User blog:RCTFan2002/What If? Episode 7: What if Cedar Fair didn't shut down Geauga Lake?

Hey guys, welcome back to the "What If?" series. I am so sorry for not uploading this sooner like I anticipated doing, but episode 2 of my "Whatever Happened To...?" series got in the way a bit. But now I can hopefully get back on track and continue updating this series on time like I want to (which I probably won't LOL XD).

This week's episode will be 1 of FOUR possible scenarios created for the now defunct Ohio theme park Geauga Lake. A few months ago, I ran a poll on which scenario for this park I should do first, and this one won by a landslide (and by that I mean it was the only one to receive a vote). This scenario will go over the possibility "What if Cedar Fair didn't shut down Geauga Lake?" So yeah, basically today we will discuss what could've happened to Geauga Lake if Cedar Fair decided to actually run the park as it was after Six Flags sold it to them instead of downgrading it to...whatever the f@*k it was by 2007 and then just silently closing it during the off-season. So with that out of the way, let's get started!

Introduction
Geauga Lake opened as a local recreational area in 1887, gaining it's first ride, a carousel, in 1889. It did not add it's first coaster, "The Big Dipper", until 1925, over 35 years later. The park continued to operate independently for several decades, until 1969, when Funtime Parks bought the property. They continued to run the park for the next 25 years, alongside their other properties "Darien Lake" and "Wyandot Lake", until Premier Parks, later on Six Flags, bought the Funtime parks in 1995. In 2000, when Premier Parks became Six Flags, Geauga Lake saw a massive expansion with FOUR new coasters and got it's name changed to "Six Flags Ohio". However, just a year later, Six Flags also bought the "Seaworld Ohio" park that opened right across the lake from the park in 1970, integrating it into their own park and creating "Six Flags Worlds of Adventure", the world's largest theme park. Sadly, due to Six Flags' financial issues, they sold the park after the 2003 season to Cedar Fair, who did...questionable things with the park aftewards. Not only did they tear down the "Seaworld Ohio" side of the park and replace everything with a new waterpark, but also removed two popular coasters and eventually shut down the park as it was seen as redundant and less popular than Cedar Point and Kings Island. The waterpark was shut down after 2016 and to this day is just an empty lot.

But what if Cedar Fair had different plans for the park? What if instead of downsizing the park and eventually closing it, Cedar Fair actually decided to keep running Geauga Lake as it was? Would rides and coasters like "X-Flight" or "Steel Venom" still be relocated? Would it become as big and popular as CF's other Ohio parks? Find out now!

Year-by-year predictions
Unlike the rest of the episodes which have gone through the year-by-year predictions with lots of detail about what I predict the park would've gotten each year, I'm gonna try to do this in a different format that hopefully doesn't waste too much time explaining everything and will be short, sweet and to the point.

To be honest, for 2004 and 2005 I think Cedar Fair would do the exact same thing they did to the park IRL (removing the zoo part of the park and replacing all the animal exhibits with "Wildwater Kingdom"), because I honestly cannot see Cedar Fair running a park with animal exhibits in it, so this move kinda does make sense for the company (even if it means killing a really cool part of "Six Flags Worlds of Adventure" unfortunately). 2006 though would be where this diversion actually starts, in that "Steel Venom" and "X-Flight" wouldn't be removed from the park. IRL, Cedar Fair deliberately got rid of these two coasters because they thought the park was "too extreme" and wanted to focus more "on families", but in reality we all kinda know that they were trying to downsize the park on purpose to drive more attention to "Cedar Point".

But here's the thing - Cedar Fair claiming that they downsized and shut down "Geauga Lake" because "hAvInG tWo PaRkS iN oHiO wAs ReDuNdAnT" doesn't make any sense when you take "Kings Island" into consideration. They didn't even buy KI until THAT VERY YEAR from Paramount Parks, so time-wise, Cedar Fair should've showed more attention to "Geauga Lake" than they did "Kings Island" - but instead, while GL was closed down within less than 5 years, KI got a HYPER, an INVERT, and a FREAKIN' GIGA COASTER. Redundancy, my ass. They just wanted to drive more people away from the park and to Cedar Point, and then ultimately Kings Island. Instead of looking at "Geauga Lake" as a liability, they should've seen it as an asset - more parks they have in Ohio, the more overall guests they can attract to that general area, and more money for the company. They clearly had no problems doing it with "Kings Island", so why not "Geauga Lake", which they had BEFORE KI? (Again, hypocrisy at it's finest).

