Slick

But that's it - if you're so short on space, why do you need a giant waterway that serves no purpose if all you're going to do is circumnavigate any use of it (see Jet Rescue's pathway under the bridge) and not use it as a way to create some fun or distinction (see the un-used bridge) when realistically you could just chuck up some trees and call it a day if all you want is separation? Still doesn't make sense to me.

One thought @joel - the original exit pathway (and its fences) are all concreted in and could easily be re-purposed as the queue line (exactly like what Dreamworld did with Sidewinder) thus you could take out all of the queue line switchbacks to allow for easy temporary access during operating hours with all the typical trimmings of equipment being escorted etc. (like what they did building Tailspin.) Another thought - everything to the right of that ride has been levelled - if you're smart, while you're demolishing acres of the park then you'd leverage the tools and expertise on hand to raise a secondary pathway for equipment that's not too heavy for the bridge that runs over River Rapids. Even if either option was just somehow unfathomable by Dreamworld and the only access was at night and as you say, Dreamworld would have to "spend 10 minutes dissembling and reassembling the Que line every day" then jesus they should do exactly that if that's all it takes to keep a staple attraction open. You know the bar's set astonishingly low for Dreamworld when an idea that maintains guest satisfaction at a minimum bar of "we keep the rides you pay for open" is debated because of its fiscal impact to Weiss' bank account.

I had questioned John about the 10,000 guest number too and he had pretty strongly defended it, going so far as to tell me a story about how he challenged a previous engineer about it who stayed on at the park for many years. I reckon what you mentioned is spot on - Village Green had a big dining hall, tea houses, rides etc. whilst Rivertown had the boat, the animatronic show, more food and shop outlets, Blue Lagoon and its shops, slides etc. and then at some point during the park's first years they were running up to three trains at any given time, too - all very well spread out across the park. Probably also worth mentioning that this was out of his own personal collection of snaps so who really knows how accurate any of it is, especially given all of this is nearly forty years ago.

Why is it really closed then? I'm calling BS on the whole "Buzzsaw is closed because of i-ride" thing - checkout the screenshot below - there's more than enough space to put hoarding up that would allow for guests to access Buzzsaw & truck access for i-ride etc. It's 100% a convenient excuse while they figure out what to do next with Buzzsaw. Realistically, if they had a plan for Buzzsaw there'd be an end date for it's temporary closure. Any other park in the word gets equipment in before park operating hours or escorts equipment through the park if need be (which is exactly what they did when they were building Tailpsin, just to add). All of this is contemptuous to the guests and their day to day experience.

Could anyone elaborate why they’re keeping that small strip of waterway? One would presume it’s going to turn murky and awful anyway, why not fill it in the whole way?

John had mentioned to me how perfectly they had these timed too - think American roller-coaster train operations in the summer - nothing gets people out of there quicker than a wave of another group coming in to take your seat. He would regularly go and sit in the back of the theatre and watch it play out. John was so clued on, he could spot whenever train conductors deviated from the script just from jumping on the train and listening in. These days what conductors say are the least of their worries, as the pictures show.

You’re welcome @MickeyD - also worth noting that they had a 10,000 person day with nearly half the attractions open today, before gold rush country had opened. I guess people really get quality, huh?

