CoastersRZ

Well, hard as it is to believe, Flight of Fear opened ten years ago this year! Although it was delayed and didn`t first open until June of 1996. And it was plagued with problems that first year. All the crowds that year would run back to Coney Mall to try and get the first rides of the day on it.

No, no one knows exactly what the MTV Soundwave concept is because so far, Paramount Parks hasn`t built any at its parks yet. The park is not going to release how much it costs them to run Flight of Fear per hour. But by deduction you can get an approximate figure for staffing costs. Greeter position, unload, driver, and three restraint checkers in the loading station. That`s six people running the ride at any given time. Then there is the cost of electricity for running the LIMS and the air conditioning for the building.

Oh, I know which car you are talking about now. The black one, right? Yes, that was located on the I-Street side, right by the entrance that has the big cast iron gates.

Excellent trip report! I`m glad you and your family had a fun first visit to PKI! Son of Beast as you probably noted while you were at the park, is down until the end of spring as the park is doing some pretty major rehab work on it to try and make it a smoother ride. (There was a crane by the bottom of the lifthill this past weekend). I was not fortunate enough to grab a ride on Delirium before it closed (I saw it testing on Saturday without any riders). Apparantely this ride is still having some issues. The manufacturer, HUSS, was apparantly out at the park over the Winter trying to get the ride running like it was back in 2003 when it opened. It suffered serious downtime last season, and when it reopened was featuring a less intense and thrilling program, before they closed it down early for the season in the fall. Face Off was having issues when I was at the park on Saturday. (Mostly related to the lift "miscatching" the train at the conclusion of the ride.) I would have liked to ride it on Sunday, but it was down most of Sunday. Action Zone seemed to be lacking, well Action this past weekend. LOL. Hopefully, you return to PKI and get to experience Delirium and Son of Beast. They are both fun rides. Although one has a bad reputation for being rough. I`ve never made it down to Carowinds since our Eagles were sent there last year. (I have visited in 2001 and 2003). The best ride in the park is Top Gun The Jet Coaster. I could ride that ride all day. Ok, I`ve written enough, LOL.

You mean its now behind the Fairly Odd Coaster. They haven`t has that car in the Paramount Story for quite some time. If my memory serves me correct, it used to be parked right next to the large waterfall, in the sunken area with stairs down to it that now has some picnic table.

Well, that is part of the reason why Taft Broadcasting wanted to build a new park around the rights that they owned to the Hanna Barbera Characters. They had seen what Disney did at his park with his characters. They hoped to have the same success with their new park and their HB characters. And they were successful. While Kings Island is not a Disney Land or World, it was the first non-Disney theme park to break the 2 million guests in a season threshold.

Yes, the Wings at Carowinds is quite nice! Right by the Super Saturator. The self service drink stand is AWESOME for one reason... free refills (at least when I was there in 2003 and in 2001)! PKI`s Wings just isn`t as busy as what the Carowinds was when I was at Carowinds.

Yes. The place has the potential to be a really cool restaurant, with the added benefit of being air conditioned. The fact that it serves Mongomery Inn products which are inherently expensive, and generally do not appeal to families with kids is part of the reason why this eatery always seems to be empty. A sit down restaurant at PKI would be a nice addition, IMO. Wings could definantely use a sprucing up/retheme. Why not retheme it to the Nick at Nite Cafe or something to tie it into the Nick Universe, but also kind of tie it into the rest of the park.

Precisely. I`m sure the parks are already looking at their 2007 capital plans. They will proceed as normal until the sale is completed. Then, once the deal closes, they might make changes to the name/theme of the new attractions, but I doubt there would be any major changes in the new attractions. Also, depending on when the sale is completed, I doubt there will be any major changes in the park this season. I don`t see Flight of Fear at PKI going anywhere anytime soon. They installed new seats in one of the trains (they are now the same orange color as the lapbars).

Yes, I heard a lot of guests at the park last weekend wanting to ride Son of Beast. Many of them did not know that it was closed, and many were dissapointed when they found out it was closed. Just goes to prove that while us enthusiasts may not particularly care for the ride, the general public generally likes the ride. Hopefully all the work the park has done on it over the winter makes it a more enjoyable ride all ardound. It is the only ride at PKI that I have walked off of and told myself I would never ride it again the rest of the day.

