April 22nd, 2022 Festhaus Park Height Survey

[tursiops]

You can't simply redo Drachen Fire since Drachen Spire is stealing its station and support buildings.

Unless they will be sharing it! World's first TWO roller coasters with ONE line! Which coaster will you gets, it's up to the Black Forest gods to decide!

Sounds like some marketing gimmick SEAS would love!

 

[Rothbury]

Went to a cookout last night with 5 other families. 4 of the 5 said they were not going to renew their memberships/passes because they were tired of nothing to see but rollercoasters and bad quality food with higher prices. Just sayin'. I guess if BGW has made the decision to move in the direction of a rollercoaster park they can see how that works out for them. I got the impression they could tolerate the rides there now, but they were more upset with the food quality, quantity and cost.

 

[tursiops]

Food has become a huge let down. Way more expensive and far inferior quality. Plus the huge lines.

 

[b.mac]

Went to a cookout last night with 5 other families. 4 of the 5 said they were not going to renew their memberships/passes because they were tired of nothing to see but rollercoasters and bad quality food with higher prices. Just sayin'. I guess if BGW has made the decision to move in the direction of a rollercoaster park they can see how that works out for them. I got the impression they could tolerate the rides there now, but they were more upset with the food quality, quantity and cost.

If they were around during the Busch days I could totally see why. BGW used to be the only park my family would get food at the park instead of leaving and going to a Wawa or something.

 

[Nicole]

I remember the first time I went to the Magic Kingdom as an adult and being confused by the lack of desirable dining options. Obviously, that has changed, but I was clearly spoiled by BGW.

 

[Rothbury]

I gave them a "pass" when we were all dealing with the pandemic. That is basically over now and there is no excuse for the food service situation anymore. We have stopped eating anything more than a box of popcorn or pretzel because you never know from one time to the next what it will be like. I'm looking forward to F&W and maybe spending more time in the park. If not, since I live 15 minutes away, I'll just go for a couple of hours and leave. Maybe use my stein club benefit once. Total spent = $5.55. I know, not the place for this.

 

[bill s]

Ironically, the food was quite good in 2020. Wasn't until the crowds hit that the trouble started. The limited openings may have been partially to have labor ready, but they still let it get out in front of them.

 

[CoasterTalkBob]

I'm sure at some point SEAS is going to have to scale back this wild capital investment strategy. I mean 4 new roller coasters in a row is pretty insane.

I don't know.... In a typical scenario (and in previous scenarios we've seen) you don't have the extreme price increases that SEAS is also doing. The cost of going to a SEAS park is just absolutely ridiculous and that starts with much higher admission prices but certainly doesn't end there when their merchandise and food is also climbing at ridiculous rates. I think we've been somewhat brainwashed into believing how much it takes to run a theme park. Or maybe I should say we've been brainwashed into ignoring just how much profit is being made. If you gave Knoebels the same amount of income that BGW has I wouldn't be surprised to see them do a SF WoA sized park and not go bankrupt.

Given that Arrow didn't do a great job trying to replicate a B&M support design for DF, I'd be surprised if the footers could be reused without heavy modifications.

Footers are footers.... in a basic sense. I don't think there is any screwing up the quality of footers -- positioning is really the only concern but we can see that Zierer made it work with Arrow footers.

 

[Jonesta6]

Footers are footers.... in a basic sense. I don't think there is any screwing up the quality of footers -- positioning is really the only concern but we can see that Zierer made it work with Arrow footers.

It's all relative to the forces they're intended to support.

I believe BBW's footers were modified, which didn't require the same level and scrutiny for permitting than replacing and building new ones.

I'm not saying they couldn't reuse the DF footers in some way, but I would not expect they'd necessarily be as supportive of the forces from a properly engineered and built ride in their current state rotting away underground (concrete rot apparently is a thing, but tbh I'd be more concerned with freeze/thaw cycles exposing any rebar and thus prematurely rusting it).

 

[BGWnut]

Went to a cookout last night with 5 other families. 4 of the 5 said they were not going to renew their memberships/passes because they were tired of nothing to see but rollercoasters and bad quality food with higher prices. Just sayin'. I guess if BGW has made the decision to move in the direction of a rollercoaster park they can see how that works out for them. I got the impression they could tolerate the rides there now, but they were more upset with the food quality, quantity and cost.

Food has become a huge let down. Way more expensive and far inferior quality. Plus the huge lines.

I gave them a "pass" when we were all dealing with the pandemic. That is basically over now and there is no excuse for the food service situation anymore. We have stopped eating anything more than a box of popcorn or pretzel because you never know from one time to the next what it will be like. I'm looking forward to F&W and maybe spending more time in the park. If not, since I live 15 minutes away, I'll just go for a couple of hours and leave. Maybe use my stein club benefit once. Total spent = $5.55. I know, not the place for this.

He's the thing an about food and it's true for any restaurant. The supply chain is an absolute mess still. It's really hard to consistently source and there are a lot of outages and product subs constantly. I have several friends who work at the corporate level for some restaurants and it's crazy how hard it is.

So while there isn't issues directly caused by the pandemic the supply chain and supply shortages throughout the industry are causing a lot of problems too. Often times it's either don't serve a popular item or sub it for something of lower quality that you can get.

