Long Term Parking Plans

If one looks at an aerial view of the CP peninsula, it is surprising to see how little of the available land is actually used for the park itself. With the resorts, camper village, lighthouse point and the marina, a lot of land is set aside from the main portion of the park. The biggest waste, however, is the parking lot. It uses probably 40% of the total acreage of the point!

The way I see it, one of two things will eventually happen. Rides will continue to be turned over at an alarming pace (Six years for STR???) OR Matt Ouimet will take a cue from his former employer in Anaheim and build a parking deck. Does anyone else think this would be a good idea?

In Disneyland, the landlocked park basically doubled its space and erected a second gate by putting up a huge, freestanding 8 story parking deck and getting rid of the surface lot. In 2001, the old lot became the California Adventure park which has become a worthy attraction in its own right. In Sandusky, a deck could be erected off point, (On the land where the Breakers Express stands) or maybe even on one of the "lslands" the causeway bisects. A tram system could transport people on and off the point. This plan would be initially expensive but could almost double the space that CP has available. Good idea? Bad idea?

This has been mentioned many times. I believe the problem with the parking deck is that it would be too heavy for the peninsula.

Then again, I don't know how it can be THAT much heavier than a rollercoaster.

If they were going to be pressured to expand parking, it may lead to either filling in the bay a bit or building an off-site parking and running trams. I highly they doubt they would ever build a garage/parking deck on the peninsula.

A parking deck would be a nightmare on a busy day. That would create huge bottlenecking. And it would look ugly if it was on-site.

Agree that it may look ugly, too heavy, but it would be great to park in the shade...going back to the car for lunch break, with a cold cooler and have a picnic in the shade.

Prob would increase the parking fee though.

I like the accessibility of everything being right on site. If you moved main parking then you would still need to have traffic headed in for hotels and the marina. The park is already huge, I don't want to walk more during my day. So I don't have a problem with it staying as is. They didn't turn str over in 6 years because of space, they did it because it sucks.

I somewhat agree with the OP comments about rides having to be turned over and retired at a quicker rate though. Some of the development you're currently seeing is from things that have been there a long time (ie Valravn taking the place of the IMAX theatre and Turnpike Cars) that were in those same spots since 1975 and 1959 respectively so it might have been overdue to develop those areas.

I think there might be less room for larger attractions (ie coasters) without the removal of some more recent attractions that aren't 40-50 years old, so yes I get that. Which is why there will be a focus on smaller family attractions and small footprints in the next few years, imo.

One thing I do appreciate with Cedar Fair's current administration is that they are looking outside the box for future potential land development. One thing that recently comes to mind is Gatekeeper utilizing areas of the park that weren't currently used for anything previously. Think of the area above the front entrance gates and GK's diagonal layout across the main lot's employee parking areas. Nothing suffered or no rides had to be removed for that part of GK's layout to happen. Space Spiral was replaced by a food courtyard/seating. I think you might see more of this trend (developing under utilized areas of the park) continuing down the line and I wouldn't be surprised to see the lagoons utilized in the future because of this.

I think when Planning and Development looks at aerial views of the peninsula, takes into account low ridership numbers with current attractions, and sees if there are better uses of that area that can be had.

I would love to see parking off point to develop the main parking lot for park use but I think you're looking at a monorail type system or bus shuttle to do that. Would it be cost justified? That's the question. CP's been pretty stagnant the last 30 years with 3 to 3.6 million visitors every year. I don't see that changing with off site parking or further development into the main parking lot. My 2c.

STR being removed after 6 years was more because it was a piece of junk rather than the park needing the room. The iMax theater had outlived its useful life as well, space spiral had high maintenance costs and low ridership, Disaster Transport was a Disaster for sure.

The weight of a parking structure is of minimal consequence on the peninsula. Larger footers, or drilled caisson footings would be used. I highly doubt a vertical parking structure will be built but it doesn't have anything to do with the ground at Cedar Point not being able to support the weight.

If Cedar Point did eventually spread out into the parking lot, it would mean either putting coasters/rides in front of the park entrance or moving the front entrance in front of GateKeeper. Both cases are feasible, but it would mean redesigning the entrance again. And what kind of a name is "GateKeeper" if it doesn't keep a gate?

CP Maverick said:

...or building an off-site parking and running trams.

This has been discussed before. The issue raised, by folks much smarter than me about such things,

CPfan1976 said:

CP's been pretty stagnant the last 30 years with 3 to 3.6 million visitors every year.

That right there is the reason it should never happen. If they were growing 100k, or even 50k visitors every year, and pushing 4.5m+ visitors I'm sure it would be a very plausible thing to do. But, you're not going to gain a whole bunch of attendance just because you make space for a few more flat rides, 1 mega record breaking coaster, and 1 good but not record breaking coaster. The demand isn't there, simple as that. There's only a handful of days a year that parking is at or near capacity. The opportunity cost is equal or greater than that of moving parking off the point or building a parking structure.

On a side note, there's no architectural/engineering reason they couldn't build whatever infrastructure they would go with to move parking off the peninsula or consolidate the area it takes up on the peninsula. If you can dream it, it can be built.

If they ever built another large giga or hyper coaster it might look interesting going along the side of the parking lot out and back from inside the park.

I don't see any real reason for Cedar Point to pursue expansion much beyond what it currently is.

It's a mature, uber-popular seasonal amusement park that does not have a land problem.

Am I missing something?

^^ And where would they put that? On one side is Gatekeeper and the other is Blue Streak. The front of the park is filled. I highly doubt anything new will be put there.

GL2CP may have been suggesting that a coaster station be located where Ocean Motion or one of the picnic pavilions are, and the coaster would run out into the parking lot.

#2ndGate

:-)

Yes, a station inside the park with a small footprint, and the bulk of the ride outside the park. This would solve the problem of not having enough room in the park as some have claimed. But im in agreement that they do not have a space issue.

Sounds exactly like Magnum...

From what I have been told and I am sure Tony(if you are reading this post) can clarify. There is somewhat of an agreement with the city and the home owners adjacent to the parking lot. It states that no parking deck or park expansion can go near (certain measurement) those homes.

Taking a coaster out the front of the park like that would totally ruin the great entrance Cedar Point now has with Gatekeeper. The park will continue to find new and creative ways to use the available land. While I sometimes am in the club that its a bummer to lose a ride I grew up with, I quickly get over it when they announce the new attraction or ride that replaces it.