Design competitions for rollercoasters

I wonder why the Theme Park industry doesn't use design competition when designing new rollercoasters. It is used all the time for buildings, and with such a large investement the spend on Rollercoasters. It would also allow smaller companies to fairly compete with the larger ones for projects. It would also allow more more variety, IMO of designs, im parks that are close to eachother.

Such competitions would just get in the way of concentrating on what puts food on the table... money.

-------------
Jeff
Webmaster/Admin - CoasterBuzz.com

First lesson to the GP about business. There's nothing written down where you have to be fair with your competitors. Or, for that matter, that you always have to make sure the little guy can compete with the big guns.

There's a couple of different reasons why this is.
First, a lot of the time the little guys don't have the same kind of portfolio as the bigger companies. And as a business looking for contractors you always want to people that the contractor in question has worked for. If you get rave reviews, that's great, but that doesn't mean you should still go with company A over company B.

You also want to make sure that they have all of the resources necessarry to complete the task. For example, Can they do it on a time table that suits your needs? Do they offer maintainence services?, etc.

Lastly, I have never heard a successful businessman say that his decision to go with Company A was made because he thought it'd be more fair to make sure everyone got a chance.

-------------
Randy Hutchinson
You build it, I'll ride it

I am not talking about fairness, but rather increasing competition on designs. And as a result of increased competition an increase in creativity of design, and an increased exposure of smaler companies. Not neccesarly giving the smaller guys a better chance, although it will invetiably happen. I think if largeser companies are forced to look at other designs, it will be incorporated into their own designs. And design compettitons are used for architecture projects all the time and they work real well. *** This post was edited by Bob Dole on 11/25/2000. ***

Randy, Randy, Randy. We live in a republic. Our government isn't perfect. May I suggest some reading? Try "Capitalism and Freedom," by Milton Friedman. It explicitly explains in so many words that the free market and spirit of competition and capitalist piggishness is the backbone of our booming economy. The best way for progress to be made is by forcing companies to make good designs for a good price or file for Chapter 11. Case in point, Microsoft suppressed competition, and now it's going to be cleaved in twain and follow in the footsteps of AT&T. Small companies might not be able to front the cash for good rollercoasters, but if they can make ideas good enough to attract a multi-billion dollar multi-national tycoon than they should be allowed to compete. It's a free country!

I know of no better example of small companies doing amazing, original things than Setpoint. Super Saturator took some of the best ideas and made them better, and even managed to appeal to a broad audience.

B&M made a better looper. Morgan made a better hyper. Intamin has made everything they've touched better in the last two or three years. The market needed better stuff, and these companies came up to the plate.

Who will be next? We'll know sooner than later, I'm sure.

-------------
Jeff
Webmaster/Admin - CoasterBuzz.com

Yes, I agree with yitzhak1995, this competition would require designers to strive for their optimum ability rather than slacking off to parks because they just don't care.
-------------
What is life without geniuses?

I'm sure when parks want a certain type of coaster whether it be wood or steel they have certain specifications they want on the ride like height and lenght. They probably give their ideas to several coaster companys to work out their ideas. Who ever has the best layout for the lowest bid wins.

Lets face it every park wants the best ride for the buck.

-------------