medford

Vortex is a people eating machine, in the numbers I've seen in the past, it generally gives roughly 1 million rides a year, Flight of Fear is around 700-800K and Firehawk is roughly 600k. The wait for Vortex is shorter than those 2 simply because it cycles thru riders much quicker than the other 2.

First time at KI last night this season, and my son choose to ride with mom on his first Mystic Timber experience, so I haven't been on the coaster yet, I will say that I was wrong about the vine coming down the middle of the sign. When I first saw pictures I thought it looked terrible, but now that I've seen it in person, I thought it looked awesome, how the sign is splitting in half due to the vines taking over. On a different note, my 5 year old daughter, who is the complete opposite of my son in terms of roller coasters (at this same age point, he had been on The Beast, Vortex and all the other 48" rides) agreed to ride Woodstock Express. She's been on it before, twice a couple of years ago when she first got tall enough, only once last year, but when we got to the park, she told me she wanted to ride it. Even better yet, after our first lap, it was near the end of the night and there was no one waiting for our seat; she told me she wanted to ride it again, and we ended up watching the fireworks begin as we went up the lift hill. She reached 44" for the first time at KI yesterday, so now we've got to work in FAAC. She says she'll ride it twice, once with me, once with my wife, but that is all. I have a feeling that once she realizes that the drops that make her scared on Woodstock Express, are none existent on FAAC, she's going to love it.

The blimp is often over KI during the tennis tournament (for those that don't follow tennis, its one of the bigger events outside of the 4 majors), its also in the area for some Bengals game and possible Reds game (though not lately). I'm not sure about the Good year blimp specifically, but I've seen the met life blimp parked at the airstrip up in Springboro and I've seen a blimp (can't remember who sponsored it) parked down at Lumpkin.

Well what if Wicked Twister is "Going to California"? Would make sense that a guy at CP would know, tweet, tease about that ride going to Cali. In all likelyhood, its just something to get people talking, speculating like CP likes to do.

I heard from a very reliable source, the head manage of dip 'n dots no less, that they are soon going to be raising a building in that area to store the green intamin track. Hang on, its going to be a bumpy ride

I bet that kid's parents stuffed tissues in the heels of his shoes That is interesting, and there is a frame at each height where you child may make it one trip but not the next depending on how often you frequent the park. My 16 month old was 33" at the doctor the other day, I'm hoping maybe we'll get a spin on the Great Pumpkin coaster before the year's out. My kids have all be early growers (I assume others will eventually catch up to them as neither mom nor dad are particularly tall). My oldest was on The Beast a week or so after his 4th birthday, yet I'm pulling out all the strings to convince my nearly 5 year old daughter to ride Woodstock Express again (she rode it 1x last season in April and wouldn't touch it again). Hoping the youngest is like his older brother when it comes to riding coasters.

My guess is no winterfest as well. Potentially there will be days warm enough to run coasters during December, but I don't think its something you can count on and would cut into the seasonal maintenance that the park performs on the trains.

my guess is the only way you would hear any type of direct "this is what we are planning" scenario for something like a Giga is if KI were to ask the city of Mason, or the state of OH for tax abatement in exchange for expanding the park (most likely a hotel, like they did at Carowinds or to acquire new land like they did in Cali) and using the Giga as a selling point on why the state/city would prosper from the deal as well. You may get a hint, but only when its a point in time that you have no idea that its a hint at all. Coaster development takes a good number of years, I guarantee you KI is already discussing their next major install. Depending on the time frame, they may already be actually planning/designing it. As an aside, the Adam House interview shed some light on something that seemed to coincide w/ what the park did w/ Banshee. He indicated how the park wanted to "spruce new life" into the area around their ride. With Misty, the train got some sprucing, WWC got a new and improved que line as well as some additional sites around the course. Misty compliments each of those established rides. With Banshee, The Bat got a new paint job, themeing (though little of it) a spark of nostalgia and some new site lines as you transverse the course or waited in line. Is this an indication of what the park is thinking as it installs new rides. Would installing a Giga at the back of the park enable them to spruce up The Racer, AE, and Coney?

