how much to build a park?

Just out of curiosity how much do you think it would cost to build an all new amusement park? It would need at least four good coasters and several good flats. Also how much would it cost to buy out an amusement park about the size of Geauga Lake before SF bought it?

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Check out the point ol! http://www.thepointol.com/

This doesn't directly answer your question (as there's no real direct answer), but if you're really interested in what it takes to build and open a park there's a fascinating paper about the building of Fiesta Texas at http://www.econres.com/documents/issue_papers/issue_era_16_fiesta_texas.pdf

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Touchè, teacher, touchè.
*** This post was edited by ThemeDesigner 7/21/2003 5:18:55 PM ***

Just ask TitanFan!

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Never Has Gravity Been So Uplifting.

Cool article.

Hey, to be my usual smart a$$ self, you can build one for $20 if you buy RCT2. ;)

Seriously though I'd guess $5-10 million for the land, $50 million for the infrastructure (buildings, walkways, parking lot), $10-20 million per coaster, and $1 million each for small flats and up to $5 million each for larger rides (drop towers etc.) You are probably looking at a couple hundred million just to build it. So if you win Powerball...don't forget to invite us for opening day...;)

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"SOME people have NO class!" - Mom from the Whizzer queue

For Marine World it's $52,000,000 for the land... but that is California for you.

So, having said that, to just start an ok park, I'd guess it would cost $100+ million.

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www.CaliforniaCoasterNews.com
www.SFMWZone.com

It all depends on the size of your park. While $100 million is a good guess, in today's world it might cost more. And don't forget that there is the possibility of cost over-runs during construction.

First step is to get a feasibility study to determine that your location is right to support a theme park project and make sure it's a location that is easy for us to get to. That's why I like close to freeway access for park locations.

X Factor

Of course, if you want a *real* park, like DisneySea or Animal Kingdom or IOA, you'll need between US$800M and US$1B :)

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--Maddie--
What do I Listen-To?
May the Schwarz be with you.

IOA was $2b.

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A random Mooshter's Dawntionary listing: Glibido - all talk and no action.

Well I don't know about YOU, but MY park would cost 16.23 gazillion (with a "G") dollars US. In fact, the rides would be so scary and fun, we'd have counselors available at guest services and friendly hosts to help wipe the GD silly smile off your face before you leave. ;)

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"SOME people have NO class!" - Mom from the Whizzer queue

I would just buy a park that is already built and well-known, then turn it in what I would want it to be.

Does anybody know how much Visionland or Jazzland cost to build?

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"The Mountain Slidewinder. Voted The #1 Non-Rollercoaster Ride in America Amusement Business Magazine, 1991"

The total cost for all of the additions for Celebration City was 40 million. But that was just for park upgrades, rides, and the laser/pyro/ect. show (4 mil.?)
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ROYALS!!!

It may cost close to $100 million to build, but no one ever would need that much money. If you buy the land ahead of time and take out a loan on it then pay it off. You'll only 10- 20 million tops to build the rides and etc. because you could get it fiananced, easily with the growing theme park market it is getting easier to get parks financed. So no you don't have to win the lottery to build a park, you just need to be backed by someone who has won the lottery.

The HFEC (SDC, Inc.) group, correct me if I'm wrong, pretty much payed for Celebration City in pure cash, with out financing. They usually do that with any of their additions.

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ROYALS!!!

All of these costs are why you don't see too many parks built from scratch these days. It's cheaper (and quicler) to buy a struggling park and then just add to it. Visionland went for just $5.2 million. That's it! You've got the land and the older rides and infrastructure in place. All you have to do is work on the upgrades, and, that's right, shatter past preconceptions that put the park on the block in the first place.

Mamoosh said:
IOA was $2b.
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A random Mooshter's Dawntionary listing: Glibido - all talk and no action.

I've never, ever believed that number. I have no reference, but I remember seeing sources that estimated the park's cost at $1B with the other $1B going to other things. *What* other things? got me. . . maybe it was all R&D for Spiderman and Pteranodon Flyers :)

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--Maddie--
What do I Listen-To?
May the Schwarz be with you.

Believe me IOA was not built on $2 billion dollars. The correct sum is a little over a billion if that.

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Join Rideworld, and tell them that coaster-freak sent you!!!

Well the reason I was asking is because, I'm having it checked, but its a possibility when I turn 18 (In 5 months) I could inheret between 2 and 4 million and I figured if I invested and let it sat for a decade or two, my dream of real life roller coaster tycoon could come true.

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Check out the point ol! http://www.thepointol.com/

It depends....do you want trees, do you want land to expand, do you want themeing, do you want a water park? There are literally hundreds of questions that would need to be answered before you could figure out an even close estimate.

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"Here's my ten cence, my two cence is free"-Eminem

My dream park would probably cost a few billion, but that's why they do it in phases.

If you were making a new park, it would probably be rather small, but you'd want plenty of land and preferably be away from residential areas. Real "theme" parks like Disney and Universal would obviously cost more than your average amusement park.

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"I don't need a compass to tell me which way the wind shines."
-Mr. Furious

Not to ruin your dreams, Mike77, but if you inherit any large sum of money, Uncle Sam will take a large portion of it.

Even if you got the $4 million tax-free (for purposes of this example), at an 8% annual return (without Uncle Sam dipping into your pocketbook - which he would) it would take you 42 years to get $100 million...

And then to make things even worse, inflation will make that $100M worth a lot less than what $100M is now...

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--George H
---Currency tracking experiment... http://www.wheresgeorge.com (Referring to The "George" on the $1 bill - Not Me)
*** This post was edited by redman822 7/22/2003 12:30:12 AM ***