 

[CoasterTalkBob]

It's all relative to the forces they're intended to support.

That's why I said in a basic sense. One would assume that if you were going to copy a layout path of DF then those forces would be similar but, yes, I agree with your point that if there is going to be a different configuration of the ride going on them then that changes things.

I believe BBW's footers were modified, which didn't require the same level and scrutiny for permitting than replacing and building new ones.

I was under the impression that they were not but I don't have any evidence I can link to support that. I also am curious how one would modify footers to begin with aside from putting other footers beside the existing ones or ripping out and reinstalling.

 

[horsesboy]

He's the thing an about food and it's true for any restaurant. The supply chain is an absolute mess still. It's really hard to consistently source and there are a lot of outages and product subs constantly. I have several friends who work at the corporate level for some restaurants and it's crazy how hard it is.

So while there isn't issues directly caused by the pandemic the supply chain and supply shortages throughout the industry are causing a lot of problems too. Often times it's either don't serve a popular item or sub it for something of lower quality that you can get.

This right here trust me it's more of an issue then most of you know.

Back to the balloon test. First a thought on the footers. What effect would them being buried for over a decade have on them? Also we know that BGW did significant regrading a few years back and we also know that the reason listed on the public paper work for doing so was that there were significant erosion issues in the area. What effect might those two things have o. the stability and reusablity of those footers?

Finally I think redoing DF is interesting I wasn't around to ride it but from everything I have heard there are two schools of thought. One it was a great ride that suffered from bad location and was doomed. The other it was a horrible ride and very painful. The general consensus from many of the people I have talked to seems to run closer to the latter. That doesn't exactly seem like the best area to start from as a crowd draw. I am not saying that there were not reasons for that that couldn't be fixed this time but that starting with a significant amount of the population have that view is not a good starting point.

 

[BGWnut]

That's why I said in a basic sense. One would assume that if you were going to copy a layout path of DF then those forces would be similar but, yes, I agree with your point that if there is going to be a different configuration of the ride going on them then that changes things.

I was under the impression that they were not but I don't have any evidence I can link to support that. I also am curious how one would modify footers to begin with aside from putting other footers beside the existing ones or ripping out and reinstalling.

To my knowledge the footers that Verbolten uses on the drop specifically are the same at the ones used by BBW. They simply reinforced them. They did minimal work to the footers that are located in the RPA buffet area.

 

[tursiops]

As far as i can tell looking at the Verbolten footers they are simply larger. I believe BBW had square and they are now larger and round. I could be mistaken though, I'm too lazy to search for pictures at the moment.

 

[bigbadwolffan76]

holy shit, this could be for alpenflip, can't believe the park actually reads this stuff! sweet!

 

[Click]

As far as i can tell looking at the Verbolten footers they are simply larger. I believe BBW had square and they are now larger and round. I could be mistaken though, I'm too lazy to search for pictures at the moment.

Here ya go ...

 

[CoasterTalkBob]

Here ya go ...

View attachment 26632

Looks like they basically poured additional concrete on top of the footers -- you can see the color difference in the Verbolten picture. When doing this I would imagine they'd add rebar to the new concrete but would that rebar attach to the exiting footers (maybe by drilling holes into them)?

 

[Coolguy15]

Drachen Fire 2: Electric Boogaloo?

I would absolutely shit my pants if they got someone like Mack, Intamin or S&S to re-imagine Drachen Fire(layout over 50% the same) with modern precision manufacturing.

rMc DrAcHeN fIrE??!?!11

 

[DrunkenCronuts]

I know that's sarcasm, but that's actually a concern of mine. I know it's not all, but it does seem to be a growing online voice of "RMC or bust" particularly from when new attractions are rumored/announced/planned. Maybe I just follow the Schilke Supporter Squad too closely.

I kinda enjoy being the new home base for Intamin America. But Mack, Gravity Group, B&M (I'd like a Drachen Flyer please), Vekoma (same thing) be all good things for us. I'd love an extreme spinner.

Or even better, a big building and decked out dark ride. I really hope once they're done with Festhaus Park - they take some time to do some TLC and work with the unused/barely used space they already have buildings for and could revitalize. Ireland really comes to mind with the castle and Eire locations.

 

[panopticon31]

I know that's sarcasm, but that's actually a concern of mine. I know it's not all, but it does seem to be a growing online voice of "RMC or bust" particularly from when new attractions are rumored/announced/planned. Maybe I just follow the Schilke Supporter Squad too closely.

I kinda enjoy being the new home base for Intamin America. But Mack, Gravity Group, B&M (I'd like a Drachen Flyer please), Vekoma (same thing) be all good things for us. I'd love an extreme spinner.

Or even better, a big building and decked out dark ride. I really hope once they're done with Festhaus Park - they take some time to do some TLC and work with the unused/barely used space they already have buildings for and could revitalize. Ireland really comes to mind with the castle and Eire locations.

Id much prefer and RMC, Mack, Gravity Group , S&S or Vekoma. BGW has until recently been very B&M heavy, now we are about to add 2 additional Intamins to bring the count to 3. I would like to see a bit more variety manufacture wise.