SFA 4/9 The day without the miserable weather

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coasterguts said:
Just a small correction Colin, when I worked at the park in 1986, Wild World was a loop. Coyote Creek was built by Burke, The Lucky Albatross was there (rarely, if ever open, but there)and went in a curve pattern back to along Wild One and where Looney Tunes Movie Towne now sits. The front of the park started just outside the main street service center.

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Oh, wow. See! They had a loop, but Six Flags just had to come and break it!!! :-p

Believe it or not, The only dead end in the park at the time was where Sunoco Speedway and Wild One now sit.

All they have to do to fix the layout is add a path that would connect Batwing with the Creek area, add a bathroom and thats it. The layout can work, they just have to stop the one way traffic in and out of that area. Its a pretty lousy dead end. Especially when you walk all the way back there, find out the ride is closed and have to leave the area again like we did on Sunday.

Something tells me there is more to it than that. Coaster Lover and I were looking at that area the other day. Mind Eraser has so many supports to run a path through them would be a maze. Renegade Rapids proximity to Mind Eraser would make for an extremely narrow path. Somehow, I get the impression it's just not as simple as building the path between the two areas.

I was there Sunday as well. I got sick as a dog on Two-Face, but other than that I had a great day! I don't know what it is about Two-Face...

I rode every coaster once. Batwing is awesome and forceful in the front seat! I waited about an hour because someone threw up on the thing. When I hopped aboard, one of the associates said, "Hello, how are you today? Is that tight enough for you sir?" I was impressed! Alot of the employee's provided excellent customer service. Hopefully it'll last for the rest of the season. Superman indeed ran slow over the last 2 hills.

It was nice to see the live entertainment and characters walking around. Did anyone see the lady in the white dress with the HUGE white/purple hat? Her badge said "Mayor," so i'm assuming she was the major of Gotham????

Anyone see the 45 Anniversary Parade? *** Edited 4/11/2006 3:40:07 PM UTC by SF Critic***

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coasterguts said:
Something tells me there is more to it than that.

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How about a bridge to go over the rapids ride?

>Probably because they didn't. That's when you call maintenance. Ride Operators aren't trained on how to fix computer or mechanical problems. I'm sure there was an error code or something similar though.

Of course this is when you would call them, but the way that things were handled were NOT professional. It could have even been a safety risk--opening the air gates and having the train unlocked, but not saying anything to the guests right away. Some people even got into the train while this was going on. No announcements were made when they should have been--he finally did say something, but it was later than he should have.

>Like someone else said, it's very common when it gets really cold for the train to creep over the bunny hills. That definitely wasn't a problem on Sunday.

I know it's common for it to run slower in the cold. I was making an observation, and also stating the breakdown. This was possibly like the slowest I have ever ridden it.

>Dude, it's Mind Eraser, a 1995 off-the-shelf SLC. It is what it is.

I know this. Again, making an observation and reporting.

>Is that based on prior rides on Two-Face, or are you saying that didn't like the ride? Since I don't where you live, I don't know if you've ridden an Invertigo before. Key seats are the very front of the train, and the very back facing the operator.

I live near Baltimore, and I have been to the park MANY times. I may have even met you before--way back. I think you were with Jeremy Norris. Anyway, I even rode Two Face on it's opening day. It rode about average for Two Face on a cold day, but the thing could SERIOUSLY use some cleaning. The dirt or whatever in the station was gross (near the track), and the shoulder restraints were pretty dirty, too.

>What befuddles me as this point is why two people have posted trip reports, but yet you feel the need to tell everyone about the bobsled ride (Avalanche) which is adequately described and there are pictures on Coasterguts site. There was a rather large maintenance pit beneath Krypton Comet. I'm guessing that had to be filled in.

What are you getting on me for? I was making an observation and giving my opinion. I wish the park would do something nicer with this ride than leave it carni-style. What about Geauga Lake's version? It's nicely in a barn. At least if they put bricks with planters around the thing, it might look nicer and more permanent, not just set up on blocks. At least it'll have a nicer queue in its new location.

