DaptoFunlandGuy

Just to touch on the 'backup' theory again - Most historical railway societies have diesel locos as backups to their steamer fleet as backup and recovery vehicles in case of breakdown, to assist in bringing the train back to the station. This is very necessary - especially in cases where the passenger cars are far away from the station - such as is the case on the Zig Zag Railway. On the other hand - if the Dreamworld railway breaks down at any point - unless it is across the two points that are level crossings (one near main street and the other at the back end of AWE) then there isn't really a need to move the train in a hurry. It's a flat and level grade most of the way, and with vehicular access almost all the way around, they could just tow it back with a tow truck on hire by the hour. Hardly justification for an entire loco dedicated to the task. As for 'specially themed' days, i think you might be mistaken. I'm inclined to take T-bone's side of this argument. Knowing his affinity for trains, i'm pretty sure he would know better than most.

Here's how I see it - I don't believe this attraction will fit within the SE helix. Not to mention the area is currently completely fenced off as ride envelope. If it really is that small (or if it is in fact a little bigger) I feel it would be better suited to the Arkham Piazza (formerly chinatown). Demolish the queue ramps and install it there. Installing in Arkham piazza has two benefits - a) Superman Escape wouldn't have to close for pretty much the entire construction, and it would make use of what really is a dead area - as well as the fact that Arkham has alternative entry exit arrangements that can be put to use. I'd much rather see something put into Wild West, but I've long since given up on that particular area of the park due to the issues with residents over the back fence.

I'm with Richard on this one also. As for tallest - didn't a park in Texas just open a windseeker type attraction that was world's tallest? I'm intrigued to see this come in. I take on board all other points regarding value - whether we could get other good quality flats for the same price etc - but at the end of the day, the park is due for a 'big bang' attraction, and flat or not, this is a big bang. Looking at the concepts - from what I can see its a tower a little taller than GD - so those that have been on GD can imagine the diameter of that tower - then it has three arms coming out with a gondola similar to the claw (but smaller as it only carries 12)... Is it just me, or does it sound like this won't actually fit in the Superman Helix, without intruding on the ride envelope?

No - it's clearly been said that the steam engines are out the door.

If it is thought out, and planned well, i'm all for it. Considering most people don't have to pay anymore these days for their FN ticket (as they get 'gold' free with a VIP purchase, and gold gets them in for free), there are just way too many people at these things. Don't get me wrong, I don't begrudge the park having that many people - the event has to be worth their while to put on. It'd just be nice to actually get a few rides in, and I for one am for that, if it is managed correctly.

That's the whole point Slick - the current 4 engineers cost too much money. Working one 8 hour shift per week caring for animals and providing basic customer service is very different to being the sole source of mechanical maintenance and safety for something that can kill if handled poorly. "If the pirates of the carribean breaks down, the pirates don't eat the tourists" - Ian Malcolm.

I can't see Disney buying out the other parks. At best they'd compete with them and potentially drive them out of business - or at the very least just make them work for their money. On the other hand, Disney has shown that they can easily co-exist with other theme parks - Ocean Park in Hong Kong recently went through massive growth not long after HKDL opened. In California (albeit with a much larger population), Knott's continues to survive, even after Disney opened a second gate and numerous hotels. They're all complimentary with each other, and working together to bring visitors to the one spot lets them leverage off each other... this is demonstrated by Disney, Universal and Sea World teaming up with the SoCal CityPass - they all recognise that working together is better than the alternative. As Gazza said though - it's a moot point in Australia. We don't have the population base here to bring Disney out here... at least not in the traditional sense. We could potentially see a 'DisneyLite' park in the next decade - but I don't know if I'd want to settle for that....

Theres nothing i've found more enjoyable than partaking of an icy cold one at Dirty Harry's during a heatwave. If i'm not running to a schedule (which basically means its just the two of us) we'll frequently stop by Dirty Harry's in the afternoon. I can't say i've ever purchased alcohol at sea world (our wedding party took a few hard lemonade's in, but thats all), but I have enjoyed a few at WnW also. As Joz said - nobody's talking about getting blind at the park. Australian parks have RSA responsibilities anyway so they'd be unlikely to let you go nuts. (so long as the employee's running the show are paying attention). Besides - if you do drink a little to excess - and then head for the rides.... you're gunna have a bad time...

