Concepts Think Tank

[Jonesta6]

Based on earlier conversations around here, I think we concluded it's not in any environmental protected areas though could be subject to whatever DCR department that deals with private dams.

Given that much of the demolition would be concrete, my guess is a few million for that.

Add another couple million for grading and landscaping - not sure if they'd need to do any bulkheads or what pathway solutions they'd implement, so costs could go up for that.

Then, per your suggestion, whatever the expense would be of adding a restaurant or water ski show, boat ride, etc.

However, dockside dining with some kind of aquatic show would be neat - don't think the existing part of the lake is deep enough for power boats plus unless Anaconda and it's foundations are completely removed there'd be too many obstructions.

 

[warfelg]

how difficult would it be to turn the front half of the waterpark back into a lake?

Long story short:
Expensive. Because the Lake is lined, my guess is the ground is quite permeable with a deep water table. So that would mean not just the immediate area needs to be dug up, but the current lake needs to be drained (likely storing too), have the liner ripped out, regrade the whole area, re-line the new lake, then refill with more water. They’ll also have to do improved drainage to the area, undo underlying infrastructure, reroute some infrastructure, put in a bigger better water circulation system, and redo some storm water management systems.

Maybe they can make it a pool and do a dive show if they wanted to do something like that and not sink a ton of money into it.

 

[Mushroom]

Long story short:
Expensive. Because the Lake is lined, my guess is the ground is quite permeable with a deep water table. So that would mean not just the immediate area needs to be dug up, but the current lake needs to be drained (likely storing too), have the liner ripped out, regrade the whole area, re-line the new lake, then refill with more water. They’ll also have to do improved drainage to the area, undo underlying infrastructure, reroute some infrastructure, put in a bigger better water circulation system, and redo some storm water management systems.

Maybe they can make it a pool and do a dive show if they wanted to do something like that and not sink a ton of money into it.

How do you know the lake is lined? Is that just a guess or it known for sure that it’s lined? I was under the impression that it wasn’t.

 

[warfelg]

How do you know the lake is lined? Is that just a guess or it known for sure that it’s lined? I was under the impression that it wasn’t.

It’s an educated guess based on 3 things:
Depth of the lake. This is a picture I could find of the lake-

Generally a natural lake wouldn’t be that shallow or easily drained. Given this looks like during Anacondas construction it’s not lined as it would be driven over.

Typically the rocks around the edge is a give away that it’s lined. That weighs down the lining to ensure it doesn’t pull inward.

But mostly it’s this:

This is a water depth chart of a near by plot of land. The water level generally is 20 feet below the surface of land in that area. So unless they made sure the entire property sloped to that spot to be enough below where it should be, and built everything around it up so those footers aren’t effected, the water level would naturally always want to recede to the water table level.

Now there’s a chance it’s more clay based in the area of the lake which would massively slow the drainage of water. But it would still need to have something going on more than rain.

The easiest example I can give is the storm water systems. They are unlined. So in heavy rain they hold water (to not wash away massive amounts of soil) but as time goes they drain because they are built above the water table.

 

[mwhinva]

It’s an educated guess based on 3 things:
Depth of the lake. This is a picture I could find of the lake-
View attachment 27544
Generally a natural lake wouldn’t be that shallow or easily drained. Given this looks like during Anacondas construction it’s not lined as it would be driven over.

Typically the rocks around the edge is a give away that it’s lined. That weighs down the lining to ensure it doesn’t pull inward.

But mostly it’s this:
View attachment 27545
This is a water depth chart of a near by plot of land. The water level generally is 20 feet below the surface of land in that area. So unless they made sure the entire property sloped to that spot to be enough below where it should be, and built everything around it up so those footers aren’t effected, the water level would naturally always want to recede to the water table level.

Now there’s a chance it’s more clay based in the area of the lake which would massively slow the drainage of water. But it would still need to have something going on more than rain.

The easiest example I can give is the storm water systems. They are unlined. So in heavy rain they hold water (to not wash away massive amounts of soil) but as time goes they drain because they are built above the water table.

Lake Charles was a body of water formed during the construction of KD. It was NOT lined. It was filled by natural springs in the southeast corner of the lake near the current Anaconda first drop tunnel and by rain water. The park built a drain/valve so they can lower or empty the water from the lake bed for access if needed. "Lake Charles" is the name the park gave the body of water. It is an extra-large pond.

My understanding is that the water table is very high in several areas in the park. Grizzly had settlement issues, due to the high water table, in which the park had to correct back in the early 1980's.

I've never seen photos of the land before or during the very early construction of CAG. Most construction photos are of CAG when it was 40%-60% complete. I was told there was a small natural pond where the springs were. KD took advantage of them by using the springs as a water source for Lake Charles when it was formed.