If Mysty is as good as Renegade, my only GCI, I will enjoy it more than The Beast. However, that doesn't mean I'll enjoy The Beast any less, and if that makes lines for an end of the night ride that much shorter, then all the better for me

It would appear that they have 3 spots in coney that could easily support new attractions w/o major work or other "guest" building being disrupted. First, is the old Flight Commander pad, the Que is still in place IIRC making that an easy choice. The next place is the old Days of Thunder building. I know this is being used for storage, and has been used for a haunt in the past. I remember reading about the plants vs Zombie attraction that went into another CF park (can't recall where) but that building is a natural fit for a similar type attraction at KI. IIRC, the plan was to spread those out to all the parks at some point. Finally, just to the left of the old flight commander pad, behind the arcade, is a spot currently occupied by a temporary type shelter structure. I'm not sure what is stored back there, but its on of those white plastic covers over metal pole, semi-circular tents. Obviously you'd have to find a place to store whatever is in there, but considering the nature of that structure, I can't imagine its highly important things that need weather tight protection. I think that would be an ideal spot for a Ferris Wheel install. It would sit behind the arcade, the loading station would be mostly naked to the public, and sit in front of The Racer. Its roughly in the middle of Coney, and with the right lighting package, would make for a good compliment to Wind Seeker once the sun starts to set. Not sure what to recommend in the Flight Commander area (flats are mostly not my thing, since most spin a bunch), but add somethind solid there, a reasonably tall Ferris Wheel with a killer light package, a similar Plants vs Zombie attraction back in the theater, refresh The Racer as well as general sprucing up of the area and I think you'd enhance the feel of Coney a ton. WindSeeker and the new light package on SR&R make it the most visually appealing area of the park when the sun goes down, I'd vote to enhance that with my recommendations.

If you've never owned a Gingko tree, they can be a pain. 1st, if you have the wrong gender tree, and based upon some old pictures it appears that they did, they can quite literally stink up the place if not well maintained ever handful of years (the berries smell like dog poop if you let them sit around, literally). 2nd, even if you have the right gender tree, they tend to loss their leaves all at once. I think one day my tree was full of leaves, the next morning it seemed like 90% of them were on the ground, a tall gingko has a bunch of leaves on it, leaving a decent size job for a morning crew and a nuisance on the day the decide to fall. These probably were not big issues prior to the fall season as the trees will hold both their leaves and most of their berries thru September, but with the advent of the hall-o-ween stuff, they're going to drop a ton of those things right during the middle of operation. Other than that, they are great trees.

was checking today, and realized we are now in weather.com's 15 day forecast window for preview day. Obviously weather patterns will change as we get closer, but as of today, they are calling for light rain and a high of 61 on the 14th. In a non-scientific prediction, the 14th is Good Friday and as a Catholic it feels like it rains on Good Friday about 75% of the time. Hopefully this will be one of those 25% years with no rain, though it wouldn't hurt my feelings if it rained all day then stopped right about 4:00 pm. https://weather.com/weather/tenday/l/45459:4:US

I can see what is in the shed, its a roller coaster train

The amount of people that will ride Fury 325 and know/care that there is a similar ride a handful of feet taller 500 miles away will be small. Of those that do care, a small percentage will actually ride both. KI and CP compete for that middle of ohio family that comes to one park or the other once or twice a season. They complement each other for the family that travels from out of state and wants to spend a couple of days at the Island and a couple of days at the Pointe as their summer vacation. From that standpoint, I doubt we'll see KI install a dive coaster to rival CPs dive coaster anytime soon, and I doubt we'll see CP install a GCI woodie to rival Mystic Timber any time soon. That way, each park gives that middle of Ohio family a choice to hit one park this year, and the other park next year, while giving the out of area enthusiast family a reason to hit each park on their swing thru Ohio. Kings Island and Carrowinds don't really compete for much business, so KI getting something similar, but a few feet taller won't have much impact on operations down in the Carolinas now that Fury 325 is a couple of seasons old.

