franky

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As someone planning to do exactly this when our borders reopen, what's nuts about it?

Could it be equally likely that noone bought it and DW are just going to demolish it instead?

I think what's going to make it difficult for a new comer to the Aus theme park market is that there are now well established parks to compare it to. If you were to open a theme park with only 1 coaster (and nothing else to complement it, like a wildlife park or a garden etc) then you're going to have a hard time staying afloat when everyone will be continuously comparing you to the gold coast parks in terms of value. Seaworld/Movieworld existing with only 1 coaster was fine at the time, because every other park was only small and newly established. My mind is open and hopeful though!

It's funny because every year my wife and I go to HVG for the Christmas Lights I always say they should put a coaster in. It would go gang busters even if they brought in a travelling model like a spinning wild mouse for the Christmas period. That being said, I don't think they're in the right location to be a fully fledged theme park. The area is known for it's winerys and quiet getaways in a tranquil area. Putting a bunch of screaming people in the middle of it all is not what I'd personally see being received well by the local businesses. The place is miles away from major public transport. Newcastle (Williamtown) is the closest major airport and it's limited in where you can fly from here. Locally, Cessnock isn't exactly known for its citizens being awash with money. However, the Christmas Light Spectacular draws in major crowds every year with tour busses from Sydney etc so it stands to reason if they get it right it might work. It's pretty easy to get to from Sydney if you wanted to make the trip up (M1 then Hunter Expressway). We've been to HVG during the day outside of the Christmas period and the place is a ghost town, maybe a few thrill rides will keep attendance chugging along. I've often thought that Old Sydney Town would be a great location for a theme park. It has the reptile park next door, is situated almost halfway between Sydney and Newcastle and is straight off the M1 and close to the train line (Gosford). Disappointingly it appears as though it's going to be housing.

And I can sleep easy now Good stuff Dreamworld!

Does the colouring of the S in Steel look upside down to anyone else? #CantUnseeIt

I mean, my first thought when seeing the video was 'it looks much slower than I imagined it would'. But I just watched a couple of off-ride videos of DCR and it looks just as fast, so I reckon it'll be a great ride!

I'm going to speculate here. The reason we're not seeing 3d signage any more is because of the difficulty and effort in adhering to the guidelines of double-fixing. I remember when I was reading through the coroner report for the RTRR and in it, engineers were pointing out fixings in the ride with single fixing points and that they should be addressed. You can see such an example in the new sign in the image above, there's the chain holding the sign as originally but also there's now an additional wire as backup. The incident DaptoFunlandGuy described at Wonderland is why. Something actually occurred, it was risk-assessed and now probably every insurance company for theme parks in Aus is going to require double-fixings or they'll have to pay additional premiums. When you've got a 3d manufactured sign, how do you guarantee double wired fixings for each element stuck on the front without making it look like trash? Sure, you can glue/screw/bolt but a bean counter in insurance land somewhere will probably say not good enough. There comes a point where a standard printed sign does the job well enough and is not worth the effort in fighting the bureaucrats.

Me too, there doesn't look to be anywhere near the station track-wise that's high enough to walk under, so would they need to construct a foot bridge? Side question, how would people unable to use stairs access the ride? How was it done when BD2 was there?

Because it would be incredibly time consuming, difficult and error-prone to do single point measurements from each and every inch of the track in each and every direction. Sure there's probably something they could do with lasers (pew pew), but I'm going to bet it's cheaper to use a bent up piece of metal or a cut out of some plywood. I'm sure you can count on the track etc being precision engineered/manufactured, but the rock tunnel... there's plenty of opportunity for someone to over apply the concrete, and you wouldn't want an extremity hitting that at 100+kmh.

I'm assuming the spinning train would have a larger envelope overall (it would exceed the standard train envelope being that its more elevated and spins), so realistically they'd really only need to pull that template through as it's kinda redundant doing the other, right? Stop a train on the MCBR or even the launch transfer track, move the other train into station, cycle other train to the maintenance track, place in maintenance shed, profit! I'm assuming there's going to be 5 blocks (station, launch, MCBR, final brakes, maintenance transfer), plenty of opportunities to shuffle two trains around.

I think I remember Magician saying it was removed and not kept, I took that to mean it was smashed up and put in a skip

Hasn't Dec 26th been the expected opening date the whole time?

They'll have to put a net under the track. Can't have people throwing stuff at the train or parts flying off into guests. It's been done with rides like the Velocicoaster and Ice Breaker (Ice Breaker was testing before they installed the nets, they were using portable umbrellas under the ride on pathways)

I would find myself unwell after a single ride too, but if you really rode it 11 times, than it's no wonder

I thought that's all this was? Why so serious?

That makes two of us (you know who you are). And if other ppl know the exact details for this ride, well, nice, me same. Holy quote inception Batman

I only just picked up where this tunnel is going: Looks like this feature entry is going to be next to Sky Voyager, so closing BuzzSaw on Aug 31 will allow them to hoard this whole area off and allow the construction of this to start.

Sad to see yet another ride go, but looking forward to what's to come. Like TOT2 they can start saving the expense of maintaining the ride for new things. Only been on BuzzSaw a couple of times during a visit, just before the TOT2 closed. It was enjoyable but not a very long ride. Kinda hurt my neck the first time we got grabbed on the lift hill at the end of the ride because I wasn't expecting it. I guess this would mean the last of the Rocky Hollow rustic theming too right?

It feels like they're were powering through up until DW announced Steel Taipan's opening date goal, and just went "oh well, no need to rush, we've got til December to get this all finished now"

If you look at his address in the footer of his page and it's vicinity to LP, it speaks volumes toward his motivations.

So, do we think the demo crew are going to take down the old water park on their way out after finishing up with the Log Ride demo?

Couple of issues: 1. Even if they did go for this (why would they?) they would still need to remove the tunnel to install the new track, so they tunnel would need to be demolished anyway. 2. Intamin don't sell hydraulic launched coasters anymore, LSM's of that caliber would cost more to operate in power consumption than TOT did. 3. For them to get the longest life (and best ROI) out of a new ride, it'd be in their best interest to build a completely new structure, as you don't want to have to factor in the replacement of the tower in 10 (or whenever) years time when it reaches the end of its serviceable life. The track location was always an issue in the middle of the park so they'd be better off relocating it to the edge of the park if they could. "To make way for new attractions" was the official reason wasn't it? Though I've heard the following reasons mentioned: Power costs to run Upkeep costs Age of ride Dwindling ridership Location in the park Noise When you think about it, it kinda makes sense. Why would you keep shoveling money into an old, dated ride that everyone complained about being noisy and broke down a lot, when you could be better rolling that money into a new experience that costs less to run? As much as I ended up liking TOT it's time had come unfortunately. I wouldn't say their current version is even in the same class as TOT, it just looks smaller, slower, and boring (to me)

You're not wrong. I saw a tiktok with some drone footage of ST on the weekend, and the comments were just full of everyone spreading frankly wrong information about the accident. They don't know what actually happened, they just know it happened, and don't appear to want to give Dreamworld another chance.