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Park News - (6/22/09) California’s Great America has sent us word about a little something they are calling the Inside Track Blog Contest. It’s a trivia contest of sorts for the park where they show you a series of close-up park pictures and you tell them where the item shot is in the park. The winner will get a a trip for themselves and 3 friends to come to the park to get the VIP treatment as well as check out the new All Wheels Extreme show. Click here for the official rules and details on how to enter!
  (1/13/09) I’ve been told that the park is trying to improve Grizzly’s reputation and currently working on installing some new trackwork to sections of the ride, most notably on the large turnaround.
  (10/16/08) Several videos shot at the Halloween Haunt have been posted to the Sacramento Bee this week: Slaughterhouse, Club Blood, CarnEvil and one showing off the Scare Zones.

2009 - All Wheels Extreme - Confirmed - (2/19/09) California’s Great America has announced the addition of the All Wheel Extreme sports stunt shot for the 2009 season. This 25-minute high-energy experience will feature a talented cast of daredevils, including BMX riders, skateboarders, rollerbladers, gymnasts and more, all packed into the park’s Redwood Amphitheater. The new show is expected to open in June. The park will also offer a new comedy / magic show called The Chipper Lowell Experience.

2010-2011 - GCI Wooden Coaster - Proposed - (11/24/08) After being left off the 2009 Capital List from Cedar Fair’s big corporate announcement last week a company spokesperson confirmed that the coaster would not be coming in 2009 as planned. However they were kind of vague if it was just being delayed a year or two or if it was canceled entirely. More as we find out.
  (9/17/08) After countless studies and recommendations to approve the project the city council decided to sit on their hands last night and voted 6-1 in favor of forcing the park to sit down with Prudential Real Estate to reach some kind of compromise between now and another meeting on October 28th. According to this article they did vote on the idea of building it and checking noise levels later again but it lost in a 4-3 vote. It seems that after three different noise studies, they still can’t decide about how much noise a wooden coaster makes and how it will impact the nearby office building. Though you would think that all they would have to do is visit the site because the park’s other wooden coaster, The Grizzly, is also on that same side of the park, just further towards the back. What’s kind of funny is that really the office building has been lucky, because the area of the park closest to them has been empty for a few years now, waiting for redevelopment. In the early days I believe The Whizzer was located here, as well as the park’s train running right alongside the property line for years, blowing it’s whistle and making all kinds of noise. The general area was one almost the home to Hypersonic before that project was moved to another park… so after several years of sitting empty, I think Prudential just got spoiled. In the meantime… with all these delays you can guarantee that this project will not happen in 2009 now.
  (9/15/08) The latest news update on the proposed new wooden coaster says that the city council will likely make a decision to allow the coaster on Tuesday night. So far they have bee recommended to allow the project.
  (9/1/08) According to the latest rumors, the various delays and setbacks over the new proposed wooden coaster planned for California’s Great America have pushed the project back too far. What this means is that the project may very well be delayed until the 2010 season at this point. I also can’t help but wonder if this has anything to do with all the talks between the park and the 49’ers over building a new stadium in the parking lot. Obviously if the team is willing to buy the park outright from Cedar Fair, then Cedar Fair has no reason to pay to put in a new coaster just yet.
  (8/28/08) The meeting scheduled to help determine the fate of the proposed GCI wooden coaster project led to an agreement between Cedar Fair and Prudential (the owner of the nearby office building) to have a peer review of the “acoustical analysis”. More time was needed to have this done so the review wont take place now until September 16th.
  (8/14/08) For anyone who has heard a rumor lately claiming that the new GCI wooden coaster planned was cancelled, don’t believe it. I went right to the source with this one and asked Al Garcia, the Marketing Communications Manager for the park, to find out what the status of the project is. 
  “As of right now, we're still moving forward with our new wooden coaster project. While it has been a little bit of a bumpy ride to get this project rolling, we are awaiting final approval at an upcoming Santa Clara city council meeting on Aug. 26. So, in short...we're still moving forward with the project!”
  (6/9/08) Tucked away in this latest local news report about the whole 49er’s Stadium story is a confirmation that the city voted 5 to 1 in favor of the height exemption needed to move forward with the plans for the new wooden coaster. They also said that the complaints from neighboring business were “unfounded”. But with the crunch on to try and finalize some kind of deal for the new stadium, there are those out there who feel that this may have been a case of, as the article’s author puts it best, “Quid Pro Coaster”. A little good will on the part of the city in the hopes of some good will back from the park to help move the stadium deal forward.
  (4/17/08) In the article about the progress of the 49ers stadium project, they mentioned that Cedar Fair is having a little difficulty with the owners of the nearby office buildings over the new 2009 wooden coaster. The 111 foo t tall coaster is on land zoned with a 35 foot height limit, so they’re attempting to get a zoning variance though so far meetings were said to not be progressing well.
  (11/16/07) While at IAAPA the I noticed the GCI booth had a little something interesting on the side wall if you were looking closely enough… the proposed layout for the 2009 custom wooden coaster going to California’s Great America. The interesting thing about the design is that it’s proposed for the front of the park on the right side where it will wrap its first drop around the park’s observation tower ride as well as wind around the back of the old Imax theater. This looks like a completely custom layout unlike anything I’ve seen elsewhere. Although it looks huge, the graphic says that it will only be about 100 feet tall.
  (10/26/07) In 2009 Cedar Fair has already confirmed plans to add a new GCI wooden coaster to the park. The new coaster will stand 104 feet tall and send riders on a 2 minute ride at 52 mph ride through a twisting first drop, a low to the ground S turn and a high speed station fly-by.

