Gordon Bombay

Last show? I thought it was endless?

Sure does, even had the same tell tale sign of low ridership that KI's had....they closed one side of the drop. Simply put, the hydro flumes were not that thrilling of attractions.

Even Six Flags Great Adventure removed their hydroflume. http://www.amusementpics.com/Hydro%20Flume.htm

And to compare the maintenance done on a few horses per year to the cost of maintaining an aging log flume throughout an entire season is like comparing how good the food was in the 80's to how it is now.

Shouldn't this topic be about Geauga Lake? -Gordon Bombay, cold even though its not hockey season.

Hey Cedar Fairl; remember the old saying "You get what you pay for?" That doesn't seem to be applying to the guests but that saying does say something for your latest 1.2 billion dollar investment.

Hey Kinzel, are you listening to the guests through the ears on your arrogant head? I remember user WooferBearATL and I talking one time about the history of the Taft parks (he is a former KI employee, pre-paramount), he once told me as far as food service Wonerland was the best designed and well laid out park in accordance with its sister park Australia's Wonderland. I wonder if the food they serve at the parks they aquired is the same stuff Kinzel eats on his platter in his office.

And we have the facts about the low ridership from what source? Was it not true that this same reason has been used for the removal of many rides and was uhhh, essentially not true. The fact is that Paramount wanted to remove the ride and put in a Top Spin. Done. Was their park they did what they wanted. Yep, Paramount was just out to irk everyone off and ruin all of our lives. Paramount would not have removed the ride unless it was beneficial to keeping it in so obviously the ride was not reliable in some fashion whether it was pulling in riders, maintenance, etc. The ride was one of the first to close whn staffing was low and employees were needed elsewhere, if it was pulling in riders and a it was a key attraoction in its later years I dont think the operations staff would have done that if it was so amazing like everyone made it out to be. Listen to woofer kids, Paramount is out to get you all! They got him!

I'm pretty sure thats asphalt in the picture, its just a very bright picture and seems like its a little over exposed.

Cheers to that!

Some people find hapinness in other things. He didn't waste your time so why do you care. He could probably say you and I waste just as much time posting on a fansite about a local park and the hours we spend browsing this site dont go to charity. I wonder if when the park shut down for the night if they stopped running the coaster and he slept on it or if they kept it going through the night. Delorean Rider and I have spent late nights working at parks for special ERT's but we never had to go all night.

The back of the Paramount Theatre looks pretty ugly and its one of the first things you see, however the front is very beautiful. I remember riding KCKC as a kid and it scaring the absolute crap out of me. That lift hill was very intimidating for a 7 year old.

Where is this good, seasoned management team the author speaks of?

I believe the queue for the helicopters used to be extra queue for Flight of Fear.

I'll be there signing autographs and snapping the scooters.

The ride is designed to have 3 trains and the third train is currently used for parts. The transfer track allows maintenance to get to parts of the train that arent acessible from the station.

Nice TR Tom, sounds like a great Time, I dont like country music and am not a fan of the music stars that were there but I would love to have gone to the radio broadcast and supported the cause, the concert was for a great cause and I hope it comes to KI again in the future.

Awesome photos and what seemed like an awesome event and excellent cause. I love that Bush impersonator, its too bad they dumped his show on Comedy Central.

So the people that visit the park once a year should wait in line longer since you are able to walk by them and get on a ride? And I was under the impression that the park was for everybody.... I agree with you Brown, KI executes their "Speed Lane" VERY poorly and they have every year its been in effect. Heck, they cant even get the right name for it, every year it changes between "Speed Lane" and "Walk on Weekends", I think it was back to Speed Lane this year at some rides and walk on weekends on the signs at other rides. I believe the perk is fine at places like Disney because even if your single day admission you have the option of paying for that perk but at KI you only get that option if you pay extra for a pass, so single day park goers dont even have the chance to purchase that perk like they would if they had purchased a Disney park hopper or single day admission. Then on top of that KI seems to fail to inform their pass holders that they actually need tickets with times on them to get through the lines, they dont tell you that in the brouchure or as you come in nor do they even tell you on the speed lane signs outside of the rides. Every time I rode The Beast in June and July people would hope out of line and into the speed lane because they would see the sign that said "Gold Passholders this lane only" and thought they could just use their pass only to get to the top and realize they needed tickets. At Disney they keep the lines seperate but at KI on rides like The Beast they have the lines running paralell to eachother and this causes quite a lot of line jumping incidents and confusion among guests who arent well informed of the way the perk works by the park. I love KI but their speed lane system needs some serious work.

I've heard that as well, but from what I know the antique cars position was thought about too, although the idea was not that serious as PP quickly scrapped the idea when the company had become unhappy with Jane Cooper and her costly attractions that encountered lots of problems like SOB, Stealth, and HSXLC.

Not true, that is a common misconception. After Stealth at PGA was built, delivered and opened (Now known as Borg: The Assimilator at Carowinds upon its re-location in 2004), Paramount Parks took a look at their recent investment and seemed to be pleased with it, they originally approached Vekoma to come up with a similar design with minor changes (Dual station, differences in on-board train computers and components, in-line twists in place of corckscrews). Paramount Park's initially had an agreement with Vekoma to initially be the only park to build one of their flying coasters with this design and layout, a plan was looked into to put the modified stealth design (which would come to be known as X flight, Batwing, Firehawk) in at Kings Island in the location of the antique cars but that concept never came full circle as at that time PP CEO Jane Cooper would be ousted by Al Webber (the man who wanted Paramount Parks to be known as the "Innovators" of the industry) soon after Stealth opened. Paramount Park's abandoned the idea upon reveiw of Stealth's construction costs and maintenance costs and the layout and plans became available to anyone willing to purchase a Vekoma flying rollercoaster since Paramount Park's was no longer interested. Six Flags purchsed two flying rollercoasters from Vekoma and placed them at Six Flags America as Batwing and Geauga Lake as X-Flight. People often think X flight was put into production and was getting ready to be shipped to KI for instillation in 2001 and PP backed out and then six flags bought it, however that is not true. Paramount Park's only purchased one Vekoma flying coaster, they had a concept to maybe put one at KI, but that never happened.

Which coaster is complete?

As Ryan said both dan, himself, and myself all have a lot more pictures from the now defunct americana/lesourdsville lake from a recent visit to there when we were allowed to go in and photograph it.

Great trip report welch, I wish I couldve been there to meet some of you guys and take photos. I shouldve been another one of those guys in the ties but I'm here in South Carolina, you and your brother took some great pictures!