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Park News - (7/16/10) Busch Gardens Williamsburg held their 2010 Hanover Pretzel Coaster Build-Off on Thursday afternoon. You can find pictures of the creations as well as a video clip here as the entrants were tasked with making their own version of Griffin.
    (7/2/10) Enjoy a new photo collection from BGW’s coasters posted to Amusement Insider.
    (6/30/10) Behind the Thrills dropped into BGW over the weekend to see the new Illuminights show as well as the other new additions to the park.
    (5/21/10) Some new details about BGW’s new IllumiNights has been posted to the BGWFans blog. The nighs events will include not only Fireworks but giant puppets, a parade, a living cuckoo clock, acrobats and contortionists and much more.
    (4/20/10) Busch Gardens Williamsburg will be holding another Pretzel Coaster Build-Off Contest this year with Snyder’s of Hanover.
    In the competition’s second year, people around the country are invited to build a roller coaster model out of Snyder’s of Hanover pretzels and submit pictures of their pretzel-coaster creations to snydersofhanover.com. Entries must be submitted before June 15. The builders of the five best creations will win a family trip to Busch Gardens in Virginia for the final round of competition. Working with only glue guns and an unlimited number of pretzels, the final-round participants will compete against each other and the clock by building a replica of the theme park’s floorless dive coaster, Griffon.
    Last year’s winner, 22-year-old Gregory Stanton from Maryland, will return to defend his title. Last year, his pretzel replica of the park’s hypercoaster, Apollo’s Chariot, earned praise from judges for its detail, accuracy and overall presentation.
    The winner of the in-park competition on July 15 will be awarded a four pack of two-year, 2-Park passes for Busch Gardens and Water Country USA, and a year’s supply of Snyder’s of Hanover pretzels. The estimated retail value of the grand prize is more than $1,200. For full contest rules, visit snydersofhanover.com.
    (4/13/10) According to the latest rumors, the new Europe In The Air attraction at BGW may open on May 1st. Can anyone else confirm this date? Meanwhile it seems a bunch of BGW fans have started an online petition to have the park restore the lost special effects once used in the tunnel segment on Lock Ness Monster. Spread and word and sign-up right here.
    (3/5/10) According to a press release from Busch Gardens Williamsburg, when the park opens on March 26th it will feature a new team of Clydesdales in the Highland Stables along with a flock of black faced sheep, two Border Collie pups and a Eurasian barn owl. The polished brass look of the stable, from the old Budweiser days will give way to a more natural rustic look. The new Clydesdales will look a bit different from the Bud team, and be black with a white blaze.

2010 - Europe In The Air - (5/4/10) A report from BGW for Europe In The Air can be found here along with a video clip showing off the opening celebration. While they have hyped up for months about how all the footage was recorded with cameras that can record footage seven times the quality of HD… apparently the may have skimped on the projectors.
    According to one of our readers, the image quality of the new ride footage was fairly blurry, especially to an eye familiar with the superb image quality of Disney’s Soarin’. To be fair this is a new attraction and there may still be technical issues being dealt with, so we’ll have to wait a bit before making a final judgment.
    (4/28/10) According to the official Busch Gardens Blog, “test flights” for Europe In The Air will begin this Friday, April 30th. According to my own sources, they aren’t ready to officially give it the ‘grand opening’ treatment just yet simply because only one of the two simulator bays will be ready at first. Crews are working hard to finish up the second one for testing as well if possible.
    (4/22/10) According to the BGW Blog, the new Europe In The Air ride will feature scent effects, such as the smell of Chocolate while flying over Paris. They’ve also posted a few other details as well as a teaser video for the new attraction.
    (1/29/10) Busch Gardens Williamsburg announced several items for this summer in celebration of the park’s 35th Anniversary. The focus will be mainly in the Ireland section of the park it seems, where a new show will be added to the Abbey Stone Theater that will replace the old Emerald Beat show. Now for the good news / bad news time… the popular Corkscrew Hill simulator ride will be replaced with a new movie adventure called Europe In The Air. Yep… it sounds like they are going to copy Disney’s Soarin’ concept… but shoehorn it into the existing motion base theater to show off Europe’s most popular landmarks.  Normally this would be a good thing, but I think they’re missing the fact that what make’s Soarin so popular at Disney is the unique Soarin’ ride hardware built to go hand-in-hand with that massive domed projection screen. I just don’t think this concept is going to go over so well in the old Corkscrew Hill simulator, BUT… they are doing this all in some kind of new video projection system that is supposed to feature a resolution nearly 7 times greater than broadcast HD, which is great to hear. Alas… Corkscrew Hill was cute and fun and the best simulator Busch has had in the park to date. Too bad they can’t find a way to offer both.
    Meanwhile the park will also feature Ramp Jam in the Festhaus Park this summer, a show that will feature BMX, skateboard and inline skate stunts. At night the park will put on IllumiNights… a major new nightly speculator show featuring amazing visuals, fireworks, and will keep the park open an extra hour each night all summer just so they can show it off. All in all… good news, despite the removal of Corkscrew Hill on top of the still sore spot of removing the Big Bad Wolf last fall. Busch Gardens Williamsburg opens for the 2010 season on March 26th.