thanks for the well thought out reply. I just can't get over that middle section of Wild Thing, frankly it blew me away with how boring that section was, it was like eating a crap sandwich on two pieces of great bread, doesn't matter how great the bread was, its still a crap sandwich Although overall, its an enjoyable ride, so perhaps that analogy is over the top. Excalibur was OK, but based upon your reviews, it doesn't surprise me that you enjoyed it more than I. I agree that familiarity does breed contempt. You start to notice the flaws, the exciting portions no longer excite as much. I think that is why I enjoyed my son's voyage thru new coasters at KI as he grew into the height. The best thrill I've ever had riding a roller coaster was the look we gave each other at the end of Renegade; neither of us were really expecting a ride that enjoyable.

I thought this was an interesting comment. I haven't ridden a ton of hypers outside of Diamondback, far, far less than you. Unless there is one that I'm not thinking of (pretty sure there isn't as I haven't attended a very large variety of parks) I've been on Diamondback, Son of Beast (if you include that as a Hyper) Magnum XL and Wild thing. Its been too long since I've been on Magnum to give it a proper comparison, but only a few years since I was at Valleyfair, and Wild Thing (Morgan) is still fresh in my mind. I'm 99% sure you've been to this park as well, so I'd love to year how you compare it to Diamondback. To me, Wild Thing had a great first drop, not as good as Diamondback, but still pretty good. The floater air time on the 2nd drop was great as well, I'd put that on par w/ any of Diamondback's "floater" hills, perhaps you could argue better. The ending bunny hills, kind of similar to Magnum with the tunnel was pretty good, but its the middle, figure 8 of that ride that just totally kills it. Overall, its still pretty good, but no matter how good you personally think the beginning or ending of that ride is, I don't know how you could get over the middle figure 8 track of that ride when comparing to Diamondback. According to my cousin, who lives in upstate Wisconsin and gets to the park a time or two every few years, Wild Thing is their best coaster, Renegade (CGI) blew that ride away in a landslide. I'm pretty sure we've discussed Renegade in the past, I'm pretty sure you love it, correct me if I'm wrong. As far as Vortex, I would hate to see it go, but would understand. I love, Love, LOVE the look of the coaster, as others have said, you can't un-see the smiling face. I love the spot it occupies, I love the first drop, corkscrew, double loop, etc... however the ride often causes me to grey out thru the double loop, the batwing beats me up and I'm often left feeling a bit nauseous. As much as I love coasters, my body doesn't allow me to ride them a bunch in succession w/o feeling nauseous. A fast pass wouldn't help me much as I definitely need a bit of a wait thru rides, stack up too many in a short span and I feel it, however 1 ride on Vortex and I'm done for a while. I don't hold that against the ride, in my younger days I could ride it 3-4 times before I got the same feeling, I haven't aged as well as the ride. But none the less, I still love it and my now 8 year old will drag me on it a few times a year. Usually mom rides that one with him, but 2 years ago when she was pregnant with our now 1 year old, I had all the coaster duties, which I wasn't going to complain about, but he didn't get to ride Vortex as often as he would like because I knew it would shut me down for a bit, which would in turn shut him down. If I ride, I usually hit it up late in the day when I know we are planning to leave soon. Interestingly, I made him ride corkscrew at Valleyfair (similar, but shorter, not as good as the version at Cedar Pointe) and he didn't like it a bit. The first time it was just us as we were waiting for my wife's cousins to meet up with us. As we were getting off, they were just getting into the park and that was the first thing they wanted to hit. That arrow looper was too rough for him, but Vortex he enjoys.

I hope not, that would completely take away from the logo art. As a general concept, it adds to the idea that nature is taking back its mill, but there is a lot of value in that logo, and a big vine right down the middle destroys that.