>I've been though this time and time and time again, but for the sake of the ignorant (and I don't mean that in a nasty way), SFA/Adventure World never had an Enterprise. There were only two companies who made those--Huss and Schwarzkopf. The company who made the Enterprise-knockoff is most likely long, long out of business and therefore I'm assuming parts aren't available to get it back up and running. Sure Iron Eagle's spot is still visible--they just removed the damn thing to the tune of $80,000! There was a 'Please pardon our progress sign,' so I would expect to see something new pop up in its place. Will it be a ride? I don't think so.

Ok, I didn't realize that it wasn't an official enteprise (though this does seem somewhat familiar). But if they can't get parts for the thing, they should take it out entirely and put something else there. Why bother keeping it, and why waste the space? As for Iron Eagle, then can be excused for that, though I hope they do make good use of the space. With this and the enterprise knockoff spaces, they have good locations, but are being wasted right now--one longer than the other, as the knockoff has been there for a while now.

>S&S Towers are fairly boring, unless a) they have a Space Shot, or b) they have a combo program. I would hate to see that happen. I would like to see a new drop tower added at some point, like a smaller version of Drop Zone.

Well, given the height variance the park has, it would probably only be around 200 ft, which isn't extremely large these days. S&S towers would be nice if they were space shots or combo towers--I agree. The plain turbo drops I don't care for as much. Plus, the capacity would be better than 12 (or the current 8).

>The layout of the park was predetermined a long time ago by the owners of Wild World. You say how is that possible? Well, they decided to place this old wooden roller coaster in the way that constrained everything else to its' border. Tell me how you would improve the layout without moving multiple rides and the train station?

While Wild World did this, Adventure World didn't help it the best, either. The location of Roar and the Typhoon Seacoaster have constrained a good path from being built around the end of Wild One to behind it. Also, SFA could open up some sort of path from near the Batman arena to under the Wild One (like they did for the one Fright Fest, only make it nicer and more permanent).

>I agree that there are certain sections of the park that should be better looking that you mentioned, but that should've been the responsibility of the last management team. They should've built more rides to fill in those areas. Putting up construction fences wouldn't make any sense as the area can be seen from Roar, S:ROS, Joker's Jinx, and Wild One.

True that. And I'm not faulting the current management team much, since they just stepped in not too long ago. But it still would be nice if it were address at some point, hopefully sooner than later. It's just a shame when you see a park with such potential (such as SFA and SFWoA--when it was still owned by SF) not run and/or laid out optimally.

There should be enough space between ME & RR to build a path quite easily,once you get clear of ME's structure for the lift & drop there's enough room to widen the path & then simply follow it to the backside of the rapids & turn north.

A spectator bridge over RR doesn't sound half bad IMO & then they can put up UT in that area & throw in a few flats as well.

We thought maybe a boardwalk along Renegade Rapids or a a series of bridges. It's costing the park $350,000 to replace the concrete in Hurricane Harbor. I wonder how much it would cost to build a concrete path, a couple of bridges or boardwalk to Batwing. Toss a restroom in that area, I bet your look at $1,000,000 project including design work.

Overall, I think the park doesn't want to make mistakes they've made in the past and do this project right from the beginning.

If they aren't sold/closed, I expect things like this and other customer service projects to be completed next year. *** Edited 4/11/2006 7:02:45 PM UTC by coasterguts***

I have an older satellite picture of SFA that includes Batwing. Since that's copyrighted (I'm guessing), I'm going to try to trace overtop of it and show you what I think is possible in terms of expansion, paths etc. that would make for a better layout without having to relocate rides. But Coasterguts is right about the Mind Eraser/Renegade Rapids junction--there's no room to build any path of width in between the two rides. I'm not sure when I'll get to this project, but I'll try soon.

I've got that overhaed pic as well printed out somewhere,it's from the 2001/2002 off season.

