It's time for dispatch and have we got theme park news for you!
First up, Slagharen, a theme park in the Netherlands, needs your help to choose a
new roller coaster. The park plans to build a family suspended roller coaster and have
three designs to choose from; one from Vekoma, one from Premier Rides, and the other from Gerstlauer.
The first, from Vekoma, is the company’s popular family suspended model. It features a small launch
out of the station, before navigating a fairly traditional layout. That’s definitely the safe
option. Then there’s Premier, who's opted to build a suspended shuttle coaster.
The trains head forwards out of the station, up the first lift hill, before navigating the quite
whippy layout backwards. They then repeat the entire thing again, this time forwards. Premier
are yet to construct a suspended roller coaster, so it’ll be interesting if this does turn out
to be the chosen design. Last but certainly not least is Gerstlauer. Now, Gerstlauer have gone a
bit over the top. Their design shows small trains navigate a vertical lift hill, yes you heard me,
a vertical lift hill on a suspended coaster. They then head down what is quite a step drop, through
various fast paced elements, and several tunnels. Gerstlauer’s option is definitely the least
family friendly of the three, but you can already tell it’s the major choice for most enthusiasts.
Interestingly, Gerstlauer opened their first suspended roller coaster last year at Yomiuriland
in Japan. Regardless, the new coaster seems to be one that slots well into the park's existing line
up. Slagharen already has a tame family coaster, Mine Train, and a launched thrill coaster,
Gold Rush. The only thing is, they want feedback on these three coasters but I
don’t know where they want that feedback sent to. So for now, just shout into the void your choice!
Next up, Drayton Manor have announced a brand new area coming to the park in 2022,
Vikings! The entirely new land is themed to vikings, funny that.
It’ll feature a zamperla disko’ coaster, one with a hill, fancy; a zamperla nebulaz, very exciting,
and one of those attractions where you sit on a horse and it goes round the track,
cool! The new area will also incorporate one of the park’s existing roller coasters, the Buffalo.
Now however it won’t be called the Buffalo, it’ll be called something much harder to say,
Jormungandr - now that is epic! The new land will also feature a new restaurant, named Walhalla,
which will serve BBQ style food. Sounds good to me - now to simply practise my
viking speech until it opens in spring of 2022.
Over the past few weeks lots of rumours have been floating about.
One of them has been rather sad. Kumba, the B&M sitdown coaster at Busch Gardens Tampa Bay,
was rumoured to be leaving the park at the end of this year. The ride opened in 1993 as the
company’s first ever sitdown coaster - it was also the first ride to feature an immelmann,
pretty neat. Apparently the ride was set to close due to it’s age. Meanwhile,
other old B&M roller coasters will be undergoing a retrack - including the UK’s very own Nemesis,
which opened a year after Kumba in 1994. Fortunately, Busch Gardens confirmed on
twitter that the rumours were nonsense and that their beloved sitdown coaster “is not
going anywhere”. Phew, now I don’t have to fork out a few thousand to ride it before it closes!
Merlin Entertainments, the company behind Alton Towers and the world’s countless Legoland Parks,
have confirmed that they teamed with Sony to produce Jumanji themed rides and hotel rooms.
This deal isn’t that much of a surprise, Gardaland, another theme park owned by Merlin,
has a Jumanji themed dark ride opening this year. However, more are set to come!
But we knew that too, as plans for Chessington World of Adventure’s new roller coaster
heavily hinted towards a Jumanji themed ride also. So what does this news actually
tell us? Nothing really, just be prepared for even more Jamanji stuff in the future!
And finally, the biggest news of all - Europa Park, Europe’s second busiest theme park,
has announced plans to build a new roller coaster. The park announced that they’ll be
building a MACK Rides Big Dipper roller coaster within the newly constructed area - Croatia.
So far, MACK Rides have built two Big Dipper roller coasters, the most famous being Lost
Gravity at Walibi Holland. Europa Park’s version is set to be different however.
It’ll feature trains that seat four rows of riders, instead of the normal two. Rumours,
key word there, rumours, are also indicating that the coaster could feature two launches, one of
which might be vertical. Sadly, we don’t know much too much about the new roller coaster just yet.
However, Europa Park plans to film a documentary alongside the construction of the ride, which
will begin to air in May. The park’s last major roller coaster was Wodan, which opened in 2012,
so this Big Dipper ride, set to open in 2023, is a very very very very welcomed addition.
So there you go! Don't forget to shout into the void why you've chosen the Gerstlauer
roller coaster for Slagharen - I mean there's no other choice really is there!