Had to take a leak and get a coffee, so I stopped in at Dreamworld to see how things are. "Theming" (don't worry, keep reading and you'll see why this average first impression and degradation of an iconic building bugs me.) This new precinct, dubbed WhiteFacadeLand is coming together nicely. Guests will be stoked. This is a good execution of continuity for the new WhiteFacadeLand as it starts outside the park and continues inside now. Jokes aside, i'm sure all these panels will eventually get wraps on them but to have your first impression when you enter the park be this is pretty piss-poor. If regional theme park operators like Six Flags don't miss details this glaring this then so can Dreamworld, a park that was once known for its attention to detail. Also, the whole Buzzsaw area is now closed. More WhiteFacadeLand construction. Stuff is definitely happening for "unknown i-ride #1." After taking a leak, I noticed this. Can you guess what picture doesn't belong? If you guessed #6 you guessed correct! Speaking of Peter Brock's Garage - they've wasted no time gutting the place and putting up bollards near the sliding doors to keep guests out. Does that stop them from advertising it in park though? Hell naww! That photo was taken outside of their brand new "Designated Smoking Area" a.k.a. Big Brother Cafe a.k.a. Hollywood Cottage (no shit, that building there is 100% Hollywood Cottage and played a pivotal part in Dreamworld existing in the first place. They would actually be nuts to demolish that building given it is such an integral part of Dreamworld lore.) Currently the whole space is very inviting and "themed." Half removed walkways more theming. Super flammable foam disintegrating more rustic theming. Posts from abandoned pathways more colonial theming. After walking down and seeing Log Ride unexpectedly closed, I jumped on the train to see what was left of Blue Lagoon. While I was waiting I got to take in this scenic theme park vista. (Below is what it used to look like.) It used to be awfully pretty. But leaves are too hard to sweep up so it is what it is. Nothing to see here. Definitely nothing to see here, like unkempt and hazardous tree matter. Nothing to see here either apparently, even though it's the only thing you can see. Definitely no dangerous fences to be seen. On my final walk around, I stopped to admire the maroon theming that's been in place for nearly two years now. Theming. I'm definitely in Australia's Disneyland right now. You thought seeing this from ground level was bad? Check this out - if my theme park went through a globally seen incident people then i'd probably avoid giving influencers a great vantage point of where we're trying to pretend like nothing happened hey. On a positive note, after The Claw's random extended downtime (it's okay, we'll gloss over Buzzsaw's extended downtime, the West side of Giant Drop's random down-time earlier in the year, the east-side's current un-announced down time and just a total myriad of unplanned maintenance because the park is super duper safe) the ride has re-opened and it's looking really good. This was a tiny silver lining from what was otherwise a super depressing visit - the signs look great (both the one pictured above and the entrance side have been really well taken care of) and the new surfacing and paintjob is very well done and should be the standard for the whole park. I don't care for upcharges attractions that are forced into areas like this. You couldn't have just chucked all of this into Kevil Hill and connected it via the current passholder centre? You know, i'm just saying that if you did that, then the Trolls IP would be connected to all the other Dreamworks IP. And you know, if you did that, then the whole area would be air-conned and then when it closes (because you said it was temporary except first it was 12 months and now it's 18 months so who knows) then there'd be no impact visually for guests? Because you know, no parent wants to have a toddler crying because they see Troll stuff but they can't actually DO any troll stuff. And you know, then you wouldn't be chucking more conflicting themes inside an ocean themed area. Because, you know, you're a theme park and people expect that kind of hindsight. Because you know, maybe you should've learnt that when you tried to jam car stuff into an ocean themed area? Because you know, it's an ocean themed area. Dreamworld was successful because of John's attention to detail and nothing else. Today's Dreamworld is not even remotely detail focussed and I think it shows. Those who reckon there's no money to keep it to some unrealistic "Disney" standard couldn't be further from the truth - poorly-placed attractions and mis-matched themes are the result of bad management, not a lack of funds. Same goes for rides that continue to be down with little to no communication on why or when they'll re-open. Same goes for letting iconic facades get knocked over, spray painted and then lets design aesthetics be ruined by a dozen and one poorly integrated conduits, crap paint jobs and air-con boxes. You folks tell me - looking at the pictures below that were all taken in the 80's and 90's, has the park really improved?

At a random guess it might be where they're plonking parts for the i-ride.

It's worth keeping in mind that this is no longer the Ardent Leisure that was but rather a long play by Gary Weiss to fix and flip what was a troubled business and that it's exactly what he's known for doing in the first place. If I was Weiss and I had sunk a lot of cash into Ardent then my obvious aim is to maximise my return, and in his case, you don't get to be a multi-millionaire without being ruthless and cunning. That means maintaining a low profile and letting the news cycle wash over your investment, that means being reactive and not proactive with the way things play out and ultimately that means being frugal with expenditure on making the individual parts of the company looking as attractive as possible to potential buyers to maximise the return. I think that there's plenty of people who sit in the "well it happened to Wonderland so it can happen here" camp that get ahead of themselves - the council's never going to let such a crucial part of the economy be bought up and then approve land rezoning for Dreamworld to become residential. The only way that'll ever happen is through Weiss - if he figures he can't make a return on his investment (read: no one wants to buy it in the next 18-24 months) he Ardent will tell investors it won't ever recover and then if the market actually buys that crap then the council will be backed into a no-win corner.

