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"Priority park access"

Does anyone else think the new plaza looks like an eventual second park entrance for the resort?

My guess:

Originally the "spring fest" concept art was for a new area that would have been exactly that, that's why Outlaw Run is in the background and the area behind the stage is missing the warehouse, even though the summer concept has it.

Probably just a "starter" resort with standard amenities and around 250 rooms.

This is about what I'm expecting too.

I'm expecting it to be a "luxury rural/'hillbilly'" theme if that makes any sense. "Luxury" materials, but styled to be old and rustic essentially them heavily leaning in to an "Experience the Ozarks" message, but no actual "old-scool" substance behind it.

Maybe I'm completely off though, this is all a guess based off what I've seen with the park lately.

Don't think I've seen it mentioned, but the festival page mentions "Debut of NEW Plaza Expansion" under the spring Exposition festival, as well as the hero image looking like concept art for it.

I can't place where the concept art is supposed to be though, it looks like Outlaw Run in the background of it, but then says it's "Doubling The Size Of The Grand Exposition."

Also drone shows coming to SDC for July. Will be interesting to see where they do it with the trees. Looks like the drone show is going to be over the plaza based off this concept art.

Dollywood announced that they are replacing the launch on Lighting Rod with a fast chain lift and that they are getting new trains. The launch was cool and we got lucky to ride it every trip we took, but I don't think it was worth the amount of down time that it had.

It will close for the season on October 30th and reopen in Spring 2024. Other than the lift, the rest of the ride experience will be the same, even the same top speed.

For me, the more interesting part of the announcement is new trains. I much prefer the Outlaw Run trains over the Lighting Rod ones. The high headrest on them made them feel much less open than the Outlaw Run twins. Now without the launch, I wonder if they will be more like the Outlaw Run ones.

https://www.facebook.com/dollywood/videos/1359445871311763/

Dang, that sucks. I loved the launch on the coaster...even though I got a gnat in my eye from it (and it was in there for 4+ hours).

It's understandable though, it's had so many issues.

Hmm, has it been confirmed they're doing this? I haven't had a chance to watch the announcement they posted but I haven't seen any mention of it.

It is listed in the press release.

Given next year's excitement, Silver Dollar City will offer a 2024 season pass pre-sale October 9-31. During the pre-sale, passes will be offered at the lowest prices of the season and include early line access to FIRE IN THE HOLE in the spring.

https://www.silverdollarcity.com/press/2024-announcement/

Also what were the issues with BBM? Long lines, or something else? I haven't paid much attention to DW as of late.

They sold it as buy your passes early to be the first to ride, but then some general public got to ride before the pass holders had their reserved ride times. It was really that people thought they were promised one thing, when they actually weren't and they got mad.

Ah, my bad. I missed that somehow.

I had assumed you meant they were planning on doing ride previews this year for passholders (why I was kinda confused because it would be a real rush to hit that goal).

I wonder why SDC doesn't do the Disney approach. Usually they do previews in the order of something like: Staff followed by VIPs followed by Passholders followed by General Public. All with reserved times and you got one go.

It will be interesting to see how the early access goes with those that buy passes during the presale. It was kind of a mess with Big Bear Mountain at Dollywood this year. I am guessing that SDC will adjust their messaging around it to avoid some of the issues that Dollywood had with it.

Hmm, has it been confirmed they're doing this? I haven't had a chance to watch the announcement they posted but I haven't seen any mention of it.

Also what were the issues with BBM? Long lines, or something else? I haven't paid much attention to DW as of late.

If anyone is interested...Silver Dollar City just uploaded the new version of the Fire in the Hole song to YouTube...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=saeqx5nVQnc

Us old timers remember when we had to download a bootleg MP3 version. I had it as my ring tone for a while.

Still have to for the amazing covers playing on a near time traveler (or I haven't seen an official release).

I honestly looked for a CD of it in the shops for a while the first time I heard most of the music (hint hint SDC merch team).

Wonder what the "special surprise" is for the passholders. Maybe a walk-through of the state of FITH 2.0?

Honestly, I would love to see them do something similar to Cedar Point. But I also get why they wouldn't think it's a popular idea.

https://www.cedarpoint.com/live-video

[it will be interesting to see where they will park everyone]

ON TOPIC: Here are several photo updates of current projects

Parking Lot
http://www.midwestinfoguide.com/2023/02/city-update-parking-sdc.html

We've heard that this project won't be completed until this summer, so it will be interesting to see where they will park everyone here in a couple of weeks when the park opens for the season on March 11th

Understatement of the year? Decade? Century?

Drove through the area on Tuesday, 2/21. It's hard to imagine the park being ready to open March 11. Maybe the large paved lot out at Notch will be used for parking.

Good view of just how big this project is, and the before/almost current state of it.

That was truly awful to watch.

Reading up about it, I actually wonder if it's going to be a ride ops error or something mechanical breaking on the ride, since it's only been open ~3 months.

Both attractions, which opened in December 2021

https://www.fox35orlando.com/news/orlando-drop-tower-ride-death

I've never been able to get a feel for how much furniture they actually sold. My wife and I loved to look, but never bought anything. I'm guessing our experience was pretty common. Demonstrations aside, did the store do enough business to justify rebuilding it?

I was under the impression that there was always a mult-month waitlist for some of the furniture, but maybe I'm wrong. An article from ocregister (well known local news site from Orange County, CA) claims an 8-month wait last year. https://www.ocregister.com/2021/07/30/why-silver-dollar-city-deserves-to-be-ranked-among-americas-best-theme-parks/

Something I'm wondering if anyone knows, does SDC have plans to install electric car chargers any time soon? We have two cars (one electric) and would love to be able to take it due to the price of gas, but logistics around it are tough atm with Branson. Obviously I wouldn't expect it to be part of the free parking though.

So Lightning Rod apparently straight up crashed last week. It reportedly "launched backwards" at the start and the train went backwards into the station and bumped into an incoming train pretty hard. Not hard enough to cause serious injury, but hard enough that people are complaining about bruises and headaches. This is AFTER a huge overhaul, and 5 years after this thing was built. Has it ever really operated for a full season? I know the first year was basically a wash, and several other years it has been down more than up.

I don't know what they can do at this point. I wouldn't be surprised if they tear it out because of how much of a cost sink and liability it is.

I wonder if it was a true backwards launch, or a rollback.

Either way, something is broken there, as it should have had rollback brakes to prevent the train from going back into another vehicle.

Rumor: MRF will be closed for the foreseeable future.  Apparently there was an incident where guests were injured and had to be taken to the hospital.  That's all the info I have at this moment.  Still doing some checking with different sources.  It is interesting that the app has MRF listed as closed for the day and that was the case at park opening.

Interestingly enough the ride is also running, but all vehicles are filled with the sandbags for testing.

EDIT: as soon as I posted this it stopped of course.