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Here's a pic of the lights on the lift hill! Link for webcam pic: https://www.visitkingsisland.com/online-fun/webcams-7315_34349

There are now lights on the lift hill and leaving the station! (Can't post a picture from the webcam currently, but go check it out!)

Heres to hoping that this is all of the lights. I am hoping that MT is another awesome night ride and that DB stays fairly unlit.

It probably won`t be much longer before the State ride inspectors from the Department of Agriculture start certifying rides at KI for the 2017 season. Another sign that spring is right around the corner.

That's great; that means the park is starting to open up again! Also, those lights on MT are nice. Now, if only we could know when Bat will be getting its trains put back on...

That's so awesome!!! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

You really have to give it to the construction team they have been putting in the hard work. This thing is definitely going to be ready for Preview+Opening Day. 46 more days guys, we're almost there guys.

I'm assuming lights such as these will be only on the lift and brake run, just like The Beast.. If any lights are elsewhere, I'm thinking along the feel of Banshee.. meaning, colored and meant to go with the theme... Though I really like the idea from.. I apologize for not remembering.. but of having the turquoise lights in the trees very sporadic almost ominous like.. Though, I wouldn't want that if you could see wires running everywhere during the day

I actually think all three trains are on BLSC right now.

Red train on BLSC as well.

^ I think so and you can also spot the front fo one of DB trains on the storage track for the past week or so. Just thought I'd point it out.

Cool lights. Looks like the DB splashdown is starting to be filled?

The area has been 3 themed areas through the years - Wild Animal Habitat, Adventure Village, and then Action Zone. It was re-named Adventure Village long about the time the monorail station was removed (this is the same location as the Skyflyer is now.) The area in front of it, which when converted to Action Zone housed the Water Tower, was not home to an attraction - rather it was just landscaping/entrance plaza to the attraction. The building I think you are referring to was the Congo Cooler stand. It was a food/beverage location that serviced Adventure Village and Timberwolf (when there was an event taking place.) On Location was built for the expansion of Action Zone. Prior to it being built, that land was vacant as part of Adventure Village. It was basically a big empty plaza.

Development plans aside, this area is too stinking hot to draw huge summer tourist crowds. Families travel in the Summer and Summer temperatures in Casa Grande average well over 100 degrees starting at the end of May through September. Mmmm yes I would like to take my family vacation to the Desert in August when its 108 degrees and go walk around a theme park. There is a reason this market remains untapped and underdeveloped when it comes to large Amusement/Theme Parks - it is too stinking hot during prime Summer travel months.

Another note, I noticed that the Lock-out fence on the bottom of the first-drop there. That means we're also getting closer to having the ride opened up.

Another pic posted today.

It would be awesome if we had a Town Hall like CP does but less random items from a certain time frame but more KI history.

I hope The Vortex never goes. Sometimes old is good! There is just something about sitting down on an old arrow looper. Long live The Vortex! On a side note its hard to believe that Flight of Fear is only 6 years younger than The Vortex.

This is a thread where people can share and discuss old or current KI advertisements from commercials to posters and everything in between. I miss old advertisements like these. I honestly think park marketing was way better years ago.

