Cover Story
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Beyond the Next Ride T
Four projects. Four very different briefs. From filling a gap in the family experience to helping redefine an established destination, recent openings across Europe and the Middle East show just how many jobs a new water attraction can be asked to do.
here is no universal brief for the next great water attraction. At one park, the opportunity might sit
between the children’s area and the biggest rides on the skyline. At another, it’s about creating an attraction with enough presence to define an entirely new area. For an integrated resort, the water park itself can become part of the reason to stay. And for an established destination entering a new chapter, new attractions can help signal just how much has changed. Four recent projects across Europe and the
Middle East started from very different places — and arrived at very different answers.
Closing the gap At PortAventura World’s Caribe Aquatic Park, the opportunity was hiding in the space between experiences.
18 Coral Bay, a new 6,000-square-metre family
area, opened this summer with a collection of attractions designed to create a more deliberate progression through the park. At one end is interactive water play. At the
other are the larger-scale experiences older guests are ready to tackle. Between them, Coral Bay introduces several new steps: a KIDZ Adventure Tower with a FlyingSAUCER 8, KIDZ TWISTER and two-lane Body RallyRACER, alongside the world’s first HIVE 6 and Europe’s first ProSlide KIDZ Coaster. The latter takes one of the defining experiences
of a major water park, the water coaster, and scales it specifically for younger riders. HIVE 6 does something similar from another direction, bringing ProSlide’s HIVE technology into body sliding for the first time. Together, the attractions make growing into the
park part of the experience. For PortAventura World, which has worked with
ProSlide since 2001, Coral Bay creates a clearer journey for families whose children may have outgrown the smallest attractions but are not yet ready for everything else.
Making the ride the landmark Thirty kilometres outside Madrid, the brief was different: give a new area an attraction with presence. Aquópolis Villanueva de la Cañada’s new
Mana Nui expansion is centred around Kilauea, a nearly 180-metre RocketBLAST water coaster reaching speeds of up to 35 km/h. On the water, Kilauea is a substantial ride
experience. Five BLAST sections and three FlyingSAUCER features make Kilauea a substantial ride experience. But some of its most
OCTOBER 2026
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