Farewell, Wildcat.

Tilt-a-Whirl said:
The park said Wildcat was leaving "to expand the plaza," not because the steel was deteriorating, not because it failed inspection, not because the car flew off the track and landed in lake Eerie. It would be very hard to keep something like that under wraps.

The removal will, in effect, expand the plaza. There's no argument with that, but you can't throw the baby out with the bath water. The job of PR employees IS to keep image-scarring material under wraps. CF will tell us that the reason for pulling the plug on WildCat was for the sake of crowd capacity at Luminosity. The removal WILL increase capacity, but it COULD also cover for some other factor ("COULD" being the operative word).

Believe whatever news you want, but I don't think anyone, save the people who made the decision, will ever know the full extent of the logic behind WildCat's removal. We can argue about this well into the apocalypse, but we just won't know.

I couldn't get through every post, but I find it completely staggering that anyone would suggest that this removal is because of Luminosity. If it really were that simple, they wouldn't be recycling the ride, they'd either move it or send it to another park.

The ride's fate, particularly after it was already being tested, and the work was presumably done to rehab the cars in the off-season, sure would imply to me that there is a bigger problem. Lift hill and final brake issues alone have caused more than enough headaches for the park over the years.

Which really makes the point that Dave mentioned, about how well engineered the dynamics of the ride are... not counting the lift and brakes. It's a shame that none of the ride manufacturers, except maybe Mack and Reverchon, are into these smaller rides. I think there is still a fantastic opportunity in that market segment.

I'm still not seeing any reason to think anything other than something terrible during testing. Terrible meaning a grossly failed inspection, or another "unplanned rollback" during a test run.

What some people may be overlooking is that, as much as you may love the ride, it is now a liability.

Does another park want to purchase a 40 year old ride with a recent history of accidents (one of which I would call particularly severe) due to mechanical failure?

Does Cedar Point want to invest in moving/rehabbing a ride that I am quite sure raised some type of insurance cost for them?

Like I stated earlier (which is now approximately 6 pages back), I completely understand the emotional attachment to a ride that leaves, but between this and Disaster Transport, they are both eyesores that I would pluck from the park. I think I can state with 100% confidence that this is the absolute last way John H. would want or plan a ride like Wildcat to leave the park. Add the liability factor to Wildcat, and you have what you have here.

I love how conspiracy theories about Wildcat are free to roam on here, but the slight mention of a conspiracy regarding say Geauga Lake is shot down immediately.

Definitely sad and unexpected news; especially seeing Cedar Point lose a coaster. I'd have to agree with the speculation that something must have gone wrong during testing (e.g. expensive part breaking..though aren't these types of coasters common?) Otherwise, the ride seems fairly easy to move if more space was the primary issue.

Does anyone know if the park maps for this year have been printed yet? It'd be interesting to see if Wildcat gets removed or they design a newer version of the map later in the season.

Tilt-a-Whirl said:
I love how conspiracy theories about Wildcat are free to roam on here, but the slight mention of a conspiracy regarding say Geauga Lake is shot down immediately.

I don't see how our speculations classify as conspiracy theories. Now if someone was suggesting that someone from SFMM raided CP and sabotaged the ride in order to win the "coaster war"....now that is a conspiracy theory and it would be shot down immediately....HAHAHA

Tilt-a-Whirl said:
I love how conspiracy theories about Wildcat are free to roam on here, but the slight mention of a conspiracy regarding say Geauga Lake is shot down immediately.

No, they're equally silly.

Red Garter Rob said:
The ride is not "portable" anymore and hasn't been for a long time. The pieces have been welded in place for years.

I wonder if the fact that everything has been welded in place makes it unfeasible to relocate or sell Wildcat. Maybe the only option for removal is to cut it apart, thus ruining the structure.

Right. But the park plainly said the reason that Wildcat was removed was because of Celebration Plaza. Why question that and develop other theories? The park gave us the reason, so assuming they're hiding something is just silly.

The theory regarding WildCat's demise has one advantage in that it actually makes sense.

I predicted the other day, in another thread, that Wildcat's days were numbered. This sounds like it is going to be an incredible show, with large crowds, and the Wildcat area would be very useful for a bleacher section.

Personally, I'm happy. It's a carnival coaster and time to move on. I couldn't take the hard brakes anymore at the end of the ride, and avoided riding it.

Tilt-a-Whirl said:
Right. But the park plainly said the reason that Wildcat was removed was because of Celebration Plaza. Why question that and develop other theories? The park gave us the reason, so assuming they're hiding something is just silly.

Because the reason given does not make logical sense. For a seasonal amusement park, you only have so much time in the offseason to make changes for the next season. To suddenly announce the removal of a major ride several weeks before opening the park again is not consistent with the idea that it was planned all along as part of the new midway layout.

I think it's pretty simple: They knew this would be the last season for Wildcat; they were just going to wait to announce it later in the summer so people could get a last ride in or whatever. But during testing they found something wrong that didn't seem worth fixing for one final season so they are getting rid of it now. No way to know for sure but it makes sense

Tilt-a-Whirl said:
Right. But the park plainly said the reason that Wildcat was removed was because of Celebration Plaza. Why question that and develop other theories? The park gave us the reason, so assuming they're hiding something is just silly.

Chuck Wagon is right. The facts that WildCat was already given a crew and had already started initial testing, but then was canned just weeks before opening day doesn't add up.

To say that it will be removed simply because of Celebration Plaza would be dumb, because I'm taking a good assumption that more planning was put into place to create this entire plaza. I'm sure they weren't just like, "Oh, let's build ourselves a plaza today! I hope it works out!" Many measurements and specifications took place, and I'm positive WildCat was meant to stay. Something had to have happened to cause the park to pull the plug on the ride.

A few points:

1) To those that think Luminosity should be located by the beach, perhaps replacing the thrill show stadium, we don't know what plans CP has for that area in the future. Whatever they are, Luminosity is probably not compatible with future plans for the area.

2) Don't you think CP maintenance is on top of things that there would not be a surprise failing of the state inspection? Any preexisting major problem with the ride would be know way before the state inspection.

3) What I have heard outside of Pointbuzz makes me believe that CP's statement on why Wildcat is being removed is accurate. NO attempt at any kind of coverup.

Pete,

So you're suggesting it was just poor planning? If that's the case I'm going to be even more upset.

What I'm suggesting is that you can believe the contents of the statement made by CP.

In my humble opinion... that's inexcusable. There are so many reasons why this just rubs me the wrong way and most of them aren't even because I've worked the ride. I'll save you guys having to read my rantings however as I'm sure many of you could care less.

Pete, I can believe that. In fact I do. But I do wonder why they were testing it a few days ago. What do you think?

Ugh, it's not poor planning. I don't care what the park says about the Luminosity being a factor... they also said it's attributed to the age and rising cost of maintaining the ride. Having more room may certainly be a bonus, but I doubt very much it was first reason to ditch it... not when it had a crew and had begun testing.

I swear to God the Internet is the land of black helicopters.