Coaster Philanthropy
This little fantasy has been keeping me going over the past couple of days. I was thinking that, if I won an enormous amount of money, I'd like to pay for certain coasters to be built at certain parks (considering how difficult it'd be to start my own). There'd be things in the contract like me being able to ride it whenever I liked, and not being able to theme it to something I don't like, but otherwise, no catch. So...
If you won £100m, which parks would you buy coasters for?
Pleasurewood Hills - wooden coaster
Good ol' Pleasurewood is getting back on its feet now, but the one thing I've always wanted to see there is a woodie. I envisage this particular ride as 60-80ft, totally smooth and full of airtime. East Anglia's Megafobia! It would occupy the side of the park that has the Log Flume, Pirate Ship, Fireball etc.
Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach - Gerstlauer Bobsled
Great Yarmouth already has a very nice woodie, so I'd offer them a piece of steel perfection from Germany. If the Pleasure Beach and Gerstlauer would agree, I'd ask them to make their best ever Bobsled, with about twice as many airtime moments and the perfect transitions associated with these very underrated rides.
Drayton Manor - wooden coaster
Now I must admit, I've never been to Drayton Manor. However, that wouldn't stop me splashing the cash and buying them a ride! This woodie needs to be 80-100ft tall and very thrilling. Let's not forget Drayton is not far from Alton, so it'd give people in that region a wooden coaster to ride!
Flamingo Land - B&M Floorless and wooden coaster
You might think I'm showing favouritism by buying Flamingo Land two rides. That's not the case. I merely think it's a good location for what the UK still needs - a B&M Floorless. Yeah, Swarm looks good, but not very traditional. What we need is the standard 150ft drop, giant loop, zero G roll, dive loop etc.
As for the woodie, it would be a large GCI twister.
Pleasure Island - wooden out & back
This park needs a woodie as much as any other and, I don't know why, but I've always thought it should be an out & back.
Adventure Island - Gerstlauer Bobsled
My 2nd Bobsled is going to a park that I much admire. I think we all know they struggle for space, but a large Bobsled that went around at least the eastern side of the park would be fantastic. Drops, helices, airtime... it would be a joy to ride on every visit to Southend.
So, after that my wallet would be lighter, but at least I'd have a) brought some wood to the UK and b) helped some of the smaller parks compete with Merlin.
at 12/12/11 10:50:10 PM
Not a bad list there, Graz! I know a few years ago, Flamingoland was looking at wood.
at 12/14/11 6:17:26 AM
> Pleasurewood Hills - wooden coaster
Definitely a great choice, El Toro at Freizeitpark Plohn comes to mind, and it did great things for attendance to that park.
Perhaps a well themed (Happy Valley scale) Vekoma Mine Train would work well, would be great to advertise the park and aimed at all members of the family.
> Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach - Gerstlauer Bobsled
Again good old fashioned fun for all the family perfect for a seaside park. I can imagine one zipping about above the existing buildings and swooping around the rides.
I reckon a compact coaster could work well for the park, we already have an El Loco in UK so perhaps a Vekoma Stingray would be a good choice, a ride that makes a big visual impact and provides a quirky flying experience
> Drayton Manor - wooden coaster
> Let's not forget Drayton is not far
> from Alton, so it'd give people in that region a wooden
> coaster to ride!
Drayton Manor never quite got it right with their coasters I do feel sorry for them as clearly they have to fight hard to compete with Towers. I good strategy would be to put in the stuff that Towers would never get planning permission for, B&M hyper coaster / giant Intamin wooden coaster :D
> Adventure Island - Gerstlauer Bobsled
Adventure Island do well to cater for the family market and all their coasters accommodate that audience, but they also have some good teen rides and Rage sits well between these two groups. I'd like to see them put in an all out thrill coaster!
I'd love Adventure Island to use the space currently taken up by Green Scream. Here's what Dæmonen would look like sat on the space! I'd probably add an extra helix to circle the Wave Swinger too :)
Although I'd perhaps be tempted to go for an inverted version instead so they had something that was more obviously different to Rage in the public's view.
at 12/16/11 6:26:34 PM
I can't believe how neatly Daemonen fits into Adventure Island.
Since I made this post, I got the new issue of First Drop, which reviews the Gravity Group woodie, "Twister" at Grona Lund (looks superb). FD did a feature about how compact it is and how it'd fit into many theme parks (they used a satellite view). This got me thinking: Adventure Island is probably the most strapped-for-space park of them all. I've never thought a wood-structured woodie would suit them, but I think a steel-structured one like Twister would very much so.
