Outdoor Man

you're kidding me. there are five eye-sight-witensses saying there is track. The track is THERE. It doesn't matter if the park announces or not... there is track on the lot, track on (1) truck and a skid-loader in the Gold Pass parking area. It's not top secret or they would have deposited it somewhere out of view of 10,000 cars an hour on I-71. Radio a trucker going by... they'll confirm. Say "it's neon green.... can you confirm this sighting?????"

yo, Combat... there "IS" track there. 5 of us confirming the same sight. bright green track.

kind of fishy, eh??? yea the neon green did kind of look like fish water. good read. No, seriously, it's there.

just drove by and I can confirm that X-Flight has apparently upgraded to the Cedar Fair MAXX Pass to move between parks with the $35 parking upgrade as there is neon green coaster track sitting in the Gold Parking area. Congrats on your MAXX Pass status, X-Flight. Welcome to Cincinnati: Home of the Reds, Bengals, and to a lesser extent the Mason Comets!

hava a 3:30 at Great Wolf... cubbie reporter to report.

a couple of the posts bring up an interesting question. surely if the area now boasts two major attractions, there would certainly be "supporting" locations to compliment; ie- new eateries, shops, games, etc... Which leads one to wonder what flavor this "new" area is going to take on.

"IF" X-flight is the candidate-announcement, they probably cannot have a press conference until they are certain that it is ready to transport, thereby giving them a dedent time to give an announcement complimented with an estimated time of opening the ride.

few things. drove past the KI parking lot enroute to Great Wolf for a meeting today. No track; parking lot empty. like an idiot I even drove in the back parking lot (of the hotel.... nothing illegal) to see if I could see machinery of any sort. Nothing. Doesn't mean they're not working, just couldn't see anything. As for the trademark. Typically if you're going to create t-shirts or any other promotional item for an attraction you want to make sure that the masses don't "bootleg" your work. I'm not saying that ThunderHawk isn't right.... but they'd have a trademark secured. I have a friend that works for one of the media outlets in Cincinnati. He didn't say when but told me that Kings Island has a scheduled press conference in the near future for an "announcement"...... he made it sound like it would be in the month of January; as in the next few days..... but I didn't specifically ask when. hmmmm, I wonder what it could be........

Coasters... am i the only one that caught that classic "Ralph Wiggum" line?

I don't think it would be a stretch to have an attraction up and running before opening day. Remember, the site preparations were started back in November (and possibly before). It has been a while since pictures have been taken (well, posted anyway)- footers could already be in place waiting on steel forms to be bolted to them.

years since repainting... rust visible... eye-sore... I thought this thread was about X-Flight, I could swear you're talking about Top Gun.

my guess is the recycling bin.

in an imperfeect world, we could get KI with the: - innovation of old - the manicure of a Busch Gardens - the Technology of Universal Studios - the checkbook of Cedar Fair - a follow-thru of Paramount's "action of Hollywood now playing"- or whatever it was. I agree though the records frenzy of the past few years can't go too much anymore. How tall and how fast can you go and still be safe. I'd hate to be in the path of a stationary insect when one of those 120mph trains comes barreling through- or a bird for that matter (anyone recall seeing a bloodied Fabio getting off a coaster after waxing a bird with his face?). I love the tech in the Spiderman at Universal Studios. a ton of action and thrills without leaving ground level.

6pm.... plus traffic- which tonight should be an absolute JOY!

Vortex itself back in 1986 cost $4 million... and it was essentially built as an apology from Arrow for "The Bat."- So The Vortex cost should have been a bit inflated. you can tell school's out... the forums are packed.

I admit I don't like the idea of getting "hand-me-downs" from other parks either. BUT- under Paramount's ownership I think our days with Flight of Fear would have been numbered. And I think the ride rotation with the other five parks would have eventually yielded a hand-down from one of th others... possibly in a worse form. Look at what Carowinds got from us......... the Flyers.... I know it's a favorite of many on this board- but what a crappy hand down to pass off as "new." It was over 30 years old.... a classic by all means that should have remained in Coney Mall. But that's beside the point. CF will keep the crowds coming to KI. They won't want a 360 acre park to use as a huge tax write-off. But I wonder how many more record breakers we may get. But then again in 14 years under Paramount we had only one genuinely unique coaster, that in and of itself was a let down. Some may say "FOF"- well PKD got one as well. (Which, by the way- did it get moved, re-opened, or still SBNO?)- I'm not sure about Face-Off.... is there another one like that? I think that CF may use KI to get creative (and that may be the parks trump card). KI has acreage upon acreage to expand on. CP is severely landlocked.

this is off topic but i did see it posted somewhere within. I don't personally feel that CF would blink twice about removing the Paramount name from the parks in signage- it wouldn't matter if they owned the rights. Same factors occured when they rescued Gauega Lake from Six Flags a few years ago. They could have kept the "Worlds of Adventure" name- which wasn't too shabby on the marketing front- instead they went with the old name. The funny part is that KI staff and a precious few that have been in the park already know the answer to these questions.... and probably get a kick out of all of the debate in here.... and I am willing to bet that there are about 4-5 on this site that know. It all bounces back to something to the effect of "those who are in the know, don't talk."

i don't know what theming issues CF may be looking at in regards to Coney Mall, etc.... A family coaster fits the whole Coney effect- but to place a family coaster right beside a ride called "Flight of Fear" doesn't work.

apparently not too many are aware or it would have been posted already- but the Flight Commander pad was originally where Drop Zone was going to be located. I remember the summer before it opened a big sign in front of the Flight Commander site saying that "Something New Will Be "Dropping In" in 199_" - I don't remember the year.

in the footprint, it would have added a bit of built-in theming if they hadn't cleared 100% of the trees.

opinion. CF working with and correcting the problems of a record-breaking coaster is consistent with their track record. Had PP not sold and continued to own the park would SOB support beams be rosting chestnuts on the open fire this year?

as far as naming items go, and this may be minor- but I drove past the park today and noticed on the scrolling marquee it rolled past the lone name Kings Island.... not the permanent writing on the big sign- the lit up letters. Normally didn't all of the name include Paramount?

Doesn't our little "dead park" to the west have a flier ride just sitting there? The only thing that didn't make sense to me when PKI moved the eagles was the fact that it came from Coney, it had been at PKI for over 30 years..... then they try to market it as a "new attraction."

................. you take yearly treks to Carowinds just so you can ride the Eagles????????????? It's not a ride, but I miss Winterfest.

Crowder has some entertaining facial hair.