Six Flags Question?

I was just wondering , does anyone know why Six Flags hasn't built a park in Florida? My reason of thinking is, with so many parks all around the country that are so close together, why not in Florida? The nearest park is Six Flags over Georgia.

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Does this thing go faaaaaast!

Orlando (and the immediate vicinity) is already saturated by "the Mouse" and Universal...fiscally, it would not make much sense for them to enter into a market such as that...

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Le roi est mort. Vive le roi.
Thanks Great America!

Well, if you consider the other parks in Florida, and then how Six Flags just kind of learned that maybe some of their other pakrs can't compete with another BETTER park in the state owned by somebody else. I think for now, that'll be their excuse. ;)

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Call me SpongeBobAlex.

Six Flags "regional" park concept wouldn't cut it there...there's too many high quality parks. They'd have to make a massive investment and it doesn't look (from their stock value) like they're prepared to do that.

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Why do you have to have a license to own a dog, but not to have a child?

They should open a park near Miami and cater to the teens and young adult crowd. A mega-club complex like Disney's Pleasure Island, combined with a thrill park, with a shuttle running from South Beach would be freaking awesome. Leave Orlando for the kiddies...

EDIT: Oh yeah, and it should be open from noon to 4am too :)

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*** This post was edited by Joe Carroll on 8/19/2002. ***

I think for the sake of the company, its a good thing they didn't try and enter the Florida market - they'd get their heads handed to 'em twice over ... and I'd laugh twice as hard ... oops did I say that out loud? :)

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Steel - #1 Kumba, #2 Millie, #3 Mantis ||| Wood - #1 Thunderbolt, #2 Villain, #3 Gwazi
"The key to a happy life is moderation" -- Jon Stewart

Okay... this may get zapped because it is only a rumor. However, I will say it anyway (Jeff or any other mod... zap away if you wish).

This past weekend my sister in law got married. My wife's cousin and her husband came up here to PA. They are from St.Cloud, FL (not far south of Orlando). We visited Hersheypark on Sunday evening and got to talking about parks during the visit. They said that there is talk around the area of Six Flags buying land. Again, zap this if you wish as a rumor (that it is all it is at this point... one that had surfaced a few years ago).

With the stock drop and cutting back on spending and the notorious job that SF does on theming, it sounds VERY unlikely. Just relaying that one of the "locals" from down there said.

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Kind of hard to take a post as objective if a park or coaster name is part of the "user name"

JC...opening at Noon?....are you hoping for the "early morning crowd" or what.....the South Beachers are just getting to bed then....have it open at Dusk, when the "creatures of the night" come out to play.....;)

I was just thinking that a few days ago. It's suck a big tourist place. Joe is right. Miami is open.

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-Sean

Six Flags would fit in nicely either three hours North of the Orlando mecca (i.e. -- Jacksonville) or three house South in Miami.

Before you get into the argument that Florida folks are spoiled by the high-tech themed thrills, consider the Miami turnout for the Fair Expo every year.

http://www.fairexpo.com/fairhistory.htm

In just 2 1/2 weeks, the carnival attracts more than 850,000 people. For most regional parks, that's a whole season right there -- only this is during the school year. And it's not free. Admission is $7. P.O.P. passes are $15 over the weekedays, with folks spending two, three times that amount over the weekend on a pay-per-ride ticket deal.

If anyone thinks the 3 million people stocked in Dade, Broward and Monroe County wouldn't support a regional park, the numbers say otherwise.

The only problem is, who would build a park from scratch these days? But for the company that would it's a goldmine in a rich metropolitan market.

HA!
they cant win against cedar point. how are they going to win against the 2 biggest known park chains in the world. could you see a typical six flags park competing against the freindlyness, tidyness, themedness, and crowd handleingness of a universal or a disney.

it would be 10 times uglier compared to CP vs SFWOA. its like a t rex vs a human

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1.Fire Dragon 2.Ice Dragon 3.Raptor 4.Batman Knight Flight 5.Kraken

FireD, I agree with you that Six Flags would be toast in Orlando. The fact that both Universal and Disney are still sitting on a lot of land, and the next park in either company's arsenal can be a traditional amusement park category killer, it'd be suicide.

The last "traditional" amusement park in the area was Boardwalk & Baseball (formerly Circus World) and it bit the dust even when the economy was toasty.

But Miami is entirely different. It is a four hour drive from the Orlando and Tampa parks. That's about a state or two travel time in some parts of the country. The local economy and median incomes in South Florida are well above that of Central Florida. MIA remains one of the busiest international airports and the Port of Miami is one of the busiest.

It doesn't matter what 8 great parks are doing in the middle of the state. There is obviously enough of a market to support just 1 even mediocre park down in South Florida. The fact that not one, but two new NBC and CBS shows this fall have Miami in the title (Good Morning Miami, CSI: Miami) shows that Hollywood still thinks that there is a young demographic group out there where Miami means something. Now it's just a waiting game for a park developer to figure it out.

Rick