Son of Beast closes

Like the nurses stationed at the Crystal Beach Cyclone? ;)

GreatBearHP said:
...and do something about Flight Deck being in the middle of nowhere.

That sounds impossible. The terrain in that area is unusable, so adding more attractions close to Top Gu-I mean Flight Deck isn't an option. There is also a service road that the line for SOB and FD goes through, and that doesn't help the illusion that FD is in the middle of nowhere. FD actually isn't that far from everything else; it just seems like it.

exactly :)

Perhaps you're missing my point? I think in all likelihood, Son of Beast is done for.

But the ride isn't as truly horrible as it seems. In reality, there is one major problem with the ride, and that is reflected in rider complaints, incident reports, and even in the track maintenance records that were presented by the local newspaper's web site. The problem is everything from the top of the second hill to the mid-course brake, the area known as the "Rose Bowl". It has never run right, it has been a recurring problem, and it has hurt people. When they tried to slow the ride down through there to make it more tolerable, it valleyed.

Construction of Son of Beast took an entire year, required re-routing a stream, and was done on a site so rugged that it required two tower cranes to reach the whole site. Taking the thing down isn't going to be much easier. Just look at the site; it's a 60-foot drop right out of the station, for crying out loud.

But the ride's problem isn't the 60-foot ravine, and it isn't the 218-foot lift hill or the 200 foot first drop. Heck, if you could opt to get off at the top of the second hill (and get transportation back to the midway) a lot of people would actually enjoy that ride.

But the rose bowl, unlike the first third and second half of the ride, is built on mostly level ground. It would probably be easier to clear that out of the way than it was to take down the loop structure.

Cincinnati probably contains more wood coaster experts than any other city in the nation (although on a per-capita basis, Central PA probably has them beat). I think ultimately salvage would be cheaper than scrap, and when finished the park could end up with a kick-ass 218-foot wood coaster instead of an ass-kicking 218-foot wood coaster, and they could probably build it for less than it would cost to dispose of the lift hill. Heck, at least one of the aforementioned wood coaster experts might even ask, "Do you still have that loop around here somewhere?".

I think there are big chunks of the ride that are worth saving. But if the park were to do that, I don't think the resulting ride would be "Son of Beast" anymore, any more than the Great Escape Comet is still the Crystal Beach Cyclone.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.
(Ross, do people actually *eat* in the Cru Club?!)

It won't take more than an hour or cost more than 10 bucks to take down. Few gallons of gas and some matches ;)

There are pictures of the removed signs here.

It is worth nothing however that they covered the main sign and put up a sign for Club Blood (a haunt attraction) last year. I would say that they are just removing the signs so they can reuse SOB's queue for haunt, rather than using part of Flight Deck's queue like last year.

Thanks Pagoda for the pics. I don't have to upload the ones I have.

Pagoda! Thanks for the pictures...
Hopefully this means the ride itself is next.
Good riddance to that pile of crap!

Do you think KI's attendence will drop if they take SOB out?

Personally i really don't think so.
SOB has been closed for most of the season anyways and from what i understand attendance is up 3% from last year at this time. That 3% is probably from Diamondback but again SOB has been closed most of the season anyways.

I agree with Dave. I would also like to remind everyone that CF hasn't put much money into SOB as Paramount did. Granted I am sure they have spent 100s of thousands on the ride already, if not in the millions, but they didn't spend the millions that Paramount spent to build it. The cost of dismantling the ride AND building a new ride would probably be upwards of 10M. It seems to me you could do a pretty darn good job at retrofitting it for a lot less than that.

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SVLFever said:
I agree with Dave. I would also like to remind everyone that CF hasn't put much money into SOB as Paramount did. Granted I am sure they have spent 100s of thousands on the ride already, if not in the millions, but they didn't spend the millions that Paramount spent to build it. The cost of dismantling the ride AND building a new ride would probably be upwards of 10M. It seems to me you could do a pretty darn good job at retrofitting it for a lot less than that.

but, the rep that SOB has even if they retrofit that ride. Would it really be worth it instead just tearing it down and starting over?

Not if they changed the name. ;)

lol. Simply change the name and bam! You got a new ride. Who's gonna know ;)

SVLFever said:
I agree with Dave. I would also like to remind everyone that CF hasn't put much money into SOB as Paramount did. Granted I am sure they have spent 100s of thousands on the ride already, if not in the millions, but they didn't spend the millions that Paramount spent to build it. The cost of dismantling the ride AND building a new ride would probably be upwards of 10M. It seems to me you could do a pretty darn good job at retrofitting it for a lot less than that.

CF may not have put as much money into the ride as PP did, but CF is now stuck with all the lawsuits that the ride has brought and may bring. Face it, people in the area know the track record of the ride and if someone should get hurt during the ride, most will immediately think lawsuit. It's a no win situation for CF at this point.

Most people with half of a brain would notice, GreatBearHP, but maybe a name change would help them to forget in the long run. :)

i know. Just a thought if they wanted to save money :)

By demolishing SOB they will be saving money in the long run. Plus, it's a good PR move ("We're removing a ride in the name of guest safety...").

I know we keep saying that CF hasn't put as much money into SOB as PP did, which is true. But SOB was still part of the asset value in the acquisition, no? That means CF is pretty much invested in it, either way.

SOB in its current state has to go. How that's accomplished will have to be determined by weighing all the pros and cons. And from the sounds of it, there's a lot to consider.

SOB had so much potential to be an easy top 10 wooden coaster. Crappy design, layout, and assembly led to this