medford

FWIW, my son had his 5 year check up about a week ago, he was right at (or just slightly under) 47" w/o shoes on. Since we use KI as his "official" height chart season to season, and he's been checking in right under 48" with shoes on, I'll assume the KI measurements to be pretty accurate. anyways, thanks for the story, we've been waiting as well for that 48" mark, he's oh so close, but not quite there. You could visably see the dissapointment in his face last time he was measured as he knew it meant he wasn't going to get on The Racer or beast (he wants to go on Diamondback as well, thinks it unfair that he's going to have to wait at least 2 more seasons to grow tall enough). Each trip to the park, my wife and I keep thinking, this is the trip we cross the threshold, but so far, no go. Some friendly advice, I don't know where your son was at last year in terms of height, nor what rides you ride regularly this season, but my son passed the 46" mark late last year, may have been august, may have been halloween, so the 2 attractions that are added at that height (congo falls and white water canyon) we didn't jump on (who wants to get that wet in september/october?), but I've decided to "suck it up" and deal with the drenching this season. My wife won't do either, plus we have a 1 year old toting along so somebody has to stay with her, so my son have had plenty of laughs getting a drenching on WWC and enjoying the great air time on Congo Falls. Both rarely have a line and are quickly re-rideable. On top of that, my son loves the observation deck and getting splashed by the boats on congo falls. If you can deal w/ the drenching, perhaps even find a way to carry towels, and a change of shoes they offer a great bridge to the rides offered up at 48".

What is CMW? Is that CSF, clearmont steel fabricators?

Thanks, yes I meant the whirlybirds. If you can walk right on, they're tolerable, but since we general go in the evenings, while the lines for most other rides in Planet Snoopy are fairly quick, that lone moves agonzingly slow. Hate the lines for flying ace arial chase as well, but at least the ride is pretty fun; there's nothing redeeming about the whirlybirds.

Of course it matters; all rides exert force on the rider, from boo blasters up to flying ace arial chase, over to congo falls, back to The Racers and all the way thru The Beast. Some hardly exert any force (if you were blindfolded, would you notice you were moving on boo blasters?), some exert a lot of variety in forces, from shoving you right or left, pushing you down into your seat or making you feel like you're going to get thrown out. Different forces have different effects, I could ride Diamondback all day, get me 1 cycle on the scrambler and I may well toss my cookies. The key to an amusement park of KI's size is to provide a wide variety of forces (ie thrills) that can appeal to a wide variety of guests while recognizing that not every thrill is tied directly into the track. turn The Beast into a steel coaster and place it in the middle of the park with no tunnels and ridership would be low, however run it thru the woods, give it a handful of tunnels, a couple of lift hills and you've got a legend. Forces matter, they most definently matter however a park must be careful, make a ride too forceful in one regard or another and you risk the ride tearing itself apart, possibly injuring guests or at a minimum limiting ridership to a small amount of people.

Bottom line, in my opinion anyways, which isn't worth much in a court of law, much less an internet message forum: the person who did whatever they did wrong has no one to blame but themselves, regardless of what they may or may not have read on this site. End of story. HTCO saying "get down here ASAP, you really want to see this" (paraphasing) then continueing to post in a manner of "I know something you don't know" is the essance of trolling. He may or may not know anything specific, but his actions reeked of someone trying to whoop up attention (and since some say he works at the park, perhaps he works in PR and is simply trying to attract attention to the park, though in that regard, one could take note from Don & terp who say a lot without really saying anything) They are two seperate issues. The first one I have problems with, and am glad the police or KI management dealt with it and let it be known that it won't be tolerated. The 2nd doesn't really bother me. Like many, I was excited to find out what may have been there, but I wasn't about to drive over in the middle of the night, I lost no sleep over the issue, I didn't get up any earlier than usual to check out the forums, I didn't swing by the parking lot on the way to work, etc... it didn't change my day, however the next time HTCO wants to claim something big is going on, or claim to be sharing a bit of previously unknown/posted information on this project or anyother, I'm going to take with a big ol' grain of salt, he's essentially been "downgraded" in my eyes, nothing more nothing less. I take this site for what it is, an outlet to share information on KI. Sometimes it provides great entertainment, sometimes it provides great insight, sometimes those 2 lap over each other, and sometimes there's a big ol heap of dog piles. Its up to the individual to figure out what is what. What is insightful to me, may well be common knowledge to others. What entertains me, may bore others. Some thrive on the dog piles of the world, others prefer a nice diversion. I doubt the park wants to shut down this site anytime soon. 1st, another one would pop up somewhere else, 2nd its a great additional PR firm for the park. There is a good reason Don mentions the site frequently in his tweets; he knows that by getting people to come here is another recruiting tool to draw more visits to the park. Not everyone is into facebook or twiter, this site allows another outlet. Out of site is truely out of mind, KICentral keeps the park in the sites of many, and therefor is another tool to help drive profits at the park with little or no cost to the park itself.

^^^ Nice post, I think SOBs footprint is a lot bigger than people realize. it was a chain lift woodie, so it wasn't installed at a super steep angle, it also curved out before its drop taking up even more room. On top of that, they're utilizing land that would be prior (west) to the start of SOBs layout which further expands the possible land available to more than just SOBs footprint (not that they couldn't go beyond in either case)

^^^ I thought that was obvious. Perhaps I overestimated the crowd.

its now "race for your life charlie brown" or the "log flume they didn't take down"

hope you've got your poncho on.

my thoughts exactly

Could have been the taco bell you had last night Honestly, there may or may not have been anything of signifigance there last night. Don's tweet may have simply been to tweak KICentral after seeing what was posted last night. Seeing how many people enjoy whatever construction pictures are up, it leaves a pretty wide moat for Don to say that he's heading up to take some pictures that KICentral would love (or whatever the wording was)

Carbon Copy Canadian Club Culture Club . . . .

