One of the hidden complications of running a popular amusement park involves real estate. The roller coasters and other rides take up a massive amount of space, and you must plan for future expansion by buying a lot of land initially. Otherwise, you’ll quickly realize that the potential growth of your park is artificially truncated by circumstances beyond your control.
The perils of limited real estate is a lesson Walt Disney learned the hard way with Disneyland, and a mistake he explicitly stated he would not repeat with Walt Disney World. It is the reason why there is so much room for expansion with the Orlando theme park but not the one in Anaheim. Alas, not every theme park has the deep pockets of Walt Disney, and even he had to cut a few deals toward the end to finance his vision for Walt Disney World.
Due to the constraints on real estate, outdated rides that grow unpopular or, worse yet, unsafe must be mothballed. The great news for theme park tourists is that out with the old and in with the new is oftentimes a good thing. Emerging technologies combined with the visionary ideas of creative ride engineering companies lead to bigger, better, and almost always faster thrill rides. Best of all, they can be placed on exactly the same land as the dismantled rides. Here are five of the best repurposed theme park rides (excluding Disney and Universal Studios attractions).
1. El Toro – Six Flags Great Adventure
In 2005, the 11-year-old coaster Viper was removed from New Jersey’s Six Flags Great Adventure. The plan was to replace the unpopular coaster that was legendary for its discomfort. The park planners settled upon a wood roller coaster to replace the former steel coaster in the same space. Cleverly, they discovered a way to keep a portion of the previous attraction, its ride station, while disassembling the rest.
El Toro aka The Bull arose in the same space. At the time of its debut, El Toro claimed the record for the steepest drop ever for a wooden roller coaster, plummeting at a sharp 76-degree angle. This wooden coaster hits all the high notes for a ride of its ilk. It is one of the best in the world in terms of height (third tallest wooden roller coaster in the world), speed (70 miles per hour), and drop height (176 feet). Where there had once been a widely derided steel coaster, El Toro now stands as one of the top wooden coasters in the world. In the most recent Golden Ticket Awards, only Boulder Dash at Lake Compounce scores higher.
2. New Texas Giant – Six Flags Over Texas
Some may consider this selection a cheat. After all, the ride that was replaced was Texas Giant. What cannot be denied is that the former ride closed for a year and a half, and a complete retooling of the previous design occurred. The former version was selected as the best wooden roller coaster in the world multiple times in the 1990s, but maintenance issues led to a bumpier ride in the literal sense. As riders got knocked around more and more, they rode Texas Giant less and less.
Eventually, the prior version of the ride was eliminated. In its place, the opposite change from El Toro occurred. The wooden coaster elements were removed and replaced with a new steel coaster, thereby making the ride smoother and sturdier. The result is a 15-story high thrill ride capable of speeds up to 65 miles per hour. The major enhancement changed the structure of the biggest drop to a whopping 79 degrees, the type of angle that wooden coasters have yet to achieve. New Texas Giant is currently ranked as one of the top eight steel roller coasters in the world. In combination with El Toro, it proves that whether you change from a wooden coaster to a steel one or vice versa, you can still design an original, better ride.
3. Goliath – Six Flags Over Georgia
Six Flags Over Georgia actually pre-dates Walt Disney World as one of the first amusement parks in the southeast. Its reputation has never matched that of Carowinds, much less Magic Kingdom, though. In the mid-2000s, the Six Flags Entertainment Corp. took a hard look at the 290-acre property and recognized that some of the attractions were failing to attract anybody. Great Gasp, an outdated parachute drop, and Looping Starship, one of those swinging ship thingies, were correctly determined to be a waste of space.
In their place, Six Flags determined to build something that was a rarity in the southeast to that point, a hypercoaster. Enter Goliath, a $20 million steel roller coaster that is 20 stories tall and capable of speeds up to 70 miles per hour. With approximately 4,500 feet of track, Goliath offers a sustained adrenaline rush for three and a half minutes. Its other highlights are a trio of bunny hops toward the end and a heart-dropping 540-degree downward helix midway through. Six Flags Over Georgia is not the first name on people’s lips when they think of southeastern theme parks, but Goliath should be a roller coaster on people’s thrill ride bucket lists.
4. Tennessee Tornado – Dollywood
Nestled in the Smoky Mountains of East Tennessee, Dollywood is one of the most beloved parks in North America due to its familial nature. While there was a paucity of thrill rides in the early years after Dolly Parton purchased Silver Dollar City from its previous owners, the past 15 years have witnessed a tremendous expansion in terms of coasters and other exciting attractions.
One of the most interesting changes involved the circuitous path of the River King Mine Train, which soon became known as River King Run-Away Mine Train. Oddly, that ride’s name changes were only beginning. It was sold by Six Flags St. Louis to Dollywood, where it was relocated and once again renamed, this time changing to Thunder Express. The hybrid wood/steel coaster wasn’t even done, as the park planners at Dollywood decided to sell it again. It has since found a permanent (?) home in Hot Springs, Arkansas as Magic Springs and Crystal Falls.
Dollywood kicked out the Coaster That Cannot Stay Named in favor of their ambitious new project, Tennessee Tornado. This new steel coaster maximizes the gorgeous treetops and mountain views of the area while providing the rider with a 63 mile per hour thrill ride. While Tennessee Tornado will never be mistaken as the tallest (163 feet) or longest (one minute and 48 seconds) ride, its incorporation of its surroundings rivals Millennium Force’s Lake Erie backdrop. Truly, it is an amusement park ride about the journey, not the destination.
5. Maverick – Cedar Point
At the roller coaster capital of the world, the twistiest, turniest ride is not a log flume. No, the White Water Landing attraction no longer exists at Cedar Point, which makes the younger version of me sad. What stands in its place, however, is a majestic ride whose design was so intense that it was altered prior to debuting.
Maverick is only the fourth longest ride at Cedar Point at 4,450 feet and its 70 miles per hour maximum velocity, while impressive relative to the rest of this list, is mundane compared to other coasters at the park. What’s the big deal, then? Maverick’s initial drop includes a 95-degree turn. Take a moment to visualize that. Several of the attractions listed above are noteworthy for drops in the mid-70s. Over 90 degrees means more than a right turn. Downward. Originally, the turns were even more dramatic, but the Intamin architects had to dial their ambition down a notch once they realized that the tracks would have struggled to handle the added tension. Maverick pushes the upper boundaries of current steel roller coaster technology in providing the most thrilling turns that are physically possible right now.
