[bgwfreak]

Hello everyone! I'm new to the site as well as the forums. I currently work at Carowinds and am excited to see everyone talking about the Park which we all love. Don't worry, I'm just like the rest of you trying to do research on what will be happening in the future as well as 08. I've been asking maintanance and there speculations are yes.

Here are some hints to help you all out:

1. Are we getting any New Rides next year? (98% Sure)

2. A couple of flatrides. (98% Sure)

3. One flat ride for sure is the Swings (100% sure)

3. Possible removal of Super Saturator ( Just a rumor) :ph34r:

4.Doubt if it's a coaster. But knowing Carowinds, your never know. :unsure:

We all just have to wait and see. Besides Carowinds see's that every park is doing something besides them. If they know whats good for them, they better stop playing and start diggin. LOL!

OK sure, I'll believe it when I see it.

Maintenance does not own or run the park. They probably have no idea what the park is getting.

They are probably about as reliable as the Dippin Dots guy.

[Davidtmp]

3. Possible removal of Super Saturator ( Just a rumor) :ph34r:

I would really like to see the saturator moved into the water park area, not sure if there is land or not. Just seems like a logical place. I just don't know if you would get as much traffic as you do now, and it just outside the water area. I love the fact that it gets spectators involved as well. OH, just leave it.
Thanks for the insight as to what we can expect in the future.

[UpperNick]

I am pretty sure that Satie was part of the waterpark in 2000.

[RRRAPIDS]

Hello everyone! I'm new to the site as well as the forums. I currently work at Carowinds and am excited to see everyone talking about the Park which we all love. Don't worry, I'm just like the rest of you trying to do research on what will be happening in the future as well as 08. I've been asking maintanance and there speculations are yes. 

Here are some hints to help you all out:

1. Are we getting any New Rides next year?  (98% Sure) 

2. A couple of flatrides. (98% Sure)

3. One flat ride for sure is the Swings (100% sure)

3. Possible removal of Super Saturator ( Just a rumor) :ph34r:

4.Doubt if it's a coaster. But knowing Carowinds, your never know. :unsure:

We all just have to wait and see. Besides Carowinds see's that every park is doing something besides them. If they know whats good for them, they better stop playing and start diggin. LOL!

OK sure, I'll believe it when I see it.

Maintenance does not own or run the park. They probably have no idea what the park is getting.

They are probably about as reliable as the Dippin Dots guy.

True, but the flat rides are coming. Maintenance knows more than we think.
Like I said before,we just have to wait and see for sure.

Oh, and for expanding Boomerang Bay, they still have the employee parking lot which they can use half of. There is plenty of room.


The Swings returning is one major attraction everyone has been talking about and longing for. Remember they still have the space available in the County Fair section. There is nothing but space and opportunity for a flat ride there.



If I find anything else out, I'll let you all know

OH and Scarowinds will be awesome this year!

[coasterbruh]

Im thinking i'm gonna have to buy another pair of speedo's/eurotrunks...

[RRRAPIDS]

This is to bgwfreak. I know I'm new to the forums, but I was tired last night. This led me into starting a new topic that I meant to erase about the new additions for next year. I actually was going to erase the new topic but instead sent it to be posted. Don't worry, I got the hang of everything now.

Hope all is well with you.


Oh and your Sarcasm is hilarious. I just hope you were not trying to play me.

Anyway, nice to meet you. LOL! B)

[kewlaidkiddd]

I think if anything... the next 2 years will bring some major changes to the park... With the new HRP going up, CF will have to pump a little bit of money into Carowinds in order to compete... and competition right now is key in order for the survival of our little park.

You can even see it on the board here... when I come to the Carowinds board daily and the only posts that seem to update are replies in the HRP, Dollywood, and that Mountain Parks thread.

Actually I would suggest this about the board to the moderators - Create a seperate section on the main page for talks about other parks because it does look rather bad that we come to a Carowinds Discussion board to talk about other parks.

I do see a good deal of negativity on the board too and would really like to see a lot of this curbed. There is always talk about the employees or the lack of new rides or just the crappy corporation of CF. We haven't even let them get their foot in the door so they can analyze and make improvements to the park without bashing them as well.

The park I have noticed so far is much cleaner (Except that One Trashcan between Nick Central and Top Gun still reeks to high hell), and attendence seems to be much better this year as the times that I get to the park at 6pm on weekdays, its much harder for me to find a spot at the front of the park like last year... so thats a plus.

There are two parts of Thrillers post to look at here.

Do I think the park will loose it? No. Reason being is that Carowinds for the most part is a local park. It very well caters to its local population... that being Charlotte. If you checked out Friday's Charlotte Observer, we are getting close to 18 new high rises in uptown over the next couple of years which means a much larger population. Carowinds is a great weekend spot for these newcomers to the city, and they don't have to drive far to get there.

This new surge in population will either cause Carowinds to have to expand, or some other company will bring their theme park to Charlotte to compete.

