International Street cam

[Michael H]

Does anyone know why the International Street cam has been down since May the 12th?

[BeeastFarmer]

I'm sure someone does!

[Winterfestguy]

Likely they have been rehearsing the new fountain show late at night and don’t want to spoil the premiere this weekend. The same thing happened last season with Icam being down as they rehearsed and fine tuned the show a week before its debut.

[BeeastFarmer]

It's back on now. 

[Michael H]

Thank you  

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

I-Street webcam currently shows some testing for the lasers and lights!

[CoasterJack]

At what point do we usually start to see the pyrotechnics installed?

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

I'd assume the pyros might go in around the same time as the Haunt sign to avoid any potential disruptions with the corporate events. The Haunt sign maybe more so because of its visibility. I'm not entirely sure when it happened last year though.

 

They did start testing the fountains and have been cycling between a purple & green set and an orange set to light up the jets. There's also a pink, blue, and purple set that I can only imagine would reflect Banshee, but I don't know. No more lasers for now.

Someone was having fun turning the up-lights on and off, from which I realized that Racer's lift hill up-lights might somehow also be tied to that switch (or something like that). It's kind of nice to have this stream on in the background while they test different aspects of the "show" scenes.

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

The Royal Fountain has been drained for the season.

[BeeastFarmer]

35 minutes ago, Losantiville Mining Co. said:

The Royal Fountain has been drained for the season.

That is a real shame. 

I know the logistics of transformation into snowflake lake is monumental, but they need to figure out to keep it and the tower open thru Haunt. Surely it does not take that long to winterize the equipment and string the lights. 

On a positive note, at least it will have been open longer this year than usual. 

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

I think it might take the week to let the fountain bed air out before they cover it with the platforms. There's also the matter of cleaning out all the goose droppings. I think the only way to make the turnaround quicker would be to hire more teams.

I'm personally fine with it. The fact that we didn't see much Winterfest stuff up this past weekend was a lot nicer than having stuff start going up in the middle of Haunt season. My biggest wish for the turnaround is that they would find a way to add more temporary indoor heated spaces.

[Timchat2]

I assume that means no more fountain shows on the hour this weekend, even a version with pyro and lights but no water? I can't remember what happened last year with the midnight show.

[BeeastFarmer]

If Dollywood can flip from pumpkins to Christmas in one night, they can take 3 weeks to transform a fountain.

But they have shareholders to answer to, so they are going to do what they need to do 

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

3 hours ago, BeeastFarmer said:

But they have shareholders to answer to, so they are going to do what they need to do 

I would phrase it more like: They have shareholders to answer to, so they aren't going to pay for the extra workers or night shift wages that a park like Dollywood would. The bonus weekend will be an interesting time to see what stage of the turnover they're at.

We still don't even know what will be open for Winterfest this year either. With other parks cancelling or scaling back their events, could Kings Island also see a scaled back Winterfest for 2025?

[Winterfestguy]

Expect less entertainment for Winterfest this year. Tower Topics has already reported the KI tradition of Tinkers Toy Factory was cut. Without the many characters including Santa from that show to participate in the parade, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the parade cut too. Six Flags does not like winter park events so enjoy this year’s Winterfest as it may be the last for many more years to come. Then the park won’t have to worry about draining the fountain early or removing all the Halloween in a short period of time.

 

[CedarPointer]

It looked like the floats for the parade were assembled the last time I rode Adventure Express. Honestly, I had been just assuming the entire event was cancelled (or that it would cost an extra $10 per visit to look at the lights) so it was nice seeing any sort of progress.

[BryanJay]

Hot take (and I’m sure there’s a better thread to post this on I apologize): I really don’t like the fear-mongering some people do of Winterfest being cancelled every year. I’m sure on one hand it could be scaled back a bit (I can see that slide thing not being brought up this year) but also I think Kings Island is a park Six Flags sees as valuable and I think it’s still favorable to have the park open for a winter event.

[IBEW_Sparky]

1 hour ago, CedarPointer said:

It looked like the floats for the parade were assembled the last time I rode Adventure Express. Honestly, I had been just assuming the entire event was cancelled (or that it would cost an extra $10 per visit to look at the lights) so it was nice seeing any sort of progress.

They still have 3 weeks to announce any kind of pricing they wish to/feel the market will bear.

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

I don't expect any new add-ons to come to Winterfest this year. Unless there were additional fees for Holiday in the Park activities that Winterfest didn't have, we probably will just get similar offerings to last year's event.

5 hours ago, BryanJay said:

Hot take (and I’m sure there’s a better thread to post this on I apologize): I really don’t like the fear-mongering some people do of Winterfest being cancelled every year. I’m sure on one hand it could be scaled back a bit (I can see that slide thing not being brought up this year) but also I think Kings Island is a park Six Flags sees as valuable and I think it’s still favorable to have the park open for a winter event.

