Gordon Bombay

A lot of them are on property still privately owned and usually guarded as a lot of the parks are still trying to sell the rides. Myself, Boddah, and Dane had permission to go into Americana/LeSourdsville Lake and we even met with the owner. All the rides there have been appraised for auction or sale, but that was some time ago. I don't know if the guy from Urban Travel had permission to go into Spree Park or not but I do know the Greenland park in Japan is wide open and they really don't mind people going in and looking around. In Japan they have a lot of respect for urban ruins like that, most of the abandoned places in Japan are void of vandalism where as in the United State's its common to see grafitti in most abandoned places. It's just a cultural thing. A lot of times when I photograph abandoned places its not with permission, although I do always seek it, however whenever I do shoot abandoned places the only thing I take is photographs and I'm careful to leave everything in its place out of respect.

I've noticed that for some reason everyone seems to think that Geauga Lake was a flat ride kingdom and my favorite is when everyone says we're going to get a "flat or two". In reality Geauga Lake did not have that many good flat rides, they had a few classic ones that KI already has. Like Elmer, the only one I would really want to see come is the Americana ferris wheel as KI really lacks one. However with what Kinzel said in the last conference call... I fear that once they sell the property, and if you read the transcript they may be hinting that they're closing a deal on it, most of the flat rides will just be trashed. I don't think we'll see anything new in rides in 2008.

So as many of you know I'm a big fan of abandonment photography as well as photographing amusement parks. I currently run a website called Queen City Discovery which highlights urban ruins throughout the city of cincinnat, places i travel to, and hocking vallery area where I currently live and go to school. Recently I was featured in City Beat magazine for a photograph I took at the abandoned and defunct Surf Cincinnati Waterpark and recently did a feature on the site about LeSourdsville Lake/Americana. Unfortuanently the state of Ohio is state dotted with quite a few abandoned and defunct amusement parks, many of them small parks reminiscent of a time in American history when small parks were as common as play stations. However, today I want to show you guys something different. It's not often you see larger, full scale theme parks abandoned with multiple coasters and larger rides but there are a few cases across the world that I find particuarly intriguing... Greenland Amusement Park: Fukushima Prefecture, Japan This abandoned park sports a large rollercoaster and one small one as well as many classic rides such as the ferris wheel and a unique version of the lazytown sportacopters and a merry go round... Plenty more pictures to see here. The next park I'd like to share with you guys is the abandoned Spree Park in Berlin, Germany. This one comes courtesy of my friends at Urban Travel... Originally opened in 1969 this park closed in 2001 when it went bankrupt and the owners fled to Lima, Peru with about 20 attractions whom authorites thought were being sent for repairs but were really sold and relocated to other parks If you'd like to see some more pictures from this park click here. Thought some of you guys might enjoy these photos of a view of an amusement park we aren't accustomed to seeing. I know a few members on here like Monroe and King Maple the Tree King have travelled to European parks so I wonder if either of them had been to Spree Park when it was open. Hope you guys enjoy the photos and the read and dont forget to check out Queen City Discovery.

The Beast was the only ride to still play the Jeff Seibert "Paramount" no smoking spiel this year. I assume that was because that spiel is tied into the lift hill and queue house sound and light effects.

Keep in mind folks this is a story passed down to the original poster from his friend, its not like it was a news article or anything. We dont really know the kids situation and what hes like nor what the parents thinking behind their actions were or what the parents are like, or let alone if this even happened.

Cool story hansel. Cause like no one ever wears OSU branded clothing.

Boddah and Dane have some great stories about Beech Bend. Hey Boddah, hows the looping star?

I'm home for 6 weeks and off of work in the evenings! Im down for a meet up!

Sure, take out Timberwolf, and along with it the revenue it generates, that'd be a good idea for the park. Just because you don't attend any concerts there, does not mean others dont.

Maybe KI should've taken some notes then, people seem to keep coming back to the Beach's event.

