Slick

Good spot! Thanks for the kind words and letting me know about that error.

The 3rd part is now live. Be sure to let me know your thoughts. Selling the Dream - John Longhurst's Dreamworld Stories.

This is quickly becoming the epitome of Ardent's ongoing hubris. Literally the only reason why Ardent chose to retrofit their existing theatre with a flying theatre, just like the Canadians with their IMAX Theatre overseas, is to primarily minimise cost, to also minimise local disturbances to neighbouring attractions and amenities and to speed up delivery time. But that cost-saving specifically comes with some huge drawbacks, too - namely the ability to build a full-scale flying theatre. And like Canada's flying theatre retrofit, ours will be a clever but scaled series of hacks to getting the motion bases inside a smaller than usual space that come with a lot of consequences (reduced capacity, smaller screen etc.) So then here's the thing - if Dreamworld's only going to preserve a forty year old warehouse shell made out of cinderblocks and literally nothing else (not the facades which have far more intrinsic value to the park) you've got to ask - why even bother retrofitting there in the first place? It's not like they're trying to minimise the impact on the guest experience during the retrofit - they've closed another multi-million roller-coaster with not even as much as a word on when it might re-open. And let's not even get started on how a giant un-covered demolition site in the heart of the park would impact every single guest's first, second, third and last impression of the park. At this point they could've built a larger flying theatre for cheaper had they literally put it anywhere else inside the park and they could've had it in the same time-frame since Ardent have continued to push back the open date multiple times over. This whole thing makes me feel as frustrated as reading news about Trump - everyone's watching the world burn but no one's doing anything about it.

So the big question is - did it really have asbestos or nah?

This was my exact thought when I heard about the whole Cyclone thing - there's enough information missing that it'd be like placing the driver at fault for a car accident without knowing their steering wheel fell off. Either way, whatever system or procedure that was in place to check Cyclone's restraints has been superseded with the Vekoma train now in place.

Ahh yep, my bad - I merged the threads and just realised then he had beat me to it. Will edit my post.

So, House of Kain huh? Thoughts? (Also, it's kind of amazing that they let this slip.)

G'day @ItsOmer - welcome to the forums! A simple Google Search like this one will point you to a full page of the information you're after, plus all of Six Flags Great America's ride pages (like this one about Goliath) on their website have the minimum height in inches on them too. Parkz is about participation in good, hearty discussion and I encourage you to join in on the fun here just as much as I encourage you to maximise the use of yours and other's time by Googling before posting.

That's pretty much where my head's at - i'm all for change & I think the golden rule for any kind of change is that whatever comes next should be way better than what came before it. As an example - Gremlins at Movie World was great, but Scooby Doo is way better. The opposite could be said for the Looney Tunes River Ride and its replacement, Junior Driving School, which is the equivalent of replacing the Sea World Resort with the Coomera Motor Inn. So in that regard, i'm all for the Flying Theatre itself - I reckon it'll make for an excellent addition to the park - if done correctly, it aligns with John Longhurst's original vision of attraction development where he would take something great overseas (like Soarin' in this case) and replicate it the best he could for our smaller market. Basically, my thought process is in regards to the facades and heritage is this - if a company's going to knock down Disney-inspired facades on a whim I don't know if they have what it takes to put something better up, especially when their attention to care and detail post incident hasn't at all met the bar (think tin shed cage at the end of Tiger Island, Peter Brock's Garage signs left up a month after closure, maroon tin everywhere etc. etc.). And what's staggering is that for a park that desperately needs all the positive support it can get, Dreamworld's defaulting to the outdated marketing model of "ohhhh it's a secret something's coming sooon ooohhh ahhhh" instead of pre-emptively enrolling brand loyalists (us) and getting them enrolled into the future of the park. Research has shown that guests staying a hotel who had a problem during their stay and then had excellent, prompt & transparent service in fixing the problem would rate that hotel higher than guests who had no problem to begin with. Post incident, that's where Dreamworld need to be right now, particularly at a time when they're ripping down iconic parts of the park and the trust is very, very weak with both the public and folks like us.

It'll be updated shortly - a few weeks back I had a super deep dive on figuring out exactly what was what, which was later corroborated by several former engineers who helped build the park and move Hollywood House itself. Basically I had spent an afternoon with John not too long ago sifting through Apple Maps and photos I had taken inside the park and we were able to work out that the Big Brother Cafe was indeed Hollywood House (it was taken off its stumps, moved and duplicated to become a restaurant) and the house that was eaten by termites was another house owned by one of the brothers of Mr. Day (the original land-owner) located near where the Coomera Motor Inn is today.

When the park first opened Gilltrap's Auto Museum was actually where the Village Marketplace (now Parkway / LEGO Store) was located. When Marketplace opened, it was moved to a building just behind what's now known as Pit Stop Burgers. It was auctioned off in 1989, which at a total guess, was probably due to Dream Co. haemorrhaging money.

As worrying as the original Disney-esque facades surrounding the i-ride being demolished, it looks like work is gearing up to remove the Big Brother Cafe. For those unaware, the Big Brother Cafe WAS originally Hollywood House and was the defining reason why John Longhurst bought Dreamworld. It was moved from behind the now Gold Rush Country entrance over to the side of the River Rapids where the building was duplicated to become a restaurant. Here's hoping it's not coming down and fencing around it is being placed up for safety reasons only.

All gone but not forgotten - there's still heaps of signs up despite it being closed for over a month now. You can do way, way, way better Dreamworld.