Now I'm still thinking that they should expand that area in between wild one & JJ by putting in a couple flats & a restroom perhaps,with avalanche having been moved to KC's former site that leaves a nice opening which could serve as an entry plaza of sorts to a new expansion....the only problems with such an idea are A. that is used primarilly as a maintenance/storage are for ride vehicles & other items & B. during FF it's used on midnight express for one of the rides themed show performances.

4/12/06 Great Weather, Great Day, Good Crowd

11:30 am - 1:30 pm 2Hrs

A few things I wanna highlight too make things short.

- Upon Entering the Parking Lot I was greeted by an employee say Happy Anniversary.

- Parking Attendents very helpful.

- Looney Tunes and Justice League Everywhere even outside the Gates.

- TSC Open which is a plus! I didn't check to see how many boats were on the track.

- Superman I believe was running two trains, but didn't ride because someone threw up and the train was stuck in the station I believe. Was told by and employee.

- Batwing running 1 train. Line very very long.

- All rides open, except Avalanche

- Employees were very positive and asking how your day was.

- Brunch with Bugs and 45 Anniversary heavily promoted.

Overall A-

The park is coming along very well, even for Spring Break. I really enjoyed myself and will be back Friday. *** Edited 4/13/2006 2:07:14 PM UTC by SF Critic***

I was there yesterday as well. Superman was running only one train (the red train). As of 4/12, Mind Eraser, Wild One, and Two Face were running at full capacity; ROAR and Joker's Jinx have both their trains on the tracks, but were only running one train (Joker's Jinx was running both trains briefly opening day, but has since gone to one train due to lack of need for the second)(ROAR's black train was JUST put on the transfer track and still had the dummies in it as of Wednesday); Batwing and Superman were both running one train with the second train nowhere to be seen... however, the coasters were ALL running VERY well with very little downtime (Batwing included).

As you noted, TSC was also running (also with very little breakdowns), which was a HUGE surprise this early in the season... I counted about 6-7 boats. PBR has recieved a few new rafts and was running very well. I have to say that right now my biggest complaint is the Superman crew... I guess the real problem is that the used to be the best crew in the park (nearly Busch Gardens or Cedar Point speed), and now are just on par with the other coasters. It's still not bad, but with only one train, it's still a bit too much of a wait.

But you're right, the ONLY ride in the park (all kiddie rides included) that wasn't running was the still under construction "Avalanche"... I can honestly say I've NEVER seen that happen at SFA before.. and this was a weekday! It's a promising sign for sure. Let's hope it keeps up.

Last night, 4/12/06, between 4PM and close there were a few glitches. JJ had a breakdown and was closed for a bit, but was back up and running within a half hour or so. Wild One also had some sort of malfunction and was down for about 30 mins. I noticed a boat full of people stranded on one of the lifts on TSC, but I didn't really pay attention to how long it was down. Several of the food stands had register problems and couldn't sell food, and at least one of the gift shops couldn't accept credit cards. All these were minor in nature and could be expected to happen from time to time. Overall, I give them a B+ to an A-.

I had a chance to speak with the new skipper at SFA and I really think that this is the guy that can turn things around. *** Edited 4/13/2006 4:24:03 PM UTC by Rescue131***

With Avalanche's relocation does anyone think we'll see a return of the backwards operational cycle? I so hated it when they just up & stopped running it like that last season as the backwards mode was about the fastest part of the entire cycle.

I think asked this question once and I was told Avalanche has never ran backwards.

^It used to run backwards up until a season or two ago.The ride would start in forward running mode for about a minute,stop & then start up in reverse for another minute or so.

I guess they chose to stop running it in reverse after they had to take it apart in 03 to repair the motor,doesn't anyone recall when it was disassembled & on the racks & we all thought it might be removed a couple years ago?

I believe that was 2004. I've been going to the park since 2002 and I don't remember the ride ever running backwards. Then again, I must not have a very good memory because the spec sheet on Chance Morgans site says it does go forwards and backwards.

I believe Rodeo ran backwards once as well, but they have since stopped that as well...