Posted: November/12/2005 at 8:47am | IP Logged

Actually they could've relocated TC,SFA did so with Wild One from MASS. for the 86 season but SF is too cheap to do so at this point in time.

Swat & Diablo falls are both going to SFNE from what I read here,the rumors of it going to SFGRADV were just that rumors...SFA was rumored to be getting ultratwister but that won't happen as from what I hear all of SFAW's coasters will either be sold to parks outside the chain or scrapped,which is kind of stupid because other parks that havn't gotten a coaster in 6 years now could've gotten new to them coasters but since when have Burke & CO. ever made any smart business decisions lately?

Personally I won't be renewing my SFA pass until a new coaster is added but I see them not doing so for the same exact reason SFAW was neglected....they probably want to sell the park because,like SFAW, SFA's land is of pretty high value.

I think SFI used SFAW's parking situation as the excuse they needed to shut the park down that they were looking for over the last few years,as they could've built a new parking lot like they did at SFA recently if they were willing to simply put forth the capital to do so.

Posted: November/12/2005 at 9:59am | IP Logged

SFI hasn't made any sound decisions since even before Gary Story left.  But hey, how can you expect a company in $2,200,000,000.00 debt make any reasonable decisions?  That's what got them this deep in the red to begin with.  I don't care who you are, that's debt that you can't pay off in a lifetime.

Posted: November/12/2005 at 1:33pm | IP Logged

Buying the Six Flags chain didn't help, made worse by buying up Jazzland et al., branding them, upgrading them with new ride packages and expecting a high return under the "trusted" Six Flags name.  Most funds to buy up and improve these parks came out of existing parks' budgets, instead of keeping most of what each park made in those parks.

A contradiction in terms was when Burke said in their still-pending lawsuit over the parking for AstroWorld... was when he said the tug-of-war they caused led to them to not put in any new rides and attractions.  But let's see: Excalibur was removed for Serial Thriller, which ended up being the only coaster AW got from them; and SWAT and Diablo Falls are the only other new rides they got in the 7 years now they've been in charge?  From what I know, parking didn't become an issue until a year ago, possibly just the beginning of this year.  How does that explain getting NOTHING in 2000, 2001, and 2002?  And if it's been such a trouble all this time, why were SWAT and DF installed in 2003?

Posted: November/12/2005 at 2:31pm | IP Logged

I believe what did it was buying up the parks like laronde & SFNO along with all the coasters SF added chainwide in 2001.

Things were going good until 2002 when SFI cut the  cap ex budget from $300 mill. to $125 mill. & since then it's been the same thing with the same parks getting coasters every year or two while others get next to,or nothing at all,in 1999 SFA for example recieved it's makover with 3 coasters(two simply replaced existing ones that were removed) then superman was added in 2000,Batwing was our last coaster in 01. and PBR (DF clone) was added in 2003 followed by this years retheme of the waterpark with a measly two new slides & new  paint/renaming of existing waterslides.

As for the parks themselves:13 parks were from premier parks original line up(SFA included) SFNO & LaRonde were the two they bought since then along with SFM,SF had only SFOT,SFAW,SFFT,SFSTL,SFGRAM,SFGRADV,SFMM & SFOG prior to 1998/99 when premier purchased SF from TW.

Premier consisted of Adventure World(now SFA),KentuckyKingdom(now SFKK,ElitchGardens(now SFEG),Darien Lake(now SFDL),Gueaga Lake(was SFWOA & is now GL again under CF ownership),Frontier City,Riverside(now SFNE),the european parks & a couple of smaller parks such as Great Escape & Wyndot lake.

Posted: November/13/2005 at 10:27am | IP Logged

jglonek wrote: And since I'm posting here now.. is there any word of ANY rides coming to Great Adventure from Astroworld?

Notice no one has bothered answering this question..