Here it is folks - looks like five of Dreamworld's original Disneyland-copy facades are getting the boot & when they come down it'll mark the official end of John Longhurst's original Dreamworld.

Ekka public holidays are typically some of the busiest days of the year for the parks. I'd actively avoid.

Agreed - it's like what, .01c per cup to put a bottom on them?

Just continuing on this and sidetracking, I think a lot of people aren't aware just how much of Florida's Disney World (specifically Magic Kingdom) played a part in Main Street's design. Magic Kingdom's. Dreamworld's back in 1981. Dreamworld's (in 2018). Magic Kingdom's. Dreamworld's. Magic Kingdom's. Dreamworld's (in 1981). Dreamworld's (in 2018). You'd think you'd only find amazing stores like this only in the Magic Kingdom. But actually Dreamworld did cool stuff like this too. Here's Disneyland's Market House from the air. Here's Dreamworld. From the ground back in 1956 at Disneyland. From the ground back in 2012-ish at Dreamworld. And this is what Disney have done to theirs. Now i'm not saying Dreamworld needs to somehow procure the money Disney has to continually drop millions on facade additions, that's unreasonable and even John Longhurst recognised that was impossible, but I do think management has done a lot of bad with the money they had by tacking on cheap lights, painting facades garish colours and in the case of the main entrance, actually knocking out a part of the building to put in a bland, cream, textured wall with barred windows. I mean talk about a jarring and hostile first impression. Disney have looked after what they had and now, some several decades later, a thousand tiny improvements have resulted in untouchable quality and finish. That's not to say that was never the case either with Dreamworld - Village Oval is a fantastic example of an addition where the facades and buildings were simply second to none. This was Village Oval. It got a lot worse. But it did get better. But we did lose amazing little buildings like this. Sometimes I feel like just they seem to get it wrong more then they do get it right, and that's where people irk up, because when you destroy something the expectation is that whatever replaces it is as good, if not better, and that hasn't been the case for so very many things at Dreamworld. Despite that, refurbishments like Green Bean, the ice cream parlour & the Dough Bros end of the plaza are all actually really well great examples in Main Street of bringing something into the 21st century without cocking it up completely (although in the case of the central plaza, removing the chandelier in the main tower and putting lino over the Dreamworld mosaic are both sins in their own right.) The Dreamworks area is another example of bringing a higher level of quality into the mix and is really great overall and Tiger Island is dead set the park's biggest asset and provided you ignore the gigantic tin cage down the end that shouldn't exist it's honestly one of the world's best Tiger exhibits. In the case of Green Bean as a Main Street facade example, when they renovated it they used softer, more realistic colours, the interior aesthetic is muted but fun and detailed, and there's plenty of nice places to sit - that kind of execution is how the entirety of the park is how the whole park should be in my mind and that's why folks like me are so judgey - it's not because we're anal theme park nerds, it's that Dreamworld used to be shit hot, and since Ardent came along a lot of things have fallen well below the bar that John Longhurst had set. With all of that said, bulldozing the Dreamworld Cinema facade would be an utter shame and frankly speaking I doubt there's anything better you could put in its place given just how iconic the design itself is.

It's definitely for I-Ride, it's been spoken about to death in some other threads. For those unfamiliar - Dreamworld's IMAX/Cinema now i-ride facade is seen in Walt Disney World, Disneyland Paris & Tokyo Disneyland. And here's ours - spot which one is well maintained: And here is how it looked on opening day, 1981. For all the marketing copy they spent on justifying not spending the same amount of money as Movie World on new rides because they're so focussed on "nostalgia" it then would be hypocritical and down-right tone deaf to destroy one of the last furnishings that exude high some semblance of quality design and overall planning / theming / integration. Let us pray that is not the case. Also worth nothing - Dreamworld's facade facsimile may not be as lush as the three above but here's the thing - every single one Disney's facades has been refurbished over time and subsequently improved upon to arrive at this point now where they all look top notch. By comparison, when Dreamworld painted the entrance building they opted to paint over almost all of the windows. If that's not half-arsed, contemptuous and ignorant of why the place was so successful in the first place I dunno what is.

So help me god if they cock up one of the last remaining Disney-clone facades i'll go bananas. I think it'd give old mate John Longhurst a heart attack - part of the reason why Dreamworld looks like a dog's breakfast is because they keep torching everything old and replacing it with cardboard cut-outs and painted concrete.

I'm not, I drink beer.

I think of it this way - a pizza shop had a boss who was pretty chill if you rocked up late or hungover and let most things slide. Then one day someone got food poisoning, the old boss got replaced by a newer, stricter boss, and then all of the staff's tardiness and extra-curriculur activities were glaringly pointed out.

Can't wait to see the Dreamworld Tower finally painted.

Having spent more time at Dirty Harry then anywhere else at the park I don't think i've ever really had to deal with Movie World's sodagate before, but I gotta say making guests walk all the way to the front of the park to get a soda is a massive oversight.

Long story short Dreamworld are telling us all porkies that Buzzsaw is closed because of I-Ride.

That's like saying my car's the safest car in the world... provided I never actually drive it. Dreamworld can't have it both ways - they can't spruik themselves as one of the safest parks in the world if they have barely enough resources to keep just more than half of their major attractions open (and safe) at any one time. Ironically, it's this kind of under-staffing/under-funding/under-communicating that got them stuck in the first place.