2010 - Christmastown - Confirmed - (2/26/10) Busch Gardens Williamsburg has confirmed that Christmas Town will now run through to New Years Eve this year. It be open on Friday, Saturday and Sundays starting November 26th from 3 to 10pm and with the exception of Christmas day, it will run daily from December 17th through 31st. Additional details about new items coming to this year’s event will be announced later this year.
    (12/29/09) It seems BGW’s Christmas Town event was popular enough that not only will it return in 2010, but they’ve put out a sign to say that it will expand into Italy next year. Take a look over at Behind The Thrills. Now for the bad news as I’ve been told that there is no longer any trace of the Big Bad Wolf coaster as you can see in the pictures posted here.

2011 - Water Country USA Expansion - Rumor - (6/30/10) Behind the Thrills posted a nice rumor about Water Country adding a new waterslide for the 2011 season. In fact, the rumor seems to indicate that both Water Country and Adventure Island in FL will see new attractions added in the same year. It’s been awhile since WC got a nice new slide, so it could be almost anything, though if I had to bet, I’m guessing one of the newer style thrills from Aquatica is likely to be copied. (ie: The Bowl style slides or even Omaka Rocka)

2011/2012 - Tower Ride / New Land / Flying Coaster - Rumor - (7/29/10) BGWFans has found the first group of numbered survey markings placed around the Katapult ride. As I’ve come to understand, numbered survey markings like this are actually the various control points that will surround the area to be surveyed… kind of a numbered sequence of markers that if you could connect the dots, you’d be able to draw an outline around the area where the construction will be taking place. Since some of the markings are inside the actual Katapult ride area, I’d guess that it is likely safe.
    (7/22/10) Busch Gardens Williamsburg has put in a building permit to the local county planning office for an expansion to Germany that will include new food buildings, walkways and “a major ride and ride locations”. You can read it yourself here.
    (6/10/10) According to a report about the meeting BGW had with the local council about getting a waver to build their new drop tower ride, the park was granted their request. The few details given about the ride seemed to indicate that it may be placed on the old Big Bad Wolf site. Comments also mentioned at the meeting regarding noise issues and such seemed to indicate that the ride would not be fully enclosed either.
    (4/29/10) According to the local news Busch Gardens Williamsburg has applied for a height waver to build a new “tower” style attraction, “not to exceed 260 feet above ground level”. The plans suggest that the tower will be built in the Germany section of the park next to Der Wirbelwind swing ride.
    The funny thing is that I had first posted a rumor that an application for a height waver around 250 feet way back in January. And if you go back to a little over a year ago, we announced that one of Busch’s next two big thrill rides would indeed be a freestyle style drop tower ride. If the plans from one year ago remain the same, this new drop tower ride will actually be enclosed inside a dark castle themed structure, inspired by the Mystery Castle ride from Germany’s Phantasialand theme park. I’ve embedded a video below giving a unique, looking up from the ground, view of the Mystery Castle ride. This seems to offer a ride experience more like Disney’s Tower of Terror ride with speedy Up and Down movements along with special effects along the way. For comparison’s sake, the German ride is listed as being 65 meters tall, or 213 feet.
    The idea of adding drop tower ride at BGW isn’t new however, as various plans have been drawn up at different times over the past decade. The first plan I had heard of was way back in 1999 when the park was coming up with plans to retheme the Hastings area into Ireland for 2001. While the only ride that made the final cut for Ireland was Corkscrew Hill, the land was actually envisioned to have a massive new signature attraction at one point, a pair of S&S Space Shot towers with the lower halves enclosed within a Castle themed structure, with the tops half of the towers poking out from a pair of tall castle spires. If this sounds familiar to anyone who has visited Florida’s big theme parks, it should, because the concept was an admitted copy of the brand new (at the time) Dr. Doom FearFall towers at Islands of Adventure.
    As for this new version… I guess it’s finally time to see if the new owners are ready to build something as impressive as this could be, or if it will be stripped down in concept to be a more simply, plain and ordinary outdoor drop tower ride. More when we find out.

