Park News
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Camelot closes Another British park bites the dust
The British park Camelot has closed for the final time. After shutting its gates after the summer season on September 2, it then failed to reopen as originally planned for the school holidays in October, and now management has pulled the plug on the 40-acre medieval themed attraction at Charnock Richard in Lancashire.
The park was founded in 1984 by entrepreneur John Rigby. Located in the county of Lancashire, about half an hour from Blackpool, it featured over 25 rides and attractions and became one of the first parks in the UK to boast an on-site accommodation in the shape of the Park Hall Hotel. Attendance peaked during the mid 1990s at around half-a-million per season.
BARPL builds Volcano Coaster
Over the years, Camelot has had a succession of owners including Bass Leisure, the Granada Group, a management buyout and more recently Prime Resorts, fronted by former First Leisure boss Roy Page. Although Page blames the weather and competition from high profile events such as the Olympics and the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee for the park’s poor performance in 2012, its days were surely numbered when it was sold in 2009 to the Story Group, which leased it back to Page (trading as Knights Leisure).
A property developer from the north of England, Story had planned to build houses on the site. Probably only the economic downturn has prevented it doing so yet. As such, very little
Get lost in
Tennessee! Hannah’s Maze of Mirrors in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, is billed as the biggest project of its kind from UK “maze maestro” Adrian Fisher.
Bombay Amusement Rides (BARPL) recently installed its first ever rollercoaster, in Indonesia. The 350-metre-long Volcano Coaster was built by the Indian manufacturer to a custom design to incorporate an existing structure at Jawa Timur Park in Batu. Five 4- seater cars are supplied, offering an hourly capacity of around 250. CCTV cameras are installed throughout the ride for monitoring purposes. At night, as an added spectacle for park guests, the volcano spouts smoke and light.
The new attraction at the Hollywood Wax Museum comprises an animated pre-show with changing scenery, various mirrored chambers, false thoroughfares and a rotating floor. Whichever direction you look, the coloured lighting bathed on distinctive scenery changes and morphs from moment to moment, adding to the disorientation. “Each of our mirror mazes is custom- designed with a specific story, with dramatic features and chambers,” explains Fisher. “The whole family goes in together, go round at their own speed, and for a short while they get seriously lost.” “We are thrilled with the design and complexity of the mirror maze,” says Tej Sundher, owner and operator of the Hollywood Wax Museum. “We often hear screams of delight and frustration as people lose their way. We appreciate that Fisher and his group considered every detail to make the adventure both operationally efficient and challenging but fun for the customers.”
investment has been made to the park in recent years, its last major new attraction being the second-hand Knightmare rollercoaster added in 2007.
Although it doesn’t exactly come as a surprise,
Park World is nevertheless sad to see another British attraction go. Read more about the ups and downs of Camelot at
bit.ly/127HXJ7
New Zamperla
coasters for 2012 Dream Park, a new park outside Mumbai, India, will get a Zamperla mine train for 2013. The ride will feature a very similar layout to the 13-year-old Wild West Mine Train at Ocean Park in Hong Kong. The Indian park's developers have even created an artificial hill in an attempt to replicate some of the thrill of the Ocean Park ride, which is constructed on the side of a mountain overlooking the South China Sea. A second coaster at the park will be supplied by Premier Rides.
The ride is one of several new Zamperla coaster confirmed for opening in 2013. At OCT's Window of the World park in Shenzhen, China, a MotoCoaster will open. The ride will feature a lift hill rather than a launch start and essentially be a mirror image of the ride Zamperla installed three years ago at China Dinosaur Land in Changzhou.
Meanwhile at the Adventureland FEC in Sharjah, United Arab Emirates, a 300-metre- long family coaster will be built three metres off the ground, so as to accommodate other rides underneath..
The new MotoCoaster at Window of the World, Shenzhen (China)
16 DECEMBER 2012/JANUARY 2013
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