So back in July of 2016 I decided to go to Kentucky Kingdom for the first time. well here's what i thought: Good things about my visit: - Park looks really clean and tidy and really upkept - The two newest coasters where running GREAT, and T3 and Thunder Run where running good to, but T3 was a little painful. Bad things: -Poor quality of service overall throughout the park, especially to keep lines moving as quick as possible -Every coaster (except Thunder Run) was one train operation...... -STORM CHASER DID NOT OPEN TILL 3/4 INTO TE DAY :cry: My thoughts on the coasters -Storm Chaser: HOLY POOP this ride is insane! (insane is an UNDERSTATEMENT), Love the ejector airtime and everything. Although I have only rode one RMC, im falling in love with them Even though the ride didn't open till 3/4 into the day, and was one train operation, I'm pretty sure i waited for the front seat for 2 cycles. LOVED IT. -Lightning Run: Basically the same thing i said about Storm Chaser can be said here, although i waited 30 minutes for a ride on this.................. BUT loved the ejector airtime and outer banked turns. -Thunder Run: GREAT woodie for this park, I felt it was running really smooth and fast paced. -T3: Great layout but not a fun ride as i felt alot of rattle and jerkiness, but then again, this was my first SLC ever. -Roller Skater: Amazing coaster to start little kids off on. My time was limited, and i was going to go around and take more pictures and shoot some more offride footage of Storm chaser and Thudner run, but while in the waterpark, some @$$ hole decided " hey this green bag looks nice" and walked off with it, and we spent a good two hours looking for it. Thankfully and would like to praise the park's security staff, our bag was found with nothing missing out of it, and I retrieved my phone and camera. ALSO, i did tackle the Tallest body slide in north america and it was NERVE RACKING. Anyways enough blabbing heres some offride footage and pictures! (Camera has okay quality for videos)

A random thing I remember from this ride was that during DOT (it may have changed during other incarnations), the seat cushion was velcrod on to the seat, so after each ride, you could peel it off and find a small pile of loose change. The 16 year old me love "making money" by checking this after each ride.

Personally, I find the lack of a wild mouse a bigger hole in the line up than a giga.

The Bat commercial Sent from my SM-G935T using Tapatalk

CP Food Blog has the details on the announcement: http://cpfoodblog.com/2017-cedar-point-season-pass-drink-program/ Notably, there is a 15-minute wait time between scans on the season pass program, as opposed to 5 minutes between scans with the bottle. I suppose this is necessary to limit abuse (one person with the plan getting drinks for the whole family).

I'm also really appreciative of your FB page (as well as this one!). The fact that we have one of the best parks in the country, with such a rich local history and memories for anyone local, is a privilege. I'm surprised at just how much it continues to evolve and change over the years. Looking at pictures and reading about it's history is awesome. This site and contributors like you have really enhanced my knowledge and turned me into a KI junkie! It would be nice if the park embraced its history more and had a "museum" type of attraction some day. Like what the Paramount Theater tried to do with it's films back during the PKI days. A history / walk though of KI, enhanced with pictures, maybe pieces of older attractions, etc. History and local tradition can go a long way, and something like this would be cheap to do.

This was for the year Top Gun was opened..... I've been on the ride several times since....have never experienced a ride like what's portrayed here!

I remember when looking up info of The Beast I saw this old school commercial, I Loved the voice of the dude on the commercial, He made the ride seem more mysterious and creepy. Sometimes for some reason, I act like I'm a voice actor for Kings Island. I do his voice and I'm like "Come and ride The Beast at Kings Island. The video is from fenikowiski.

From the first time I rode it in 1989 (and it drove my earring posts into my head) until a couple seasons ago, I was very much in the "tear it down!" camp. When I was still a young teen it always made me so angry to hear people play it up as the one to ride to show how brave you were. Beast was so much better! Then I had a friend (NoChickens) who I often ran into at the park around Vortex, and he wanted to ride it. I had heard about 5-1 previously, and rode that but wasn't impressed. NoChickens introduced me to 7-1, and I realized I could ride with very few punches to the jaw. As I learned to avoid the restraint in the spots it still hit me, I also learned to really appreciate the ride. I even ride it alone most visits now. I've been told that steel coasters have a lifespan, and have accepted that eventually Vortex will have to go regardless. But I'm hoping it is awhile before that happens. There is something beautiful about that turn before the first drop, when the entire park comes into view. I particularly love to ride at sunset for that reason. And that first drop is among the best moments in the park!

Hello... only been about four years since I last posted... I don't think I ever posted a thread here on AE's design, but I did contact R&R Design years ago and spoke with the company's president, Rick Bastrup. He was kind enough to send me some incredible concept-art of the ride... Here's an incredibly-small picture of the Monorail crossing Adventure Express' track, from R&R's website... And here's an overview, circa 1993, of that... (source unknown)

I'm sure more people were disappointed when the Phantom Theater theming was removed and replaced with "Scooby."