Where Carowinds does lack and this ties into the second part of my reply to Thrillers post is in the Traveller Traffic. It will take a good moment for Carowinds to really gain the reputation of being a park that people will want to travel to. Granted yes we do have a lot of Outer Visiters... but its not that big of a place for people to come vacation to. This will take a few more years, purchasing of a lot of the park area and making more use of the land that the park is on. We definitely won't be able to compete for a while because people just don't come to Charlotte to Vacation. People come here to live. With HRP at the Beach and Dollywood in the Mountains... There will have to be some big change in this area to actually get people to come here.

But looking back on this.... we are going to have the Nascar Museum soon - granted not my kinda crowd, it will definitely draw more tourism to the area. So take of that what you will.

I'll end this now and continuing discussing if this gets looked at.

[Thriller]

I agree with you here. One question...why does Carowinds not have no more advertising than what it has? I see a commerical about once during my nightly television shows, but I only see it on my local Fox station. Carowinds needs to have billboards on 77 and other major highways in the lower part of NC and upper parts of SC. I see billboards for attractions at the beach 70 miles from the beach. Carowinds needs to hit up most local travel agentcies in NC and welcome centers in SC, TN, VR, and NC. But I know Carowinds is staying put and yes, Carowinds is a great park that can only get better!!!

[Davidtmp]

Thriller & Kewlaid, I will agree with both of you. Charlotte is growing, as it has been for years. The difference, someone woke up and mentioned that Charlotte needs to grow up and not out. Downtown is becoming more dense. Nascar Hall of Fame is coming, this will bring in people from out of town. The White Water park could bring in visitors as well. More advertising would be nice, but maybe they are waiting to see what they had and hit advertising hard next year. It definitly needs to be done.
One thing that is being discussed is a new Water Park either in Fort Mill or near Concord Mills. Some hotel/water park combo that only hotel guest can use. Not sure I like the idea, but seems to be working in other parts of the country. Can't remember the name. Don't know if it would have any effect on Carowinds or not. But could be something for Cedar Fair to watch.

[MarkD]

I think you are talking about <a href='http://www.greatwolf.com/' target='_blank'>Great Wolf Lodge</a> .

Personally speaking I don't see where this will hurt Carowinds at all. With the prices they have it is a much better deal to go to Carowinds and stay there. Plus you get 2 parks at Carowinds.

[arjaybee]

Hi everybody...I think this is my first post of this Carowinds operating season. I haven't been to Carowinds this year after having season passes last year (12 visits last year). First off, we need to give Cedar Fair a few years before we evaluate whether or not the aquisition is a good thing. I am not a fan of their erosion of season pass benefits for the '07 season which according to their second quarter conference call, was to bring the Paramount parks in line with their existing pass program. Season pass purchases were down significantly this year at Carowinds and attendance is down as well through July which CF attributed to the pass program changes and reduction of complementary tickets and discounts. They say that per customer spending at the parks was up which offset the soft attendance numbers and that they anticipated these numbers when the changes were made. I miss the Bring a Friend Free admission for each passholder as well as the hour early admission as opposed to 10 minutes and half off Scarowinds tickets certainly beats $10 off and what is with the 8pm closing time during the summer!? With all that said though, I like the fact that CF is quick to respond to issues people have with the parks. They did extend the park hours to 10pm (every theme park should have at least 3 hours of after sunset operation) even if it was late in the summer and they returned the after 4pm discount admission. Carowinds still has 40% of their operating season to go so these corrections should have an impact.
In keeping with the topic, let's talk rides and the future. I will not miss Super Saturator and Rip Roarin Rapids needs to be improved or removed! I don't think CF will introduce new rides any faster than Paramount did, but when we get new rides they will be a significant improvement over the new attractions that Paramount would have offered. We should see new flat rides as early as '08 and the long awaited hypercoaster by '09 or '10 and CF has a great track record in regards to new signature rides. I agree with earlier posts that Carowinds currently doesn't have any direct competition within a 4 hour drive of Charlotte. The Hard Rock Park isn't any more a threat than SFoG or Busch Gardens. Carowinds is very much a local park but I believe CF will introduce rides that will attract a greater number of out of region customers by the end of this decade.
This is still a transitional period for the new ownership and I have faith that positive improvements are on the way.

PS - Wouldn't you know that as soon as Paramount sells the parks thay have a hit the size of Transformers...would have loved to see an Autobots vs. Decepticons themed dueling coaster. *sigh*

[Jonathan]

PS - Wouldn't you know that as soon as Paramount sells the parks thay have a hit the size of Transformers...would have loved to see an Autobots vs. Decepticons themed dueling coaster.

Well in that case I'm thrilled they sold it when they did.

[chargercrazy]

LOL

[arjaybee]

PS - Wouldn't you know that as soon as Paramount sells the parks thay have a hit the size of Transformers...would have loved to see an Autobots vs. Decepticons themed dueling coaster.

Well in that case I'm thrilled they sold it when they did.

Autobots...ATTACK!