    (1/31/10) A Screamscape reader tells us that Busch Gardens Williamsburg may have applied for a 250 ft height waver for a future attraction at the park, likely for the 2011 season. Can anyone else confirm this?
    (4/16/09) Our spies tell us that the park still has big expansion plans on deck to add a new land to the park, taking over the former site of Drachen Fire. The unfortunate side of things, is that many of Busch’s big plans were put on hold when InBev took over the company, so there is no telling if this plan is still moving forward or just on hold for the moment. Either way, it seems that the multi-year plan to build an entirely new country (Spain is the most likley) in still very solid. It’s all a matter of “when” and not “if” at this point from what I’m told.
    In addition to adding a new train station to service this area on the line, we’ve heard about two major new attractions that will also be fighting for your attention. One would be the chain’s second B&M Flying coaster, where the design will be based on what they’re learning from Manta right now. Like many of the rides in Williamsburg, I’d expect this one to be an even bigger and longer coaster than what we’ve seen from Manta already, and given the location, I can help but wonder just how close some of it may some to Big Bad Wolf, or perhaps even diving down close to the river. The second big attraction being talked about would be actually something unique for the Busch parks, their first true “freefall” style tower ride. However don’t expect to see another Drop Zone style tower or something as basic as that. From the sound of things, they want to keep the entire experience INDOORS... offering an experience more like Mystery Castle from Phantasialand in Germany. Since this is a multi-year project, lets assume the plan is to build up the land in complete phases, so expect one new ride with each phase if everything gets approved.

2012/2013 - New Coaster / New Land - Rumor - (7/11/10) Time to shake up the rumor mill… as we’ve been sent a new rumor about BGW’s next coaster project tentatively planned for 2012. According to our source the new coaster could actually come from a German company. I’m going to assume Schwartzkopf is still out of the picture, and they would likely avoid Maurer at this point given the troubles Universal has had with the Rockit coaster. This pretty much narrows things down to Mack and Gerstlauer. While Mack is mostly known for the Mouse coasters, they did make a big splash into the launched coaster market last year with Blue Fire, and their spinning coasters are very cool as well. Plus they have a long standing relationship with the Busch parks.
    While Gerstlauer hasn’t been used by the former Busch parks yet, their impressive Eurofighter line of coasters (launched and vertical lift hill varieties) have already proven to be very adaptable to highly themed environments as seen with Dollywood’s Mystery Mine and Hansa Park’s Curse of Novgorod. A highly themed indoor/outdoor ride like this would be a great fit into BGW’s already impressive coaster collection.

    (4/16/09) Our spies tell us that the park still has big expansion plans on deck to add a new land to the park, taking over the former site of Drachen Fire. The unfortunate side of things, is that many of Busch’s big plans were put on hold when InBev took over the company, so there is no telling if this plan is still moving forward or just on hold for the moment. Either way, it seems that the multi-year plan to build an entirely new country (Spain is the most likley) in still very solid. It’s all a matter of “when” and not “if” at this point from what I’m told.
    In addition to adding a new train station to service this area on the line, we’ve heard about two major new attractions that will also be fighting for your attention. One would be the chain’s second B&M Flying coaster, where the design will be based on what they’re learning from Manta right now. Like many of the rides in Williamsburg, I’d expect this one to be an even bigger and longer coaster than what we’ve seen from Manta already, and given the location, I can help but wonder just how close some of it may some to Big Bad Wolf, or perhaps even diving down close to the river. The second big attraction being talked about would be actually something unique for the Busch parks, their first true “freefall” style tower ride. However don’t expect to see another Drop Zone style tower or something as basic as that. From the sound of things, they want to keep the entire experience INDOORS... offering an experience more like Mystery Castle from Phantasialand in Germany. Since this is a multi-year project, lets assume the plan is to build up the land in complete phases, so expect one new ride with each phase if everything gets approved.
    (10/30/07) The latest whisper on the wind in Williamsburg indicates that there may be a possible multi-year plans to add a new country at Busch Gardens Europe. A multi-year build plan very likely as we’ve seen Busch do with SeaWorld Florida’s Waterfront area. Over the years different counties have been mentions as possible future projects, but some say that they’ve heard Spain mentioned specifically as a primary choice in the past. As I recall, the park currently has an old England area, Scotland, Ireland, France, Germany and Italy… so there are still other options as well such as Greece.
    (10/24/07) We’ve heard an interesting rumor for Busch Gardens Europe today that gives us a good location to watch for the park’s next big expansion in 2009 and possibly beyond. In short, we’ve been told to keep our eyes open for a possible fourth train station to be added to the line, this time in the German area of the park. Things get interesting when you realize that the best place to put down a new train depot in Germany would be back along the existing tracks near the old Drachen Fire spot, which is a fairly large and undeveloped area currently being used for the three back-to-back Never After haunt experiences. Given the massive size of this area alone, it could be used for anything from a massive new coaster to a large new themed land. Of course the bigger the size of the development, the bigger the chance that this could become a project that will take more than one year to build out, so 2009 may just be the beginning.