Over the past couple of weeks I have noticed that there's been a big amount of members saying how they want Vortex gone in the next few years. I personally don't agree and I say it'll stay around for years to come. However, I'd like to see what our members actually think about our Arrow looper. I am not starting a rumor, I just want to get peoples' opinion.

For Q#1, I answered with the second option. In my mind, Vortex is one of those great Kings Island classic coasters (see also Bat, Flight of Fear, Beast Adventure Express and Blue Racer) and it's pretty iconic to the park. However, my experiences have varied. I've had awesome rides (particularly those in the back or those summer night rides through the fog) as well as some rough ones that make me dizzy (and see stars in the double loops). All in all, I ride it every once in a while and it's a good ride. I think I'd miss it if (when?) it left (leaves) as I (or anyone) might take Vortex for granted and then it's gone one day. And I must confess, another KI Arrow great has stolen my heart even more (sorry @homestar92, to me, Vortex is not bae! ). For Q#2, I answered with the second option as well due to the varied ride experiences detailed above.

I honestly would like to see another launch coaster by either Intamin or Mack at KI rather than a giga, we need a more unique launch and it would fill a gap in the lineup with unique, fast inversions like Maverick, Blue Fire, or a new Extreme Spinning coaster like what Silver Dollar City is getting in 2018, or a new Big Dipper would be great like what Walibi Holland received for 2016. https://rcdb.com/12315.htm https://rcdb.com/4074.htm https://rcdb.com/11048.htm

Horribly designed parking lot? The entrance is right in the middle of the lot of the regular park. Or do you mean the directions you have to drive to get in? I can think of many worse parking lots than KIs lol

Um.... Going to soak for "photography purposes" doesn't sound like a weird feeling that anyone should "get over"... Now I have a weird feeling. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Maybe it will look like this inside the shed............ image found on Pintrest https://www.pinterest.com/pin/108086459783989953/

And it should be pointed out National Amusement Devices was based in Dayton, Ohio.

This isn't an outstanding example, but it IS an example of a wooden coaster with on-board lights: (Source: forums.planetcoaster.com) National Amusement Devices was a major player in the pre-KI amusement industry. Their Century Flyer trains (pictured above) were capable of having up to three lamps installed in the first car: the two shown in the picture, and a third in place of that red circle in the middle. Century Flyers used to be everywhere, but now (to my knowledge) only exist on three coasters today: Thunderbolt at Kennywood, Blue Streak at Conneaut Lake Park, and Big Dipper at Camden Park (which I believe is the ride pictured above.) Lil' Dipper at Camden is (again, to my knowledge) the only coaster out there with NAD's kid-sized version of Century Flyers. I've read before somewhere (I've forgotten the source--it's been years) that the jostles and jolts of wooden coasters would knock something out of place in the lamps and destroy them. I've gotten the impression that many parks would, over time, remove them and provide some kind of non-technical placeholder that was easier/cheaper to maintain. Until very recently, all three trains on Kennywood's Thunderbolt looked something like this: (Source: Negative-G) In 2014, Penn State's Theme Park Engineering group made a proposal to restore the headlamps on Thunderbolt using LEDs. (Here's a link with a short write-up.) When Thunderbolt opened for 2014, the two headlamps on the red train were updated, but the green and blue trains remained the same. Here's what the new headlamps looked like: (Source: Kennywood Connection) Unfortunately, I don't know that the restoration ever continued beyond that point--or even that the red train's lights ever were functional. I've never witnessed them working myself, and I've never read any reports that they were operational. I've also never heard whether or not the blue or green trains were completed--I don't think I've been to Kennywood in the summer since 2014. Whether this is due to the lamps not functioning or due to them not being a priority for Kennywood at the moment, I'm not sure. So yes... lights on a wooden coaster have been done before. Kinda. I just don't get the impression that it's ever worked particularly well.

Won't be long and there will be trains and testing. They've had a good winter for building.