True, there was a lock of entertainment where as winterfest had wonderful stuff like the Toy Factory show but I still think HolidayFest gets its success from the fact that its more affordable and offeres a decent amount of activities, rather than its successful just because winterfest failed.

Except Ryan you wouldn't be spending 64 dollars. Admission is not 39 bucks per person, that is how much gatorhead would spend to take his family. Admission is 15 dollars according to The Beach website. So lets see, you would pay for admission and parking (which compared to KI 6 bucks is not bad and you get a discount if your a AAA member). You didn't do either the carriage or pony rides last year nor did we spend any extra money on skating and I seem to recall all of us having a blast last year. So you can be entertained for a night at Holiday Fest for 21 bucks at the most if its anything like last year, even less if you have a AAA card for discount parking. Definently more affordable than winterfest was.

Holiday Fest at The Beach is a blast. Last year me, Boddah, zoso, and coastersRZ went. My only complaint was how unbelieveably slow the line moves for the paddle boats due to the fact that the paddle boats often get stuck and an op is required to come and use a pole to get you back on track. The boats will often cause a traffic jam. Id say it took us atleast 20 minutes to get around the whole course.

Great find PKIVortex, and thanks for sharing. I agree, I miss King Cobra as well, that really was a good ride. Look how good Top Gun looked with that bright red track, and how long the lines were for X's Raceway (aka Days of Thunder) now.

Which KIC member gets to be which charecter?

Id rather see any money set aside to build a tunnel go to the maintenance team to help keep the ride smooth.

As it appears they are the old tubs from Fun Spot's old set. Fun Spot had a set, then replaced them when they bought Americana's old set when it closed in 2002. Apparently this rumor was started by some ACErs with too much time on their hands.

When you open the image in a new window you can view it full size... If you check out carowinds zone it doesn't seem that their flyers tubs are painted in that way at all... http://www.carowindszone.com/eagles.php and the KI flying eagles never had their numbers painted on them like that... http://www.KICentral.com/photos/displayima...um=98&pos=5 These look like they're used and could be being moved to KI. Didn't Geauga Lake have a set in storage? Edit: Look in between the fins on the tub under the exit sign, you can see the wooden fence that was installed in the parking lot this year. Edit 2: EXIF data f//3.5 s 1/20 ISO = auto WB = Auto

Well it says that picture was taken on the 12th and the post was made on the 12th at 7:53 P.M. Not sure when the picture was taken but it looks like it was taken as the sun was going down. According to this the sun was setting just around the time he posted that... They could be the original flyers before they were moved to carowinds in 2004.

Been to many SF parks this year? Most of them were very well improved. If you listen to the conference call september and october seemed to have gone over really well. Those quotes you described sound more like a certain recent Cedar Fair conference call. Trim brakes on airtime hills? See behemoth. While you check that out, check out the degree of the drop too.

Favorite quotes so far... "Escape was paramount" and "The Tony Hawk coaster has show us you don't have to spend 20 million dollars on a coaster for it to be a hint." Shapiro sounds so smart and confident in his business and brought up the SFKK accident directly. Definently a nice change of pace from similar calls. Oh and... "Keep in mind when we first came in in 2005 the cap ex plan was in place. The 22 million dollar coasters they were building we couldn't undo, but with what we still had we improved the parks..."

Waiting for it to start....the music is almost as bad as Cedar Fairs.

whos house does it go to and who gets to use it on what days

Cory, Adam, come on now. Theres no need for name calling Settle down, its not THAT important what the actual color is called. If I remember correctly, a certain marketing spokesperson from long ago talked about re-painting the eifel tower in a bronze color but then manager of the park; Al Weber, decided to stick with the green. Also, why did they shorten the spike at the top of the tower? Dominions is like it was originally but Kings Island's go shorter. One other thing, does anyone else feel an American flag should be flying from the top of the Eifel Tower?

^Powder Blue http://www.KICentral.com/photos/displayimage.php?pos=-1979 ^King Islands Eifel Tower Survey says?