Marc

Inferno still has its original track - the inferno music on the cd sounds like The Jungle sound track (Inferno shop / pizza pasta / I’m a celeb when it’s closed!) No idea if they will release a digital version though sorry!

By the looks of these the park is simply open till 10pm, rather than it being a separatly ticketed event like before , so it will in theory be busier than summer nights and hopefully more sustainable long term - fingers crossed anyway!

They could just get RMC in to convert it - that I’d quite like to see!!

Angry Birds 4D Experience (5) Depth Charge (5) Detonator: Bombs Away (5) Flying Fish (5) I'm A Celebrity (5) King Pig's Wild Hog Dodgems (5) Lumber Jump (5) Mr. Monkey's Banana Ride (5) Nemesis Inferno (5) Quantum (5) Rocky Express (5) Rumba Rapids (5) Rush (5) Samurai (5) SAW - The Ride (5) Stealth (5) Storm In A Teacup (5) Storm Surge (4) The Swarm (6) Tidal Wave (5) Timber Tug Boat (5) Vortex (5) X (5) Zodiac (5) The Swarm + Storm Surge -

Yeah they did and it’s posisble they could bring these back pretty easily - blocks are all still there.

I agree there definitely needs to be a balance between thrills and family - with that said Thorpes most successful years were at a time when it was certainly thrill thrill thrill! (2009/10) Since then in the Family Ride category we’ve gained Storm Surge, Dodgems, Angry Birds 4D, Timber Tug and Lumber jump, at the same time we’ve lost CCR, Loggers Leap, Carousel so it’s not as if they’ve not been totally ignoring the family market. With X I’d be surprised if it went all the way back to 1.4m a height restriction, but I guess time will tell. Like others I’m quite interested to see how they pull it off, AMC certainly had high standards, the theming in Livingn Nightmare is some of the best we’ve had at the park, so in that respect quite looking forward to seeing what they do with it.

There was some sort of tower your right which didnt make it into the final ride, i think it was meant to be in the middle plaza bit opposite its entrance, but as said above cant see it being related to DBGT.

Some pretty awesome pictures here from Thrope back in the 80’s!

Yes it will return

The railway won’t return - pretty much the entire tracks been removed now for various reasons, it was nice they tried to give it a bit of a purpose after the Farm closed but as a stand alone attraction I’m not really sure it added much. Personally I think Old Town is in need of a lot of work - it’s abit if a miss mash of themes at the moment - I’d like to see the entire area rethemed along with ideally loggers returning or if not replaced - but that’s a whole other topic!

There were pictures of a Rumba boat up at towers - it looks like they are looking into modifications to the boats after what happened at Drayton earlier in the year - I expect we will see some of these modifications done to all the boats for the new season. Rumba was running pretty well this year, nice to see it running more pumps than It has done in recent years giving abit of a better ride, I hope to see a few more bits of theming towards the jungle theme it going for, it’s nothing spectacular but certianly fits in abit more. Photo credit Towers street.

True - It will be interesting to see how it’s handled , as I said I’d be surprised if they put the restriction back to 1.4 but guess we will nee to see.

^ The Point is we don’t know yet, we’ve very little idea of what theme this will take, what ages it will be suitable for etc, I’d be surprised if it goes back to 1.4m personally but I guess we will have to see. X trains were new - just turned around ,head rests removed and new lap bars added! I would guess this is probably the most investment X has seen in all it’s different variations.

I do wonder what they will do in regards to it’s current target market, obviously at the moment it has a 1m height restriction so you get 4/5 year olds going on there - I can’t see the theme being overly gory / extreme like the mazes day, that said I’m wondering how / if they will make it suitable for the younger ones.

I’m not sure how much effect terrorism would have had on the resort theme parks, but I saw a graph from one of their presentations of visitor numbers to the midway attractions and there’s no doubt a significant dip right after the attacks in the UK. As for weather that probably has more of an effect on the theme parks than the midways, I don’t think we had a particulary good or bad summer weather wise his year, pretty average. Of course this isn’t the only issues, the parks all have their individual visitor traits, we all know thorpe hasn’t reached the visitor numbers it got back in 09/10/11, Towers are improving but are still noticeably quieter than they were before the acident. It will take time, but I’m sure things will improve in respect to visitor numbers and in turn merlin will be less hesitant in making the investments we are used to.

To be fair the money spent on X during the season would have been negligible, it would have closed for another reason and the took the time to paint it a little bit and add some new lights. The lights could be used elsewhere easily enough and who knows with the IMAScore soundtrack - it was only a minute long or so so again in the grand scheme of things im sure the outlay wasn't large atall.

Plans have been subbmited to the council for the retheme of X, including the instalation of a "Watch Tower" and new barbed wire fencing around the queue line - sounds like this could be where the "Safe Zone" is! https://www.thorpeparkmania.co.uk/news/01-12-2017/X+Retheme+Plans

I *think* it was the 2008/9 closed season vortex was totally dismantled and maybe even sent to KMG over closed season (of course starting panic all round it have been removed!) interesting to see see it from this angle though!!

Other than the fact that X is having work and it shares a building with TWD maze - No ! But hey closed season is made for this stuff With that said - X is obviously getting some significant work, the fact they've removed the entire entrance is a fair amount of work in its self.

Towers have released opening days (not times for some reason!) for next year. Park opens for season on Saturday 17th March and closes on Sunday 4th November Scarefest runs 6th - 7th, 13th - 14th, 19th Oct - 2nd Nov. Fireworks over 2 days again on 3rd and 4th November. Number of closed days throughout the quieter times like this year. https://www.altontowers.com/useful-info/opening-times/

^True I was more referring to A horror theme can work on a family coaster if its done in the correct way, like Thirteen. I feel sure IF they do do something with Walking Dead it would be appropriate for those who are able to ride it.

To be fair to Thirteen it gets pretty decent reviews - maybe its not all that "stupid"?

^ Would make sense if it is indeed related to walking dead - living nightmare could become a queue / exit - could possibly use some of Slammers queue too.

Everyone would just complain how they are ripping people off making as much money as possible etc

I think plans did actually show space for another room, but I can’t see it happening now after all this time!