Hmmm... Not sure how that picture negates my memory? LOL It actually confirms it.... ;-) I said I went in 1994 to find the monorail gone... (I just couldn't recall if the station remained or if it was an empty plot of land in 1994) then I said that in 1995 the Skyflyer was built. That pic could be from 1994 or possibly 1995 before the Skyflyer was added (if indeed, the Skyflyer opened mid-season) Remember, Top Gun was built in 1993. I distinctly recall Top Gun operating for a season with the Monorail, and then a season without it, then the following (95) Skyflyer appeared. (It was as I drove past the park... sometime in 1995 that I saw Skyflyer being constructed - not while IN the park.) What I am fuzzy about is not when the Monorail was or wasn't there, or when the Skyflyer was or wasn't there... what I am fuzzy about are details like whether the monorail station sat vacant or was demolished for the 1994 season - or the entrance to Wild Animal Habitat was altered in 1994 or 1995 - or if the Skyflyer appeared mid-season as I recalled or if it was ready to go with the start of '95. If we had a specific date of that picture, it would answer a ton of those "fuzzies" I have about the minute details mentioned above. Bottom line, when the Monorail left, it solidified the trend of negating the overall theming of areas within the park that it followed all the way through the Paramount tenure. The "De-theming" of areas IMO started with AE - totally misplaced - by the Linder staff. Then Paramount jumped on board and decided to try and make it a poor man's Universal - and commercialize the park with no regard to it's history. I DO think some good came from the Paramount days - and it gave us lots of good stuff to talk about. But one of the really bad things was how mis-focused the park became. Since Cedar Fair has taken over, IMO, there's been a concentrated effort to adhere to the themed areas. For instance Mystic Timbers is a great theme for Rivertown. Had that been Paramount, we'd be looking forward to "Star Trek: Beyond - The wooden coaster" in Rivertown. *Edit* - I was able to track down an online video from Jul 1995 that shows the Skyflyer (then Drop Zone) was in place by then. So, that answers some of my fuzziness - I probably saw Drop Zone being constructed as I passed by in early 1995 before the park opened for the season. If the above picture is from 1994, that means the entrance to Wild Animal Habitat was altered before it was taken - so that occurred in either late 1993, or early 1994. Here's the video...

Yes, Scooby Doo was a downgrade from Phantom Theater as its approach was to minimize the theming and make it simpler (and cheaper?) to maintain. However, even though Scooby Doo and Boo Blasters are almost identical, Boo Blasters comes across as way worse because of it's total lack of a recognizable theme, and a story/plot that is almost non-existent. Even though the props and theming within Scooby Doo was simpler, at least it had some appeal with it's recognizable characters and story. I think this helped to create some kind of connection between the ride and the rider. In my opinion, there is no connection that exists today. Everything is so scaled back and "generic" that, for me anyway, there is nothing that excites me or appeals to me about riding the ride except the fact that it's KI's only dark ride. That's it. Here's hoping something is done to improve that space very, VERY soon.

Working there in '96, not a big Nascar guy but always dug that Days of Thunder ride (hence the profile image). And rarely a line IIRC.

This past season was the first I found caring the refillable bottles along to be a hassle. Maybe because now I have 2 kids tall enough for Banshee, I found myself asking if we were planning on riding that, and if so, we didn't bring the bottles in. Plus, am I the only one who thinks the quality of the bottles has gone down each year?? Seriously, scan my pass, give me a paper cup, and let's move on with our day!

Well, that would make KD the only park with two of the exact same ride.

^ By definition doesn't he understand everything? KDD, not a great theological scholar.

And SOB's announcement: "Welcome to The Son of Beast..."

I've heard this at Cedar Point: "Enjoy your ride on The Maverick." Not just GP

Speaking of Carowinds, someone can't count.

Actually, the deadline extension is a full seven days this year. Interesting. Also, Cedar Point is selling Carowinds Gold Passes now, I guess. CA, CP, CW...

Via the Kings Island Google Play page