The problem there Slick is you're allowing unpaid workers into a commercial organisation. If a volunteer rail museum type place is operating, and a boiler explodes injuring many, the public liability insurer will pay out, and then dump the society - they will never be insured again, and therefore closed down... no big deal right? If a volunteer is operating an attraction within a commercial enterprise where fees are charged for admission (rather than 'donations') and a boiler explodes - ardent leisure would be sued as they are the 'operators' of the property. The volunteers, while professional, aren't held to the same 'standards' that a paid employee is held. No - offering up the Dreamworld Railway locomotives to a volunteer society is absolutely a no-go zone.

It also depends on how much stuff you're carrying 'as a group'... if you're 4 or 5 people, you don't always fit everyone's bag, and stuff into an SE locker - so potentially theres 4-6 dollars right there... more than one ride? and an all day locker becomes viable... horses for courses.

Don't the outdoor attractions usually close a little earlier? or is this timeframe taking that into account?

Gazza I think he's asking that because I pointed out that the WSDB was your idea... he's asking permission to use your idea - not the Parkz name...

You raise a good point Mort, but there are pros and cons to both for DL Park. California Adventure not so much as World of Color runs every day (weather permitting), but off-peak days (such as mid-week) are no longer the same value as a weekend. We found that Fantasmic only ran for the peak weekend nights, and the Fireworks ran about 3 or 4 days out of 7. I guess the point is if you want the true experience, and see everything, midweek isn't always the best day to visit (unless you have a park hopper and will spend more than one day in each park). The other thing to remember is that off-peak, midweek days usually have a shorter operating day - such as 10am-9pm (11 hours), whereas peak days may be 8am-midnight (16 hours)... Even on peak days, many attractions have sub-hour queues, and the big queuelines mostly have fastpass, so the minor additional wait times you experience on peak days can be offset by more time to do things, as well as more things to do... In summary - go more than once. Choose an offpeak day to try and get most of your e-tickets done and get familiar with the park... but go in peak for the full experience - just be prepared for a little more queueing. P.S. remember that wait times are estimated by the attraction lead. In some cases, they use a very 'low-tech' system of displaying the wait time - they look at what section of the queue line is full, and use a diagram to work out what wait time that queue section should have on average (i've seen this on Mickeys Fun Wheel and the Jungle Cruise). This is very subjective - as the presence of several strollers, wheelchairs, or just people who spread out a bit more than others can impact on this guesstimate. The diagram also measures based on the queue section being 'full', so if the cast member sees 2 people in that queue section, the wait time is adjusted to allow for that whole section to be filled - a difference of potentially 50 guests or so, which is a big difference in wait times.

TBH I preferred it a little faster - the inversions aren't fast enough to hold you in your seat - you start to slip and really feel like you're coming out of the restraint. That said, the additional few seconds of ride time allow for a smoother cycle transition. It's probably a little harsh but the cycle times on my last visit were incredibly slow (mainly due to training two new ops)... on the plus side.... FINALLY got Audio.

Not far from the 'whatever dreamnova' that it fast became... I don't know that he'd need permission to use the 'parkz' name. Has Richard bothered to register it as a trademark? I mean i get this: But on my take, that only refers to the content being held under copyright by the respective holder. It doesn't refer to the name - eg: when you look at a bottle of coke for example, the fine print says something like 'Coca-Cola', 'Always' the dynamic ribbon device, the contoured bottle, etc etc are copyright of blah blah blah', so in the above quote, nothing asserts ownership or rights to the 'actual name' only the content on the site. I'm not trying to be smart, or cause unnecessary debate, i'm just honestly interested. I read up a lot on case law in various fields, and receive monthly updates from the Australian Copyright Council, so i'm just trying to find where the actual name is protected? Simple ownership of a domain name has been proven in the past to NOT exert rights over a specific name, which in this case is only an 'alternative spelling' and nothing more. I'll be interested to see the site. I don't think the copyright council would really care if the site looked completely different, however if it was attempting to emulate this site, and misrepresent itself as being part of Parkz, I think then you'd have a case. On the other hand Gazza, if you did want to cause a stoush over rights of use, I believe the WSDB idea was yours... that'd be the case more likely to proceed forward.

