Cedar Fair sells land under California's Great America, will lease back and close park after 11 years

Yea, Andy, I’m well aware and my opinion is that one can never have enough garlic-themed rides at an amusement park in Gilroy, lol.

That Von Roll would work nicely at Gilroy Gardens. I'm sure the drop tower could be plunked in along with the mouse. I'd really love to see Gold Striker there, but I don't think they have the room. My point is that when Great America goes bye bye, Gilroy could cover some of that market.

Too late: Cedar Fair No Longer Managing Gilroy Gardens

Watch out, Knott's -- you're next! ;)

(At least, I hope winkyface...)

Knotts is one of their best performing parks and I believe multiple members of the Knotts family are still on the Cedar Fair board so I doubt it. CW, CP, Carrowinds, KI and Knotts have gotten most of the capex for sometime, there’s likely a good reason for that (they make the most $.)

Wow breaking news from the city today... Mayor of Santa Clara Lisa Gilmor put out a video today stating neither she nor anybody in the city had any idea about the sale until CF announced it yesterday. She definitely seems irked by this. She also confirmed that the land is zoned to ONLY be a theme park, so for Prologis to do anything else it would need to get the land re-zoned and approved by the city. Still hope for us in Santa Clara to convince the city to not allow a re-zoning, to force Prologis to be in the theme park business 😂

Here's a link to her statement:

A slightly different response than Aurora Ohio in the fall of 2007.

Municipalities don't usually get into fights over zoning for commercial changes that don't impact residential areas. It's often too hard to justify, and theme park to whatever flavor of commercial this is doesn't likely cause any disruption. It's already attracting thousands of cars everyday.

Maybe the closing of this park won't happen quite as fast as we thought. Or maybe Prologis saw some of this coming which was the reason for setting an 11 year time table.

Gillmor was mayor when the city sold the land to Cedar Fair that 3 years later CF sold for double (city could have done that too). And she is running for reelection this fall and no doubt will hear people talking about how she sold the park for cheap and didn't do enough to save the park they went to when they were kids and now have taken their kids/grand kids to for decades. Expect her to be defiant about it. The city can fight over zoning issues if they want when the time comes but the choice will likely be an alternate use that will bring in tax dollars, create jobs, etc. or have it be an abandoned amusement park.

It may be true that the city could have sold the land to Cedar Fair for double, although possibly not three years ago, and almost certainly not if they wanted someone to operate an amusement park there. I presume the price was negotiated in order for CGA to continue operating profitably, and that the city took a lower price because, as the mayor said, the elected officials felt it was a community asset offering jobs of various kinds, entertainment for residents, sales tax revenues, and economic activity from tourists. It's not unreasonable for the mayor to feel a bit betrayed three years later, although obviously nobody was counting on a pandemic changing things significantly.

I won't get into the weeds but it will be awfully difficult for the City to defend what will likely be a far less intense use of the property with the zoning change. I'm a little surprised someone from Cedar Fair or, more appropriately, a representative of the buyer, didn't have some conversations with the City prior to the announcement.

I wouldn't assume they didn't...

So I have kind of a unique perspective on the issue. Don't want to name-drop, but I'm going to ahahaha. So my dad was head of the City Planning Commission for Santa Clara for 35 years. He worked until the late 2000s when he was diagnosed with ALS and had to retire. He has a street and a park in Santa Clara named after him and everything... Geof Goodfellow Sesquintennial park: (https://www.santaclaraca.gov/Home/Components/ServiceDirectory/Servi...y/310/2654

But so he played a big part in a lot of the previous Great America deals over the decades, as they changed companies, changed ownership vs leasings, all the drama, etc. The one thing I've noticed over following the park closely my whole life is that the city absolutely loves this park. They literally have done everything in their power to make sure it stays over the years. They've helped battle through all the complaints, all the issues (for example they helped mediate Gold Striker getting built with nearby companies, and convinced them that the added tunnel over the first drop would ease their noise concerns.)

I know that they are devastated about the loss of the park. It is definitely about a 90% done deal, but I wouldn't call it with 100% certainty yet. They're going to be mediating with Prologis over the next few years, and it's possible they can't come to a deal over what to do with the land and Prologis may end up re-selling. Prologis always does warehouses. Just thousands and thousands of square feet of warehouses. I'm sure the city won't be loving that idea. They want something that helps put them on the map, like CGA did and the nearby 9ers stadium does. Definitely some interesting things will be happening..

So this was posted over at reddit, with the assumption that this may be the CGA wildmouse being relocated to CP for the new boardwalk.

Woah. My 90% certainty just went up to 95% 😭.

A wild mouse at Cedar Point, that’s going to go well…

The city can certainly negotiate with Prologis about the land use, but doesn't that have zero impact on what Cedar Fair can do over the next 11 years in terms of moving rides? I'm seeing some parallels with what happened at Kentucky Kingdom, which might not be a bad thing considering that park is still alive today and arguably better than ever.

I made some comments over to the PointBuzz in regard to Psycho Mouse. In a nutshell, please no.
I waited the better part of an hour for my credit on that ride on a slow day. The dispatches on it were so far apart there was rarely two cars on the circuit at the same time. Some changes would have to be made in order for it to do well at a park like CP. It’s an Arrow model from 2001- the size is right for that spot but that’s about all I can think of. Our Kevin mentioned how much he and his family enjoyed HangTime at Knott’s, and I’m afraid a rinky ride like this would only make me ache for something better. Knott’s well-placed addition fit into a spot that held a Boomerang. I can’t help but think that CP’s patrons would notice that a high-thrill ride was replaced by something that might be considered inferior.
On the plus side- it would be cost efficient. There’s nothing like moving a ride you already own into a place where no one will recognize it. It would also be “family friendly” and look fine as part of the beach side improvements. And Ohio was lousy with Mouse rides back in the 60’s- it’s hard to think of a park that didn’t have a Mack, a Schiff, or at the very least a Herschell, so it’s return would have a certain nostalgic factor that could be played upon. Cedar Point had two mouse rides that for at least a season operated simultaneously.
My every hope for this rumor is that the ride gets a nice face lift, and maybe even new cars replacing those cartoony mice with something else, but Arrow’s no longer around to help with that. I’d also hope that CP would make a nod toward its coaster history and name the “new” ride Scamper.
Maybe all that’s left is to worry about what fun fun fun flat is going to join Troika Troika Troika, lol.

I'd be happy with a refurbished Chance Rotor, refurbished bathrooms, and getting rid of the current rain and wind policies.

Do you save that much more moving a mouse than just getting a new one?