 

[warfelg]

Springs are well documented, and even with then KD was built there would be some record of a spring there. As far as I can find there is no documentation to support this. It would also make filling in where the "north" part of the water park is would have been extremely difficult as water would have continually tried to work its way back into that spot, as reclaiming land is difficult and expensive unless the water feature was man made from the start. There would have needed to be an additional basin provided for the water to go. For a body of water the size the lake was it would take massive water flow out of that spring to keep the lake filled. Rain alone isn't enough to finish that job.

Google earth pro shows the lake drained on 4/07. If there is a spring, then there would be evidence of a pump draining the outflowing water somewhere. However, that doesn't seem to be the case. Additionally if it were a case of unusually high water table in isolated spots (which is incredibly rare) then we would also see the evidence of that same settlement issue on Anaconda as Grizzly does. Likely we would see some issues with Racer or anything else in the lakes immediate vicinity have issues. Water tables tend not to rise and fall that sharply.

Now I'm not saying that it's impossible, but I'm not seeing much evidence to support that there's much natural. Especially given the one time size of the lake, the fact that it held water shows where people dived into the water (meaning at one time it was much deeper), and the lack of water movement. To add to this, Kings Island had a lake where Beast is and filled it in, along with evidence supporting most of their water features were man made. Lastly the plan for Racer was to split like KI's but they decided not to when (at the time) infill was considered too expensive, and there's no record of them talking about a spring at that time.

Maybe someone can find more, but this is some of the only places I can find reference to the lake and they both say man made:

Kings Dominion

Infobox Amusement park name = Kings Dominion location = Doswell location2 = Virginia location3 = United States opening date = 1975 previous names = Kings Dominion 1975 to 1993, 2007 to present Paramount s Kings Dominion 1993 to 2006 area = 400…

en-academic.com

Rebel Yell (roller coaster) - Alchetron, the free social encyclopedia

Rebel Yell is a wooden racing roller coaster located at Kings Dominion, near Doswell, Virginia, north of Richmond. It opened with the park 42years ago in 1975. Rebel Yell is a racing roller coaster with two individual tracks that are parallel mirror images of each other. Its design was inspired by

alchetron.com

 

[mwhinva]

Springs are well documented, and even with then KD was built there would be some record of a spring there. As far as I can find there is no documentation to support this. It would also make filling in where the "north" part of the water park is would have been extremely difficult as water would have continually tried to work its way back into that spot, as reclaiming land is difficult and expensive unless the water feature was man made from the start. There would have needed to be an additional basin provided for the water to go. For a body of water the size the lake was it would take massive water flow out of that spring to keep the lake filled. Rain alone isn't enough to finish that job.

Google earth pro shows the lake drained on 4/07. If there is a spring, then there would be evidence of a pump draining the outflowing water somewhere. However, that doesn't seem to be the case. Additionally if it were a case of unusually high water table in isolated spots (which is incredibly rare) then we would also see the evidence of that same settlement issue on Anaconda as Grizzly does. Likely we would see some issues with Racer or anything else in the lakes immediate vicinity have issues. Water tables tend not to rise and fall that sharply.

Now I'm not saying that it's impossible, but I'm not seeing much evidence to support that there's much natural. Especially given the one time size of the lake, the fact that it held water shows where people dived into the water (meaning at one time it was much deeper), and the lack of water movement. To add to this, Kings Island had a lake where Beast is and filled it in, along with evidence supporting most of their water features were man made. Lastly the plan for Racer was to split like KI's but they decided not to when (at the time) infill was considered too expensive, and there's no record of them talking about a spring at that time.

Maybe someone can find more, but this is some of the only places I can find reference to the lake and they both say man made:

Kings Dominion

Infobox Amusement park name = Kings Dominion location = Doswell location2 = Virginia location3 = United States opening date = 1975 previous names = Kings Dominion 1975 to 1993, 2007 to present Paramount s Kings Dominion 1993 to 2006 area = 400…

en-academic.com

Rebel Yell (roller coaster) - Alchetron, the free social encyclopedia

Rebel Yell is a wooden racing roller coaster located at Kings Dominion, near Doswell, Virginia, north of Richmond. It opened with the park 42years ago in 1975. Rebel Yell is a racing roller coaster with two individual tracks that are parallel mirror images of each other. Its design was inspired by

alchetron.com

I never stated that "Lake Charles" was NOT man-made. I said when the "lake" was formed, the park utilized natural springs that already existed to keep the lake filled with water. Lake Charles maximum depth was just over 6 feet deep. I was told back in 1980, that there was originally a small natural pond that was filled by spring water. When Lake Charles was formed by construction equipment in the early 70's, they graded the earth lower and in the process eliminated the original small pond and the earth beneath became part of the much larger lake bed known as "Lake Charles".

 

[Zachary]

Lake Charles maximum depth was just over 6 feet deep.

