Water park success this year

Previous to this year, it wasn't really commonplace to hear about widespread construction or expansion of water parks. Sure a few parks would add a new slide every year or two, but nothing close to the buzz that's been generated this year.

Is the increased interest from the public because of more thrilling innovations or are the peeps becoming less interested in actual ride portion of parks? Does this massive heat wave that's positioned itself over the majority of the midwest have anything to do with it, or is it just a timely bonus for water park owners?

Why would there be such an interest amongst industry folk now? I mean, it's always been known that water slides, lazy rivers, and wave pools are really fun and, as a whole, cost a heck of a lot less than a coaster, so what has changed in the past couple years? Are the large amusement park owners starting to realize that maintaining or increasing attendance by adding a new coaster every few years is no longer as economical as expanding their water parks instead?

Also, people in the industry are finally starting to realize that operations like indoor water parks combined with hotels are not a fad and really do bring in the beaucoup (bookoo) bucks year round.

I know I've proposed a bunch of questions, but I'm interested in what people's thoughts are on the determining factors that have lead to the whole industry finally taking notice.

Waterparks have come far. Take a look at SFA and DP, there water parks are usually more crowded than the actual park. I am actually glad that water parks are starting to take in the bulk of the crowd, because I am more of a roller coaster lover, than slide lover.

http://www.coasterbuzz.com/2005-192-657052.htm

Oh, quit hatin' Moosh.

-Signed, Waterpark Fan ;)

Who's hatin? I thought CPGenius might be interested in the other discussion.

mOOSH - likes waterparks, too.

Yeah, I've seen that article...I actually read it in the hard copy version. :) It's one of the few articles in the Journal Gazette that didn't give false facts or an unfavorable bias regarding amusement parks.

That discussion didn't seem to delve into some of the questions I had though, and since news article discussions pretty much die when their link leaves the main page, I thought that a thread in the forum on the topic would be better than replying to a "dead" news article discussion.

Moosh: Smiley face = obvious jokey-joke

Should I have signed it 'Wavepool Tamer' instead? ;)

-'Playa

I can vouch for SFGAm. While we've been waaayyy overdue for a summer like this, I know for a fact SFGAm is extremely happy with their decision to finally build. It has been an idea for 15 years!

Each day the waterpark is slammed and the park has made signs to let guests know at the front gate: "Hurricane Harbor is expected to operate at full capacity today, etc..." While I don't know how the amusement park is doing on hot summer days, the waterpark has reached capacity quickly almost every day since opening.

Still makes me wonder what SFGAm is going to do with the current water rides inside the park. Yes, I remember Logger's Run was refurbished not too long ago. But is there a point to have 4 large water rides AND a waterpark? Hmmmmm....

-Jeff-

Sure there is...lotsa parks have wet rides in the 'dry' area. Means you don't have to get in swimmies to get wet! Or in SFGAM's case, you can still get wet when you can't get into HH.

-'Playa

Agreed, 'Playa...the only real *waterpark-y* rides I can think of inside most parks are the Shoot-the-Chutes and the "super-wet" TopSpins...and I guess the occasional FSS....but those are just TOO darned expensive.

Flumes, most rapids, everything else is just a good cooling-off/misting....more parks should invest in those misting fans, they ROCK!

I think with SFA's transformation of their waterpark, it wouldn't surprise me to see other SF water parks converted to the HH format. For starters, SFFT. Think about a Schlitterbahn quality water park (and I use the word quality loosely) inside SFFT. SFFT already has a decent water park but converting it to a HH could draw a few more people.