Browntggrr

White Water Landing as well as Kenton's Kove Keelboat Kanal at KI are excellent examples of rides taken out due to maintenance issues- mainly cost of maintenance. DD will not be relocated to KI. Since PT is a very similar ride, and DD is not as popular as it once was due to PT being taller and giving guests another option of how to ride it, it really is not a surprise that CP put it up for sale. It is also not a surprise that DD has not been sold. While it may not be an "old" ride, today's technology makes it look ancient. Look at it this way, DD is 131', but you only freefall drop 60' due to the curve in the track. A park can install a brand-new 120' drop ride for less than $250,000, with a smaller footprint, less maintenance, and easier to operate. I will be surprised if CP is able to sell it. Especially now with the unfortunate incident at KK. Even though both ride are completely different, all the general public heard was "feet taken off" and "drop ride". CP has traditionally planned for expansion/ new rides many years in advance. The decision to sell DD was not made overnight. CP has something planned for that section of the park. We just don't know for what year.

Sad story. Can anyone else see some media idiot twist this story into another fatality where the park is responsible?

Why does Interp, and many others, have negative things to say about SoB? Because they are right. The ride has sucked. SoB has been up to now an absolutely terrible coaster. It has beat up guests from day one. If that was not the truth, than please explain why Paramount and now Cedar Fair has spent millions of dollars as well as months of downtime fixing a ride that, in your opinion, needs real men to handle it. Sorry dawg, it doesn't add up. Another intresting point is: where it ranks with other coasters. Yes rankings are very skewed due to people voting for/ against coasters they have not been on yet. The common arguement is which is the best steel coaster MF or SRoS at SFNE? -or- which is the best wood coaster, El Toro, Voyage, or Boulder Dash? But the one common in all the rankings, SoB has been near dead last. It has even been ranked behind coasters that have been removed. Wood coasters are NOT supposed to be an uncomfortable ride. I have not seen a sign on ANY coaster that says "Deal with it, wood coasters are supposed to kick your ass. Be a man about it!" Extreme? Yes. Violent to the point where it is tearing itself apart and hurting guests? Absolutely not.

July 4th is not the turning point in a park's season. Especially now when there are dates for Halloween events. The bulk of revenue for any Northeastern park comes between the 4th and Labor Day. You can see the effects from the business side here: http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=...46371&rfi=6 While it seems that SoB will be open within the week, there was no way for the park to guess if the ride was even going to re-open at all.

Raising the VIP experiance was necessary due to everyone wanting to do it. There are numerous VIP events that Disney has, that for the common guest is not known, nor could they afford it. The more expensive it costs, the less likely your average guest will be willing to do it. I would be willing to bet since the cost has been raised to $350/ person, there has been less people taking advantage of the VIP experiance, thus less revenue generated.

Of course it is more expensive. The costs associated with anything normally do not go down year to year. Unless, of course you are talking about single day admission to CP which dropped from $45 in 2005 to $40 in 2006 and was raised to $42 for 2007.

Once the 3 new cameras at CP are up, the two existing will be taken down. There will only be 3 choices to view.

CP had their VIP program years before CF aquired Paramount Parks. It is difficult to attribute the cost of a VIP program to offset their debt. Also, CP scrapped "FreeWay" toward the end of last season due to poor guest feelings. Apparently their system, which was free, left some guests feeling slighted because they could not get a FreeWay stamp.

Chances are, if someone had gotten sick, they would attribute it to food poisoning, sun poisoning, Roto virus etc. But in all reality, who actually would go on WWC to quench their thirst? Yuck! Ok, now here is one that I don't know. Where does the water come from for AF? I know at CP that the water for SRF is clean (for a water ride anyway), and treated, and certainly not the same water for TC. But I have only been on AF a couple times and cannot recall if the water is clean or not.

... even though it was at CP... I really enjoyed the webcam that was on TTD facing East/ main parking lot. You could see how busy the park was from the amount of cars in the parking lot. A FunCam at KI would be great, but the thing is, the FunCam facing CP is not owned by CP. This has actually really pi$$ed off some of the higher ups at the park because when CP turns off their cams (in this instance the issue with the heart-line roll on Maverick), everyone jumps to the FunCam to check out what is going on. I suppose that is the one positive about not having all those nuisance green things that produce oxygen. You can see more!

*If* KI had a webcam, and *if* it would actually be pointing at SoB, the park would turn it off just like CP did when Maverick was testing.

^ I'm with you. I prefer MS to Mantis. I will only ride Mantis if I am with a first time rider, or if my wife REALLY wants to go on it (which does not happen too much). I have some good rides on Mantis, but for the most part they have been bad. I am just not sure if there is a good way to ride it. I just try to keep a slight bend in my knees to save my hamstrings and my manhood. And all the issues we have mentioned are probably why no new stand-ups have been built in 8 years.