This would really surprise me since they hosted water ski shows on that lake.

 

[mwhinva]

This would really surprise me since they hosted water ski shows on that lake.

Since I worked at the park between 1979 and 1983, there were many full time employees in maintenance and mid to upper management back then working there since construction started in 1973. The ski boats only needed a draft of 3 feet to operate. Average depth of the lake was 5.5 to 6.5 feet deep. This was a water ski show not a diving show.

A few years later, KD changed the show to a hybrid of water skiing and a diving show. The park dug a 15-20 yard by 15-20 yard pit in the lake bed to a max depth of 14-16 feet. This was needed for diving off platforms that were 15 and 25 feet above the water surface. The grand finale was a dive off a platform 50 feet in the air. You needed that depth clearance to safely land in the water.

 

[Zachary]

Ok, average depth makes a ton more sense. Thanks for the clarification. Carry on.

 

[I305Evan]

Here is a photo of the lake drained in 2014 when Anaconda was being worked on.

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[mwhinva]

Photo of the lake and rebel yell during the park's construction. (maybe taken late winter or early spring 1974).

 

[mwhinva]

Here is another photo of the lake as it is filling up with water. I don't see any liner in the lake bed, just dirt. Not sure about the circular foundation for the fountain (concrete?). I believe all the fountain equipment was removed in the early-mid 80's. The pump house building had not been constructed yet when the photo was taken. It stood on the lake bank right next to the Racer 75 / Rebel Yell (where the concentration of construction vehicles are in the photo).

P.S. look in the upper left corner of the photo. You can see the cars going in and coming out of the drive-thru safari.

 

[warfelg]

FYI - Liners aren’t always visible or big black tarps. I’ve seen applications where places chose to bring in a lower viscosity clay, I’ve seen concrete, tight impacted gravel, heck even compacted shells. Some places chose to put dirt in the bottom for importing marine life, some places bury it to hid the fact that it’s there. Notice the hard sharp corner by where the bumper cars are? The picture isn’t too high quality but it looks to be a barrier of some sort.

Basically long story short here:
The height of the water in the lake is higher than the water table. Water would not stay in it without some way of forcing the water table to be that high. Given how stagnant the water in there is, its most likely being forcibly held.

I’m not saying I’m 100% right, but there’s something more than just “water spring” with that area.

 

[Jonesta6]

All of this to say that though possible, it's not likely fiscally feasible to remove the northern portion of the water park and rebuild the lake in the area?

 

[warfelg]

All of this to say that though possible, it's not likely fiscally feasible to remove the northern portion of the water park and rebuild the lake in the area?

It depends on what they want to do. They could, but it would likely be pricey. If there was a new water ride tied to it, could be worth it. But most likely it would be too expensive given all that would need to be removed infrastructure wise.

 

[mwhinva]

FYI - Liners aren’t always visible or big black tarps. I’ve seen applications where places chose to bring in a lower viscosity clay, I’ve seen concrete, tight impacted gravel, heck even compacted shells. Some places chose to put dirt in the bottom for importing marine life, some places bury it to hid the fact that it’s there. Notice the hard sharp corner by where the bumper cars are? The picture isn’t too high quality but it looks to be a barrier of some sort.

Basically long story short here:
The height of the water in the lake is higher than the water table. Water would not stay in it without some way of forcing the water table to be that high. Given how stagnant the water in there is, its most likely being forcibly held.

I’m not saying I’m 100% right, but there’s something more than just “water spring” with that area.

That "barrier" is a retaining wall to hold the grading from collapsing into the lake bed. There were boats that you could pilot in the water by remote control. The remote control units lined the top part of the retaining wall. You stood there and used some type of boat wheel with a forward/reverse shifter to drive the boats below.

 

[mwhinva]

Here is a photo, taken from the swings queue line looking toward the lake retaining wall. The red and white awning is where the remote controls were for the boats.

 

[92ramsfan]

If they were to put a simulator ride back into this space, could this be a viable option for the park (assuming they have the space or could get a custom sized one)? Would you want something like this?

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Would be great in kd action theater

 

[CoasterSkinny]

Would be great in kd action theater

I actually jumped on this thread because I've been thinking about the Action Theater a lot recently! I recently took some friends to KD and we spent little/no time in the Old Virginia side of the park. Something great in that theater could really help that side of the park regain popularity.
Something significant needs to be installed there and stay long-term. The announcement of DarKoaster at BGW has me thinking about rides that could go in that structure. Having a climate-controlled ride on the opposite side of the park from FoF would be a great addition, especially during the middle of the summer and Winterfest.
Any decent coaster wouldn't fit in that building, but a flat ride might. The ride wouldn't have to be geared around the fact that it's inside a theater; it could just be an indoor flat ride! Any ideas?