I forget who said it, but the quote goes something like this: "If Kings Island's Winterfest is not profitable, it's because of bad management". Fear-mongering doesn't help anyone, but it is worth saying that everyone should go take in the sights and experiences this year because Six Flags has proven themselves to be wholly untrustworthy. If any part of Winterfest is on the chopping block in the foreseeable future, I'd bet we'd see it scaled back to the scale of the 2005 event. (I agree with you BryanJay!)

Surely someone in the SFEC corporate offices is doing calculations on whether cancelling an established event is worth the bad press and potential lost customers. With the new CEO will come the potential for a shift in strategy and some changes to the event lineups as well.

[robintodd]

7 hours ago, Winterfestguy said:

Expect less entertainment for Winterfest this year. Tower Topics has already reported the KI tradition of Tinkers Toy Factory was cut. Without the many characters including Santa from that show to participate in the parade, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the parade cut too. Six Flags does not like winter park events so enjoy this year’s Winterfest as it may be the last for many more years to come. Then the park won’t have to worry about draining the fountain early or removing all the Halloween in a short period of time.

 

They also stated that it will be replaced with a different show.  I don't believe Winterfest is going anywhere.  People spend plenty of money there.  I see several boxes of cookies being carried around, plenty of people skating, buying the specialty hot chocolates and pulling out credit cards at restraunts. 

There seems to have been several misses this year.  At the beginning of the year people were talking about cutting hours and or days and instead we got extended hours (sundays till 11 for haunt) added days (thursdays) and an additional weekend after Haunt.  (strange that if you are expecting anyone to admit missing those points you'll only hear crickets...)

We are fortunate enough to have enough of a population around the park to keep it going with little to no competition.  Kings Dominion competes Bush Garden Williamsburg an hour away.
We have no major park that close to us. We compete against animals inside their shelters in a zoo and drive-through attractions.  People during the winter tend not to drive too far away from home.

If you want a sign of Winterfest going away I believe the first sign will be when Ice Skating is not offered one year.  It takes ALOT of money to do that and since they have already seemed to drain the fountain in preparation for Winterfest, I think it's safe to say Winterfest is safe for the foreseeable future. 

[Timchat2]

The lights are still in place and operating in the fountain along with the pyro:

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

Does anybody remember how soon the Winterfest sign came down in previous years? I noticed that most of the front decorations were taken down shortly after the new year and thought they kept it up a little longer in previous years. If this is sooner than before it will be good fuel for the doomers who think we'll be seeing "Six Flags Kings Island" (or even just a new sign or logo) this year.

[RedSummit20]

7 hours ago, Losantiville Mining Co. said:

Does anybody remember how soon the Winterfest sign came down in previous years? I noticed that most of the front decorations were taken down shortly after the new year and thought they kept it up a little longer in previous years. If this is sooner than before it will be good fuel for the doomers who think we'll be seeing "Six Flags Kings Island" (or even just a new sign or logo) this year.

what are you even talking about lol?

[Losantiville Mining Co.]

The main Winterfest sign at the front of the park. The other part of the post was to jab at the doomers on the Facebook groups who always speak ill of the park or say that Six Flags will ruin it.

[RedSummit20]

20 hours ago, Losantiville Mining Co. said:

The main Winterfest sign at the front of the park. The other part of the post was to jab at the doomers on the Facebook groups who always speak ill of the park or say that Six Flags will ruin it.

they always take it down, the timing has nothing to do with a name change lol 

[robintodd]

I'm one of those that look at CP and KI cams every morning.  Interesting things are going on at the KI cams this am.  

1) Crews are quickly tearing down Snowflake lake to complete the task before the weather hits this weekend.  They are almost 2/3 of the way done since starting on Wednesday.

2) Zephyer seems to be taken down all the way to the ground (2 cranes are on the pad).  I've never noticed this in years past hopefully it's just a routine 10-20 year maintenance.  Would be interesting to know if CP's is doing the same thing.

3) Action on the Monster pad.  About 4 employees with what looks like an arm for the ride were there this am.

4) The lights on the Eiffel Tower are still up.  If I remember correctly these are usually down by now.

I'm looking forward to seeing the snow on the KI cams later this weekend.

[Orion-XL200]

49 minutes ago, robintodd said:

I'm one of those that look at CP and KI cams every morning.  Interesting things are going on at the KI cams this am.  

1) Crews are quickly tearing down Snowflake lake to complete the task before the weather hits this weekend.  They are almost 2/3 of the way done since starting on Wednesday.

2) Zephyer seems to be taken down all the way to the ground (2 cranes are on the pad).  I've never noticed this in years past hopefully it's just a routine 10-20 year maintenance.  Would be interesting to know if CP's is doing the same thing.

3) Action on the Monster pad.  About 4 employees with what looks like an arm for the ride were there this am.

4) The lights on the Eiffel Tower are still up.  If I remember correctly these are usually down by now.

I'm looking forward to seeing the snow on the KI cams later this weekend.

Zephyr usually goes down to the ground every year as does Cedar Point's (usually stripped to bare bones). 

[DonHelbig]

5 minutes ago, Orion-XL200 said:

Zephyr usually goes down to the ground every year as does Cedar Point's (usually stripped to bare bones). 

It is after all a flat ride.