There is a very good possibility that it will not be the fastest anymore. I just wonder if they are going to get rid of that cheesy *nucular* symbol (or whatever it is).

^^ I like the front myself. The 2nd half of Mantis there is a little headbanging, combine that with the hook on the seat and the pressure on your legs, it is nice to see where you are going. And according to what I have heard, Magnum is back to a three train operation.

http://www.reuters.com/article/bondsnews/i...531591520070625 Update.

While TTD and WT did have numerous issues the first couple of years, the issues were not CP's responsibility, but Intamin's. Actually, even with the removal of the famous "heart-line roll" on Maverick, it has ran well being a brand new coaster with some unique elements to it.

Great article Chef! Since the park provided the pics, did they also supply the caption "The Firehawk"?

^^I disagree about waiting for DT. It really is a great ride to wait for in the middle of the day when the sun has been beating down on you for hours. The ride is below average, but the wait can rejuvenate you!

^ Red Ryder carbine-action, two hundred shot Range Model air rifle BB gun with a compass in the stock and a thing which tells time? Hey check your calanders! 6 months till Christmas!

And do you know how scary that is? I am willing to bet that 99% of those who frequent this site know how to engage a restraint, as well as see when an operator is not doing their job. Now put a kid that may be a bit overweight, or a kid that is slightly mentally handicapped, that doesn't know any better about restraints. The potential for an accident is there. Operators like this need to be re-trained.

Ya, I was thinking the same thing. 1" over is a alot different than 1" under. I would have to think that with your son being so young, they may not even check him at all. Kids at that age have really weird growth spurts. If they strictly enforced that policy it has the chance to put a negative light on kids' rides.

If you are going to be getting to the park at 10:30am, I would not go to Firehawk first. Everyone else will be doing the same thing , but they showed up at 9:30am. Hit everything else first, Firehawk will have shorter lines later in the day.

Try riding all the coasters. That will fill your day. There are two avenues to try and hit all the coasters. If you are staying at a CP resort, use your Joe Cool to it's fullest extent. Hit Maverick early twice in the day, then avoid it. MF and TTD will be the next longest lines of the day. If you don't have Joe Cool, I would hit all the minor queue coasters early: WT, BS, Raptor if it under 1hr., etc. going to the back of the park but hit them in order. Once you go from the front of the park to the rear of the park, and back again, you have spent precious coaster time walking around the park. I would always park in the Soak City lot, it has that nice "halfway" feel to it as opposed to parking near the front. To fill your tummy. Try heart attack-on-a-stick, a.k.a. cheese on a stick. They are good! Just don't expect to fit on MF or TTD when you are done! Macaroni's is a nice stop for food. As is the TGI Fridays at Hotel Breakers. Have have heard both good and bad about Famous Daves, so that really depends on the people working and the crowd. Going this Friday is going to be tough. Many are starting their 4th of July vacations this weekend. The weather forecast looks good, so I would expect a good size crowd. Have fun!

^ I am going to guess that a majority of the testing takes place after the park closes. If the bulk of the testing were to be going on during hours the park is open, it would cause commotion from those who are not geek-like enthusiasts like us (you know you are! ). You can just imagine the comments from guests that want to tride it: "It's running, I want to get on!", "I paid for the right to be on that ride, let me on", etc. In our eyes, those are terrible arguements. But for the general public, all they see is the train cycling on the tracks.

It is quite possible that the thinking behind having the firework festivities on the 3rd is because of people (just like yourself) having to work on the 5th. From a business standpoint it makes sense. The park will spend money on days where they may not be busy, as opposed to days where you know the park will be crushed. People will come out for free fireworks. So have the fireworks promotion on the 3rd which may not be a busy day/ night, and more people will be more inclined to show up. As opposed to the 4th where people will show up no matter what. I can only imagine how many families took their summer vacation the week of 7/2 to 7/8. Combine that with SpiritSong on the 5th, everything with the park will be a mess that week. Given that the 4th is on a Wednesday, I don't think the park had a chance is pleasing everyone's needs. Unless they had the same type of fireworks display for 2 or 3 nights, but then that takes away the draw to go to the park on the 3rd. And a really decent fireworks display will cost $50,000+. And Avatar- it is too bad that you feel that way about KI, but hey, it is your opinion, and you are entitled to it. You have been to enough parks with your family to know the ins & outs. Just think, in a year or two the whole height restriction issue will be a moot point. (or MOO point- a cow's point of view- does anyone get that? ) But I do understand how you feel about the height issue. My local park, Waldameer, has changed the height restriction for their Scrambler ride the last three years. In 2005, my whole family was able to go on it. In 2006, only my older daughter (who was 5- but a year older) was able to go on it. Now this summer, neither of my daughters are able to ride it. The park's explanation was that the maufacturer changed the restrictions.