The thing that most influence PKI fro Roy Disney is he told the executives at Taft to figure out how much land they thought they would need. Then buy five times that much. DisneyLand was landlocked and until California Adventure opened, that property could not expand. That led Taft to buy 1,600 acres on both sides of I-71. Originally, the Kings Island Golf Course, the Tennis stadium and the Kings Island Resort were all part of Kings Island`s property. Sales of the land has shrunk the land that PKI owns down to the current 752 acres. An interesting note, is that when Walt Disney was designing DisneyLand, he paid a visit to Coney Island, at the time one of the finest amusement parks in the country. After his visit, he gave the park a $1 check for professional services rendered. The park still has the check to this day. (You can see a picture of it in Charles Jacques Jr.`s book on Coney Island).

I think what he was trying to say is that on live action shows, the shows can continue, but the specific actors can move on. Much like what happens with Power Rangers. That show no longer has the original actors on it.

Yes, the red, green and yellow bands on Drop Zone had a fresh coat of paint last weekend. The purple and black bands did not yet have new paint.

Yes, that would be what he was refering to. Unfortunately, most of the time I checked the Action Theater on Saturday and Sunday, only Spongebob Squarepants was open. With regards to the lights on the Eiffel Tower. They are only going to be used for WinterFest and special events, like Nights of Fire (and probably FearFest). The lights on the buildings on International Street will aparantly be lit every day the park closes after dark, like the old lights on the buildings used to be.

What is this doing in the trip report section? That is because only us staff members here at PKIC have the ability to add photos and edit the photo gallery. We prefer to have quality images over tons of images of the same thing from the same angle. As a general rule, only photos taken by staff members are added to the gallery. There are always exceptions to the rules though! Now, if you have a unique image that is not in the gallery, try PMing one of the staff members the photo(s) to get feedback from them.

Elmer Fudd, I don`t buy those guys` story. The entrance to the park will be a short shuttle ride to the front gate. Plus, the resort guests would have a long hike even to get to this north entrance. Secondly, Top Gun is almost identical to The Vortex at Paramount Canada`s Wonderland. The Vortex at Wonderland actually opened in 1991, two years before PKIs. This means that PKI`s was not necessarily designed specifically for the site it sits on. Although, they probably located the ride their because it did fit the site.

Well keep in mind that before the 2005 park map, their was no "Signature Attractions" boxes on the park maps. They are merely pointing out some of the major attractions. They don`t have the room (or the need) to point out Flight of Fear. FoF pulls in enough people because of its popularity. On any given day, it has one of the longest lines in the park. Right up there with the lines for Drop Zone.

Expect moderate crowds. Don`t count on too many walk on rides. But at the same time, it will pale (most likely) in comparison to Bring a Friend Free Days.

On the contrary, I think the theming on FoF has held up relatively well. Especially considering that it is ten years old this year. Its theming hasn`t deteriorated as much as on Top Gun.

I`m assuming that he is talking about the covered games pavillion across from It`s Fried that has one of the sides of the game (closest to Its Fried) missing.

Yes, School of Rock WILL be back at the Paramount Theater this year. I believe that it opens on June 5th.

Yes, I feel that overall opening weekend was a huge success. Yes, there were glitches here and there. (A particular ride in Action Zone that I wanted to ride but was having issues stands out to me). But overall, the park looked great, and it was nice to be back up there with the rides running. Also Nick UNiverse looked awesome, and better than I expected it to look. But it kind of makes me sad, especially when I was back by Avatar, not seeing the hand cars, or the kiddie tumblebug, rides that I rode when I was just five years old, LOL.

Yes, I agree. Since they are powered the entire time, they are not roller coasters in the true sence. While the ride is assisted by gravity some, the traction wheel still is powering the ride for the entire cycle.

Well, I don`t have much time to add all of mine on here right now. But I`ll come back and edit in the rest later. PKI: 2 The Beast: 7 Flight of Fear: 10 Drop Zone:1 Tomb Raider: 1 Fairly Odd Coaster: 1 Avatar: 2

Face Off was cycling empty trains yesterday at 4 o`clock.