They may wish to accelerate the plans, but if their financial model doesn't allow for the additional capital (or the manufacturer's are unwilling to slot them into their manufacturing timeframe) they may have no choice but to wait it out as planned. Considering the plans they had when I last visited - some 6 or so years ago, they've cut back alot on the original design...

Much as I want it to be built, i think the wrong person has got this vision.

See it may be the 'old guy' in me - but when i hear Wacky Worm - i think of this: That said, these guys seem to have a throwback from Sea world.... (first one in the list).... or maybe not... http://www.aceamusements.com.au/inflatable_rides.html

it's also an excuse to do nothing else for this year.

It seems a shame though that a multi-million-dollar organisation needs to save what would amount to +/- $150,000, and at the same time cutting out what really is dreamworld's last 'original' attraction* (*i'm aware the park opened with Rocky Hollow and the Model T Fords, however given that the fords have been relocated (and theme destroyed) and Rocky Hollow has also lost most of the theme and charm of the attraction, and in my opinion neither can be considered an 'original' attraction in their current state)

it's usually a good idea not to go on the first night as no matter how much 'testing' they give all of the attractions, there usually seems to be some opening night teething problems - this happens anywhere on an opening night. The scare actors also need to find their rhythm on night one so they usually hit their stride on the second or third night. Despite the 31st being Hallowe'en, because it's midweek, it's sometimes quieter than the weekend events. I'd usually say the 18th-19th would be the better events to go to but attendance will be higher because it's a weekend... same goes for the 25th and 26th really. I guess it depends on what you mean by 'better' - do you mean 'better experience' or do you mean better 'less crowds' ...? because that will differ depending on what 'better' you mean.

You're going to have 6594 admins? pretty top heavy isn't it?

Yep - must admit on my last trip - I did spend time trying to see certain things in the queue lines that I knew was there... such as the Eeyore in the Indy queue. And the details in the queue houses are all amazing - that is definitely not in dispute... you do have to go through them once, I guess my point was helping get through most of the more desirable points - by all means you can go back and queue up to check out the details, but utilising the fastpasses smartly from the get-go in my opinion is a wise way to spend your day (the fact that RSR and World of Color aren't linked to the rest of the park means holding three is worth it). As a matter of fact, the day we did RSR - we entered the 'running of the bulls', and ended up queued outside Flo's. One of us had instead queued for the RSR fastpass - got through in the first ten minutes and met the group in the 'queue' before we'd even gotten to the standby queue entry. We continued through the standby line, got through all the queue houses and halfway up the last ramp - we were literally 8 people away from the 'grouper'... when the ride broke down... for 3 hours. After queueing for about an hour - we were thankful we had our fastpass then, believe me. And when we left the queue during the breakdown, the standby queue waiting time was posted as 180 minutes..

It's been suggested on Facebook that this might be a little more of a political stunt. In case you all haven't done too much research, Mr Khan is running for federal parliament. We have yet to see any other stakeholder come out publicly and announce their involvement. All of these mysterious 'parties' continue to be unnamed. We'll see what happens after September 7th. On another note Ammar, you have stated you are a qualified builder, and real estate agent. I am wondering whether my freedom of information (FOI) enquiries with the Master Builder's Association, or the NSW Dept of Fair Trading will confirm you hold the necessary licenses and qualifications to hold yourself out to be both of those things. Please don't misunderstand me Ammar - I'm sure you can see by my signature block that I am a very big supporter of Wonderland. However so far, I've seen very little from you except big talk with little in the way of substantiation other than some very poor 3d renderings done by an 8th grader on an easily created website. I'm just asking you to put something a little more concrete on the table to prove this is legitimate. You had better not be using this as an electoral stunt... that's all I have to say.

I think Richard's hit the nail on the head. There would be few steam-engineers around these days doing the work professionally (as opposed to the historical societies) so the people they have running them would be able to hold the park to ransom (to a degree) on their pay. They can command their own salary - and eliminating the steam engines is the only thing that DW holds over them. Now i'm not suggesting there has been a pay dispute or argument, and this is DW's way of responding, i'm just saying it's possible. A diesel operated engine, potentially could be operated by anyone with relatively little training. Then, the only experienced staff you'd require would be your maintenance staff - and diesel engines are modern, so this maintenance could be outsourced on an 'as needed' basis. Such a shame.