Cedar Fair considers purchasing Paramount's Kings Island

I really hope this doesn't happen. Does anyone else fear that one day all amusement parks will be corporate owned and stripped of their individual character and charm? *** This post was edited by scraperguy99 5/20/2006 11:03:49 PM ***

...so you're saying that Paramount's King's Island isn't corporate owned??

I really hope this does happen. I almost don’t care who they sell it to. I’ve been A regular at Kings Island since 1979 and Cedar Point since 2000. The last few years at PKI have been awful management wise. I could go on A long rant explaining some of my experiences at that park, but I don’t like to do that. SFKK is the only park that I think has been consistently worse. Here is the list of parks that I thought were better managed last year: HW, CP, IB, SFGAm, SFStl. That last one surprised me too.

Kings Island used to be one of the best parks in the country until the late 80’s-early 90’s. The only parks that I can think of that received more national attention at that time were Disney and SFMM. CP didn’t come on strong until 1989. Paramount hasn’t done enough with Kings Island to remain A top park.

King’s Island is A very well rounded park. It’s also the home of A neutered legend and the worlds most expensive torture device. I will at least give Paramount credit for that. As far as rides are concerned, A few great roller coasters and A great Water Ride is all that PKI is really lacking. If Cedar Fair were to buy PKI, I think that they would complete the package in under ten years. Are the Paramount Parks the only large parks in North America without A hyper coaster? (The worlds tallest, fastest, only looping POS doesn’t count…IMO…..taer it down! =)

Summary: The two things that I like least about Paramount (Management, Quality of Coasters) are among the things I like most about Cedar Fair. That sounds like A recipe for A real winner to me. Kings Island may become one of Americas best amusement parks, again! I’m so exited!

I know Paramount is corporate, but I just think it would be worse if CF bought it. The Paramount parks would lose their character and become the same as the other Cedar Fair (minus CP) parks.

I just plain don't like corporate america I guess....I wish I could have been around for the good ole days of amusement parks. When there were wooden coasters everywhere and they were run as they were meant to be run....not choped up, "modernized", razed or trimmed to all hell like most woodies I've ridden at Corporate owned parks.

It's those big corporations that can put up the big capital to build these big rides.

For the record, I've yet to go to a charming Paramount Park (PGA and PKI). They are decent parks, but very far from what I would consider charming.

bit0mike, I'm in Lexington, and I haven't seen any television ads for PKI or KK this year. I think people in Lexington only respond to UK ads though.

Any PKI reps out there, build a blue and white roller coaster named the Wildcat with UK logos all over it, and people here will take it into their own hands to make sure more people ride THEIR coaster than any in the country... haha.

In a response to an earlier post about how Ohioans feel about these parks, pretty much GL and KI are strictly locals (aside from die-hard coaster lovers such as people on this site), whereas CP is clearly filled more with people on weekend trips, mini-vacations, etc. Directly comparing CP and KI, there's definitely a lot more people living in close driving distance to the park than to CP. And there's a world of difference in the clientele at the parks.

I used to live near KI and went several times a year, and went to CP on a weekend trip once a year. Now I live near CP/GL and go to those parks a few times a year and haven't been to KI in a couple years now because honestly I find it to be rather worthless right now. Hopefully Cedar Fair can turn it around.