Kennywood's Gold Rusher to take last ride

Kennywood Park has officially announced that its classic dark ride "The Gold Rusher" will take its final ride Thursday 8/23/07

The Gold Rusher was new to Kennywood in 1981 and has become a classic to dark ride enthusiests the ride is themed as a runaway coal car traveling through a haunted coal mine. skeletons,ghosts and even coyotes are just some of the things you encounter on your journey.

The decision came due to the ride being outdated and only capable of carrying 300 guests per hour plus low ridership (except on very busy days) Kennywood will be replacing the gold rusher with a new ride for 2008 in the same location that will triple or quadruple the amount of guests The Gold Rusher can carry.

I work at the park and Know what is going to replace The Gold Rusher but Kennywood has not released that info yet so neither will I ;) LET THE GUESSING GAME BEGIN

the new ride replacing The Gold Rusher will use the same building that housed The Gold Rusher but will not use the bridge enterance that is there now.

Nobody likes a tease.

Well, you kinda leaked out it's going to utilize a building....

My guess would be some kind of interactive ride where you do the target shoot or something of that nature.

Put me in the minority here but I never cared much for Gold Rusher. I'm a fan of darkrirdes but that one didn't do it for me- it was too high-tech to be traditional, but not high-tech enough to be as impressive as it should have been. At least it sounds like it will be replaced by another darkride, although I doubt it will be le Cachot!

I like Goldrusher more than any of the Sally rides...they're too modern for my tastes. I loved the western themeing and will really miss this ride.

Why was Le Cachot removed anyway? I thought there was a fire that damaged it? Or was it something else?

Glad I rode it on my last visit. I just hope it's something different then a sally ride, or if it is a sally ride it's something more then most of them.

I hope they don't remove this "classic" dark ride and replace it with something like... I don't know... a now popular comic strip character based ride that will look very dated in a few years when the popularity of that character kind of fades...

Oh... wait...

Been there, done that...

Never mind.

I would not be surprised if KW puts an interactive darkride there. It would be the only such ride for over 400 miles between KI and HP. Also this would give KW somethibng that CP doesn't have.

If this turns out to be true, I would expect Sally to be involved. Kennywood Entertainment has had two Sally projects in the past. These were Ghost Hunt at LC and the animations for the Exterminator.

^And Ghost Hunt remains one of the top-rated interactives around...

To me, it's a virtual no-brainer for Kennywood. Den of Lost Steel Mill Workers? ;)

I personally find the interactive thing a waste of time. You spend so much time trying to shoot targets that you can't fully enjoy the scenery.

Give me a dark ride like Knoebels Haunted Mansion or a Spiderman at IoA any day over a Sally Interactive.

-Tambo

^I think many enthusiasts agree with you, tambo....

But the GP eats those things UP, like a never-ending gravy boat. Just at Universal in Orlando, the standby line for MiB is typically almost twice the line for Mummy...yep, I said Mummy. Soooo thankful there's a SR line, cause MiB is really quite good - just not worth waiting an hour for...

As long as Kennywood continues to keep darkrides a part of their formula, I'll be happy with whatever they add... unless it's along the lines of what SLFAKE said.

So tired of the stupid general public, they're why we can't have classic rides anymore in most places.

I say if there is another Spiderman thing like at IOA I wouldnt mind but I usually like dark rides no matter what, and so does the general public.

There is no way Kennywood would ever put a Spiderman ride in that building, its not possible. For one thing its way too small (Spiderman and Darkastle are both in gigantic buildings) another, the ceiling is way too low for all those big screens, and finally its on the second floor of an old building (those cars are really heavy.)

Its either going to be a classic or interactive flat or they are going to build a new building.

RIP Gold Rusher you always had the right combo of cheesyness for me.

lol scraperguy99, have you ever thought that parks don't keep around these old rides because they are too expensive to maintain? There aren't many classic cars around either, its not cause people don't like them, its cause they cost too much to keep running.

I would place money on a Sally ride unless they tear down the whole building and start from scratch.

I am shocked that more people aren't fired up over this to be honest.

This was kind of simple and pretty outdated towards the end, but nothing like a bunch of Wile E. Coyote types at the end of a ride. The ride seemed like it was going to be a gone a while ago, but they seemed to have it open a lot more in recent years then say ten years ago. I'm a little surprised that a few more people aren't fired up also with the loss of I guess the last old style feel dark ride that hasn't been revamped.

I'd like to get excitied over something that will replace it but there just doesn't seem like there is a much space there to do anything to go crazy over.

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I personally find the interactive thing a waste of time. You spend so much time trying to shoot targets that you can't fully enjoy the scenery.

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You beat me to it. I cannot stand them either. Leave the "interaction" to shooting galleries, etc...and let the ride itself be the experience. Often, one spends so much time trying to "shoot" things, one missed a lot of what's around to see.

A new high-end dark ride will be just fine.

:)

Anyone who is completely against interactive dark rides needs to ride MIB @ Universal before they can make that statement. While I agree that I can see your position when it comes to the Sally rides (although I dont agree with it) I cant with MIB, because the targets are the scenery.