Anyways, in this scenario, we could assume Cedar Fair actually took what I said above, about attracting more guests to that general area with more parks in that state, into consideration and decide to keep "Geauga Lake" running the way it is - without downsizing it and making BS excuses for doing so - but just taking expansion and new additions a LOT more slower than Six Flags did (SF expanding the park really quickly the way they did was partly the reason they had financial distress and sold the park in the first place). So, yeah. "Steel Venom" and "X-Flight" stay, meaning Kings Island and Dorney Park never get "Firehawk" or "Possessed". Considering what KI did to "Firehawk" though, we probably just dodged a bullet.

But the park DOES still need a new ride of some sort, since the last one (not counting the new waterpark) was in 2003, maybe even before. Which brings me into 2007 - I predict that this year, if Cedar Fair actually put more investments into the park, Geauga Lake would build an S&S drop tower complex, just like the ones at "Cedar Point" and "Dorney Park", over the former spot of "Mr. Hyde's Nasty Fall", which i predict Cedar Fair still would've gotten rid of anyways around this time since it was an old, outdated version of a drop tower anyways. This new modernized drop tower would definitely be a rejuvenating take on the old ride in it's place and, with more towers, means more capacity and less lines. Plus it's location - at the very front of the park near the entrance - would definitely provide an appealing visual to people even before they enter the park.

For 2008, I predict that the park could finally see it's newest coaster for the first time in 7 years - but given Cedar Fair's more family friendly atmosphere, I predict that the best type of coaster this park could add, given the time period as well, is a spinning coaster, just like what both "Knott's Berry Farm" and "Worlds of Fun" also added around this time period (the manufacturer shouldn't really matter, Worlds of Fun got a Gerstlauer, Knott's Berry Farm got a Mack, you can decide for yourself), It's the perfect combination of a family coaster and thrill coaster, being an exciting and thrilling ride but also appealing VERY much to families and kids, as it's not too tense for them. This type of coaster is also usually compact in layout, and seeing that the old "Hurricane Hannah" waterpark on the theme park side is pretty much just open land now, I think this coaster could perfectly fit here (and maybe even rejuvenate that area a bit, as before becoming a waterpark in 2000 it was also part of the theme park).

For 2009, I predict a waterpark expansion on the former spot of the "Happy Harbor" area of the park, because to be honest, this area worked a LOT better when Six Flags was running the park, as there were more rides on that side. But now with Cedar Fair running the park, it's just...separated from the park and painfully awkward just sitting next to the waterpark, far away from all the other rides. Since it's right next to "Wildwater Kingdom" I believe that using this land for a future expansion of the waterpark would be a MUCH better choice than keeping it as an awkwardly placed park area. As for the rides, I predict that some of them would be reintegrated somewhere else in the park while others are scrapped (it depends on which ones are the most popular w/guests, though for some reason I can see "Black Squid" being scrapped simply because it's older). Also, "Time Warp" would most likely be removed from the park around this time because I honestly just don't see it as a fitting ride for a Cedar Fair park in general. For 2010, a kids area conversion, turning the "Kidzworks" area of the park into "Planet Snoopy", as the other CF parks did around this time, and expanding it a bit to cover the old spot of "Time Warp" which was literally right next door. This would give the park it's much needed Peanuts kiddie area that it never got IRL for some reason.

For 2011, I predict that we would see a Mondial WindSeeker come to the park. Even though the park isn't exactly Cedar Point or any of the Paramount Parks that CF bought, remember that "Knott's Berry Farm" and eventually "Worlds of Fun" also got this type of ride later on so I could definitely see a ride like this coming to "Geauga Lake", especially if Cedar Fair was actually investing into keeping the park open and running and trying to attract more people to it. This type of ride would be PERFECT in the old spot of "Silver Bullet", the park's Enterprise that was removed in 2003 - it's certainly narrow enough to fit on the small former ride pad and would finally get rid of that awkward empty spot in the area where the ride used to be.