???? - 49’ers Stadium Project - In Talks - (6/5/09) While the city and the 49’ers seem ready to press ahead and build a new stadium, Cedar Fair has now threatened possible legal action if their concerns over the parking situation at the park are not addressed. You can read more here.
  (5/22/09) A major sticking point in the 49’ers plans has come to the close today as the local news reports that the team and city have come to an agreement on the financing terms to build the new stadium. A meeting is planed for Tuesday next week to disclose the terms and possible plans to the public, but they also need to make some kind of deal with Cedar Fair over the use of the land and parking lots for the stadium if they want to open it by 2013. Otherwise, it’s going to get sticky and very legal real quick.
  (5/20/09) The local news mentions that a finalized plan to build a new 49’ers stadium could be signed off on soon and announced in the very near future. In fact, from the tone of the article, the city may actually attempt to just give the land over to the team to build the stadium “as long as it still gives Great America adequate parking nearby.” Of course, this doesn’t mean that any plan to sell off the park to the team is off the table yet either. More when we find out.
  (4/29/09) We’ve come to the end of the month and still no announcement on what is going on with the park and the 49’ers. Some have taken this sudden silence to mean that perhaps a deal has been reached as they are just busy finishing up all the minor details and paperwork to come up with their final agreement. A good argument for this line of thought is this news article that talks about how many police and security people need to be staffed per game and who will pay for them. This seems like they’re getting ahead of themselves to me, unless perhaps they know something they’re not sharing yet...
  (4/3/09) According to this article there has been some good progress lately in the efforts to make a deal between the city, the 49’ers and Cedar Fair that could allow them to all come to an agreement on a new stadium plan within the next couple of weeks. Cedar Fair is talking with them it seems, as they have been having some meetings with Cedar Fair about it in Ohio lately.
  (1/12/09) According to the local news the current economy problems are likely going to slow down any progress the 49ers may have hoped to make on building a new stadium for the team next to the park. In fact they may be forced to do what was once “unthinkable” and bring the Oakland Raiders into the deal with a plan to share a new stadium facility.
  (6/16/08) The rush to try and finalize a deal to build a new 49’ers stadium next to California’s Great America is no longer a rush issue as the city has now extended the deadline to finalize the stadium plan until February 2009.
  (5/9/08) In a weird bit of news, the city of Santa Clara has sent word to Cedar Fair that they actually don’t need their approval to build the new 49ers stadium on the park’s overflow lot. It seems the terms of the city’s land-lease agreement only require that if the city does develop the parking lot property, that they only need to replace any lost parking spots. This means that the option is open to build a huge parking structure in the theme park’s main parking lot that would make up for the loss of the overflow lot. The hitch here is… just who would pay for it? The city or the 49ers? Seems the city already has already committed $42 million towards building just such a parking structure as part of their deal with the 49ers and could simply opt to move to. Apparently Cedar Fair is also still open to the idea of selling off the entire theme park to the 49ers, which would allow them to do as they please.
  (4/17/08) We haven’t heard much lately about the proposal to build a new football stadium for the 49ers on the park’s overflow lot, but this is due to the fact that not much is going other than talking it seems. The city and the team are on the same page it seems, but no one can move forward until Cedar Fair is happy and allows the project to happen. According to a Cedar Fair spokesperson quoted in this article, “We are agreeable to the overflow lot if certain concerns are met from our end," Frole said. "And we have to work through some of those items.” Apparently the rush is on since July 22nd has been set as the “soft deadline” for all the these negotiations to take place that would still allow for time for the issue to be placed up for a public vote this November.
  (3/18/08) The 49ers have wrote a check to the city for over $14k to begin the planning review process for the new stadium they hope to build in the overflow lot at California’s Great America. Currently the 49ers and Cedar Fair are said to be in negotiations about the issue but so far Cedar Fair has not given their approval.
  (12/26/07) Here’s the latest talk about the various issues involved with building a new 49ers Stadium in the overflow parking lot at California’s Great America. It shows off Cedar Fair’s basic stand on the issue, since they have really nothing to gain by allowing it, so to make it worth their time, Cedar Fair is asking for a cut and some compensation.
  (12/17/07) The latest news about the proposal to build a new stadium for the 49er’s next to California’s Great America is interesting. In addition to some money haggling over who is paying what between the city and the team, Cedar Fair has also demanded “unilateral control of stadium scheduling” during the park’s season (March – October) along with reimbursement for lost revenues because the parking and traffic demands of the home games will require the park to close down entirely on at least four days during home games. Previously Cedar Fair has been entirely opposed to the project, but this is now a first step towards negotiating to allow the project to happen, a step that the team in glad to see. Though I’m a bit sticker shocked to see that the total price for this project may end up costing $916 million. Oh, to dream of just what kind of theme park I could design and build for $916 million… Screamscape: The Park.