Gee, I haven't updated this page in a while. Time to do it. Here are this years coasters!
Roar! at Adventure World-(seen above) GCI is designing and nearing completion on their second coaster. This is probably my most awaited coaster of the year, the layout looks wicked! If this is as good or better than Hershey's Wildcat (GCI's first coaster), it may rival Riverside cyclone as my new #1! Also, for those of you who don't know about Adventure World it is a nice, good sized ride park in Largo, Maryland. It has many coasters including Python (an Arrow Shuttle Loop), MindEraser (a Vekoma SLC), and the wonderful, airtime filled Wild One. Also, there is the world's first "Sea Coaster", which is a shoot-the-chutes with many coaster elements including a double-dip and a turntable, so you can ride part of the ride backwards!
Excalibur at Funtown USA, Saco, Maine- this CCI, it has been said, will be better than Raven, it's cousin. Excalibur will be a terrain woodie taking you on a wild flight through the woods with a unique double-helix. Let's all start making our travel plans for Maine, eh?
Rampage at Visionland (new park), outside of Montgomery, Alabama- this is Megafobia on a larger scale, with a few minor changes. The first drop will be 120 ft. (Megafobia's is around 95ft.), and it's length will be 3,550 ft. If it's as good as MegaFobia we will have a new #1 coaster in the world.
Twister Sisters, Kentucky Kingdom, Louisville, Kentucky- the coaster enthusiasts on the net have known about this coaster for a while (WAY before the press release), we just called it "Double Trouble." This CCI is a racer with many head on collision elements on it. It will be but 85 ft. tall, but like all CCI's, it proves to be thrilling.
1999, Ghost Rider, Knott's Berry Farm, Buena Park, California- This CCI proves to be amazing. A double out-and-back design that will travel over the street twice. But the most amazing thing about this coaster isn't it's height, length, or speed. Which aren't amazing, but it will cost $24 million! That's astounding considering most CCI's of this size cost around $4-5 million. Most of the $ will go into putting full grown trees along the course of the ride. This will be the tallest, and no doubt the best coaster in California (it may be hard to beat the 2 Giant Dippers in CA, though).
Riddler's Revenge, Six Flags Magic Mountain, Valencia, CA- this will be B & M's largest stand-up coaster so far. It will have 6 inversions (Vertical loop, 2 diving loops, inclined loop, and double flat spins!). The layout is similar to those of Mantis and Chang. The coaster will even have a helix going around the park's freefall!
Volcano: The Blast Coaster, Paramount's Kings Dominion, Doswell, VA- This is Intamin's 2nd inverted coaster, and it's first park version inverted. It will be located in and out of PKD's old Smurf Mountain. The ride will feature 2 LIM launches and 4 heartline flips.
SW4 (Secret Weapon 4), Alton Towers, Staffordshire, UK- Alton Towers theme park, one of the world's most beautiful park likes secrets. They started construction on this B & M before the park closed, and the park opens in March, but they haven't confirmed the ride yet. All we really know about the ride is that it's going to have a near vertical drop, and it's going to go into an underground tunnel (some say the tunnel is 180 ft. deep!), the coaster will be but 65 ft. tall. There is some speculation, though. Half of the coaster enthusiasts say it will have loops, the other half say no. Many say the ride will consist of the lift, drop, uphill banked curve leading you into the station. Very short. But it's bound to have awesome theming, if this is Alton Towers (see Great Coasters- Nemesis.) There is also speculation on theming, some say it will be space themed, since that's the section of the park it's in now. Others say it will be water themed, and Alton is totally retheming the entire ssection of the park. There are also questions about the train. Many enthusisast believe the coaster's trains will be 2 rows of 8 people across, because the track is so wide (all B & M coasters has 4 people per row). There's one thing for sure though, this coaster is one of the biggest mysteries in coaster history!
Invertigo, Paramount's Great America, Santa Clara, CA- Invertigo is basically a Boomerang coaster, by Vekoma, that is inverted (where cars are suspended under the track). Lim's are also used to lift the coaster up the hills. Not too different.
Mamba, Worlds of Fun, Kansas City, Missouri- This is Morgan Engineering's third hypercoaster (a hypercoaster is a coaster that either has a lift or drop of 200+ ft.), all of Morgan's hypercoasters so far have been hands down winners, and all have been built for Cedar Fair Parks (Cedar Point, Dorney Park, Valleyfair!, World's of Fun, Oceans of Fun, Knott's Berry Farm, Knott's Camp Snoopy). The first was Wild Thing built in '96 at Valleyfair, which all coaster enthusiasts liked. Then in '97 Morgan built Steel Force at Dorney, which all coaster enthusiasts LOVED. Now comes Mamba which proves to be a winner. Off to Kansas City!
Mr. Freeze (SFoMM, SFoT), Chiller (SFGAdv)- These 3 coasters, built by Premier rides were set to open last year didn't because of LIM overheating problems, and never opened. The Freezes are a single track launched coaster where you are launched to 65 mph, then you go through a couple of inversions, get another launch, up a 200 ft. hill, then do it again backwards. Chiller is the world's second racing looper, similar to the Freezes. You get launched, and the Batman track goes through a "top-hat" element (1 inversion), while the Robin track goes through a Boomerang (2 inversions), then they race through a heartline flip, get hit by LIMs again and go up the tower, then do it backwards. Cool huh?
Alpine Bobsleds, Great Escape, Lake George, NY- this coaster which used to be Rolling Thunder at SFGAm is being moved to Great Escape, on the hill where the picnic groves are. From what I hear it isn't to great, so I hope Great Escape fixes it (it is my home park after all).
Boomerang, Darien Lake, Darien Center, NY- a vekoma Boomerang. Nothing more.
Vekoma SLC, Geauga Lake, Aurora, Ohio- an SLC stands for Suspended loopin coaster. All are the same, but this is the first one being built over the water, I really want to ride an SLC over water.
Taz's Texas Twister, SFAW, Houston , Texas- this coaster used to be Thriller from the german traveling fairs, and it's said to be the most intense coaster in the world. There is a big pic of it on the Coaster Greats Page. Can't wait.
Let's hit a Home Run! Click here.
A pic of Roar's fan curve, almost completed
Roar's logo
Riddle's lift completed
Riddler's loop starting to go up
Thriller