Spring has officially sprung and with an influx of new members thanks to Mysty, I thought I'd bump my favorite thread in the history of this site. Seriously if you haven't read thru it, take some time, start from the beginning and just start enjoying some time travel. Oh, and if stand by me is still out there occasionally reading (been a while since I've seen him post) we need an update to photo set #1

This has been brought up before somewhere on here. The only GCI coaster I've ridden (to my knowledge) is Renegade at Valleyfair. https://www.valleyfair.com/rides/Thrill-Rides/Renegade Renegade has a 4 star rating. If Mysty is as good as Renegade it will be awesome. I don't know what makes a 4 star rating vs a 5 star, but throw it out the window b/c Renegade was awesome.

Are you sure your friend doesn't work at the Dip'n Dot's stand?

I was told that his new job prevents him from posting. What that new job is, I don't know, why it prevents him from posting, I don't know. If that is even true, I don't know. I don't know the man in person, but like many that have felt his absence, I hope he is alive and doing well. as far as which side was more popular, the forward one was always more popular (if my memory is correct). I viewed that in the sense that the backwards Racer was significantly scarier to this target audience at this point (families and young coaster riders just getting used to the thrills). If state laws, insurance policies, etc... allowed it, I would love to see the return of the backwards racer, even if it was only for a handful of days a year. I imagine the lines would be long on those days, and if they did it on a random Wednesday or two, I imagine attendance across the park would spike a little just so people could revisit that thrill.

It has been said, by Terpy and others, that the state requires them to operate the ride and trains as indicated by the company that built the ride and trains. Apparently PTC doesn't recommend that as an option, and I'm guess will not (at least not without some sort of fee) so they both run forward now. It probably also helps the operating cost of the ride as they can shut one side down during low crowds and not have the general public feel like they are "missing" something. I would assume if PTC isn't willing, the park could go out and find a manufacturer that is willing and buy new trains, I'm sure that is not cheap.

My biggest issue with this ride is that I haven't ridden it yet, but I guess that is fixable, in time. Seriously, ever since riding Renegade at Valleyfair, I've been wanting something similar for KI, so I was excited once it was announced.

no doubt they have looked at the ROI value of Timberwolf's maintenance. As long as its a push (or even slightly negative, but there is some sort of "goodwill" value in having Spirit Song at the park and a % of return visitors that come back later in the season or the following seasons due to spirit song that can't be accurately accounted for) there would be no reason to tear it down until they have something "better" to go in its place. When/if timberwolf closes and is removed, you can bet that w/n a couple of seasons some major will pop up in that area. Could be rides, could be a hotel, could be camping areas, who knows, but it will be something that improves the bottom line (at least in theory)

I've been to the park when spirit song was there. While I've never been in timberwolf while Spirit Song was going on, you get a pretty good look into the seating area when leaving at night, and it appeared to be pretty packed, if not sold out. Anyhoo, my question, that likely nobody on here can (or I guess more likely would) answer is how much money does it generate? If they don't have any other events in timbewolf, any profit that Spirit Song generates is going to be offset to some degree by the maintenance and upkeep to the speakers, wiring, lights, stage, backstage, seating, etc...for (1) 4 day event. If there is nothing else there to generate profit, all of that associated cost will be directed towards that 1 event. Is it possible to hold some version of spirit song in different parts of the park, in some of the different stages? Assuming the content is family friendly (I don't listen to christian rock, so I'm just assuming) would there be a benefit to not only the park, but also the performers to have them perform on the stage behind the tower where park guests could hear some of the show, perhaps "stumble" into something they like? Perhaps ticketed seats to actually be "inside" the theater, but standing room availability or just allowing the noise to drift out to the masses? Would it be too loud that it would be a hindrance? Obviously there are many angles to look at, but I could see a benefit in holding various acts in different parts of the park, spread out over the coarse of the weekend while freeing up the area that Timberwolf sits on to be used for more than 1 event a year. They could also do something similar for perhaps local or smaller national acts to perform on one of the open air stages and perhaps grow their audience.