I reckon both @wikiverse & @Skeeta are correct in their own way. Simply put - Dreamworld has way more on offer for young families than Village's whole offering and it's why it's been able to hang on for as long as it has. On the other hand, Movie World's teen/adult offering is an order of magnitude better than Dreamworld's. Dreamworld became the country's best tourist attraction because for the first ten years of its life John Longhurst paid extraordinary attention to detail and quality and the place had pride in delivering once in a lifetime memories. The next ten years my generation thought it was the place to be because the thrill rides were actually world class. Skip forward twenty years, John's legacy has been literally bulldozed to bits and the ageing thrill rides that were built in the 90's are still mainly the poster child for competing with things like the Hypercoaster.

Yesterday's articles reported Ardent writing Dreamworld down another $75 million - that puts us seriously close (if not already) to the park being virtually worthless beyond the value of the land it sits on. Until the corporate culture, the leadership and the vision that exists for Dreamworld changes (the one that's still prevalent in the park today, that's existed for twenty years and is solely to blame for the incident and Dreamworld being led to this point), nothing will actually change for the better and empty gestures like a name change will be seen as an obvious ruse.

There's a shot or two in there -

The horse drawn cart in Main Street? All of ABC Kids World?

The waterfall and steam train will be in many of the 80's TVCs found on YouTube.

Train - Steam now diesel, reduced carriages, removed rock cave (used to have a huge waterfall) River - Used to have the paddlesteemer, bushranger show before that Giant Drop - Used to have interactive panels of stuff in the final room

Cheers for sharing @Gold Coast Amusement Force - hope you don't mind - because the video is so quick I took the liberty of screen-capping the most interesting frames and bringing out the shadows so folks could see inside the building.

Classic Roachie rant, here goes: This map is better than the Movie World one, but still un-useable as a guide. This is definitely sunk cost fallacy at its finest. With a hand drawn map, firstly there's a quaint aesthetic that makes it interesting to absorb what's traditionally a dreary piece of design. It also means you can augment pathway lengths and scale buildings & attractions to show more or less detail, so in the case of the main plaza or the entrance building, you can actually show the F&B and Merch shops without simply going "stuff it, it's too hard" and covering it all in white or shades of brown roofing. I guarantee you this doubling-down on a badly thought out idea would attribute to lowered guest spend because it's simply too hard to easily digest what's what and where. From a UI/UX standpoint in the digital space, people jump off websites and abandon e-commerce carts because of far less (things as trivial having to load a secondary checkout page are known to increase bounce rates) so to think showing back of house areas & abandoned buildings (Viking's Revenge Station) is "cool & realistic" at the expense of showing what's inside their plazas and buildings means who-ever design this completely missed the point of the fundamental "why" this exists in the first place.

@themagician is on the money - sorry guys - just a combo of work and man-flu right now.

That would be the layers of stuff that have been covered up over the years.

About as accurate as a half-arsed Google search.

She was a junior being trained to become a level 2 operator.

@Mark Shaw is going to start working at Sydney Harbour Bridge Climb come September, just FYI.

If it's the pit that's usually locked off to guests that they're selectively allowing people into then that's a great idea because it's sunken into the rock face and not obstructing anyone's view. If it's just seats up the front then bahbow.

Given this is a public hearing, any and all information that's been presented is open for the media and the country at large to do so as they wish (like publish names). Ultimately that means individuals can include whatever details they think are appropriate. @Jdude95 i'd love to see some live updates, wall of text be damned - having one consolidated source instead of having to check Twitter and a bunch of news sites would be an incredible asset for many like myself who want to keep in the loop as the day unfolds. It'll also mean the information presented will be easily found and filterable by members using the forum search and guests coming to the site via Google.