland? And why are these parks at all time highs? It's been a year of no new attractions so it should be a year of all time lows. If the parks do really well without spending too much capital on new attractions then they will probably continue doing nothing for the next year and the year after that (much like Wonderland). Just a thought