Don't know for sure, but I'm guessing Kings Island had an existing loan out thru JP Morgan Chase, or perhaps a line of credit. The last one perhaps put the value of the park at 885 million. If that is true, it means JP morgan has a lien out against the park for the line of credit, should KI fall to pay its loan back in a timely manor, JP morgan claims lein rights up to the value of the loan. All a guess based upon the lein language, not sure why else Chase would have a lien out against KI other than as collatoral against a line of credit KI has thru the bank.

If nothing else, Don is giving this site some solid free pub with his constant mention of KICentral. I imagine there are a lot of people who follow KI's twitter feed who have never heard of KICentral.

FWIW, driving south on 71 I couldn't spot any staging in the north parking lot, nor track, nor cranes. Now with that said, driving south on 71 at 7:30 in the morning isn't exactly a great vantage point, so obviously I could have missed something, perhaps even a "big" something. I'm sure others will report w/ a better view of the parking lot later. Also, I'm not sure what the time of delivery has to do w/ the manufacturer of the track. Certainly KI & CSF could cordinate an evening deliver. It probably would take at most an hour to make that delivery, coordinating it around expected lower driving times would make things easier. With that said, the ramp from 275 to 71 north is scheduled to be shut down from 9:00 pm to 5:00 am for the next couple of weeks. Rain may have pushed that off, but ODOT has had signs up for a week or so now. I'm guessing any delivery to KI from CSF right now is going to happern prior to 9:00 PM.

Seems like there are an awful lot of people ready to cast aspiration at the women who passed away, are ready to blame her weight on the problem. Was she at fault? Possibly. Was it the ride op? Possibly. Was it the locking mechanism on the ride? Possibly. Was it a design flaw? Possibly. I'm sure I've missed a warning somewhere, but don't recall ever seeing the warning sign for a rollercoaster list direct weight as a ride limitation. They mostly (if not all) indicate that rides of unusual or larger porportions may not fit in the ride, but I don't recall seeing a specific weight. The women who tragically fell to her death certainly appears overweight, but that does not mean she was at fault. Did the ride op check her in properrly? Was he/she sure that the lap bar was in correct position? Did the car manufacturer overlook a potential design flaw? Was it a combination of all 3, and possibly something else, in essence the perfect storm? I've seen more than 1 person do the walk of shame. I've never seen anyone protest, though I'm sure the current or former ride ops have on many occasions. I'm guessing most, when they realize they don't fit suffer an immediate dose of shame and are looking to scoot away as quickly as possible. I couldn't imagine being the ride op on that train. How many questions have to be going thru his/her brain at the moment? How much shock do they feel. Its a terrible tragedy, no doubt about that, but lets let the investigation take its coarse before we place all the blame on this lady's weight.

I wouldn't worry too much about. Like most things in life, "and beyond" only means they'll continue operating the haunt in that building until they find a better use for the building and/or footprint. I'll assume KI has a 5 & 10 year plan. When The Crypt was taken down, it was likely already decided that SOB was to come down, and the 2014 attraction would be going up in its place. May not have been room in KI's budget anytime soon to do something other than the haunt, which by most accounts was very well done. All plans can and will change when something comes along to prompt the change.

Do ride stations typically have video monitoring? Something like that could offer a clue or two. Obviously, audio would be hard, if not impossible to capture in a station, but visual evidence could be used to see if the women or ride operator was doing something the helped lead to this death. I was watching the POV this weekend of this ride (post retracking), it appeared that the is a decent "side" to the car, as well as some sort of plexiglass barrier on the side. Made me wonder how anyone could just fall out to the side, assuming the restraints were working as intended. I'll second (or third, fourth, etc...) others on the seat belt redundancy. Even if some sort of seat belt was completely and totally useless on a ride like Diamondback, it would ease my mind a bit. I'd love to see a test video of a ride w/ no lap restraint. I trust terpy on that statement, or at least the manufacturer's statement, but I'd still find it interesting to watch.

don't pollute

There are some rides, like scrambler I won't ride because spinners make me sick or at best feeling like I'm going to be sick. There are some rides, like Drop Tower, that I have been on, but don't like and doubtful I'd get on again w/o a cash offer b/c heights bug me (though it makes me wonder why I have no problem with heights on a coaster) Then there is woodstoock flyers (or whatever those helicopter things in Planet Snoopy is called) that I'm very thankful my 5 year old son has never taken a big interest in. I think he's been on them 2 or 3 times in the last 3 seasons. The lines are always long (well slow actually) and ride is about as boring as it can get. I have yet to figure out what the peddles are for, doesn't seem like they did anything the 2 times I've riden the ride. I say a little prayer each time we go, that my 1 year old daughter will take a similar dis-interest in the ride, while at the same time being willing to ride every other ride she height will allow her on.

Everybody's working for the weekend.

Its behind the icee station (I believe, not 100% sure what is there), its pretty well hidden, but easy to spot if you know what you're looking for. I'm guessing 99% of the park passes along there and doesn't realize there is a que back there.

My point exactly.

Banshee the maze????

Construction workers, especially on a day like today, are typically too busy, too worn down by the heat/job to waste their time with the Lennay Kekua of the world.