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SANTA CRUZ BEACH BOARDWALK Santa Cruz, California (Abbreviation: SCBB)
Park News - (7/24/10) The new Haunted Castle ride at SCBB was forced to close for repairs after a teen on the ride reached out to grab one of the props, dragging it onto the tracks where it blocked the next two cars, bent the tracks, broke cables and more. Security camera footage helped the police ID the teen who was then arrested for vandalism. (5/24/10) A nice photo update from the Bay Area Bash trip to the park last weekend has been posted to Theme Park Review. (6/11/09) Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk is celebrating the 85th birthday of the Giant Dipper. A fun article that includes a POV video of the Dipper in action can be found here.
2010 - Haunted Castle - (6/9/10) Pictures and a new onride video from the Haunted Castle can be found this week at Theme Park Review. (6/8/10) Good news for SCBB fans, the new Haunted Castle is now open according to the official website. A bunch of new pictures has also been posted to the park’s Facebook page and a video of the official “launch” of the new ride is embedded below. Now who’s got a ride-through video?
(5/31/10) According to the official website the opening of the new Haunted Castle attraction is now listed as “This Summer” instead of the previous May 28th date. It’s likely to open very soon however, so this should only be a minor delay if all goes well. (5/19/10) A new time lapse video showing off the construction of the new Haunted Castle has been posted to YouTube and embedded below.
(5/7/10) New pictures of the SCBB Haunted Castle dark ride can be found at the park’s Facebook page. (4/26/10) A few new construction pictures of the new Haunted Castle can be found at the park’s Facebook page. Meanwhile the park’s main website is now announcing that it will open on May 28th. (3/27/10) New construction pictures of the SCBB Haunted Castle can be found at Facebook. They’ve put up the rough outside shape for the castle façade at last. (3/18/10) Sally Corp has posted a great new video (embedded below) showing off a sneak peek at the various animatronic figures and effects they are building for the new Haunted Castle at SCBB.
(3/17/10) New pictures from the Haunted Castle have been posted to the official Facebook page. (3/9/10) A new fan made video shows off some fan made concept artwork inspired by the new version of Haunted Castle. It will be interesting to see if some of these ideas are close to what will be in the new ride.
(2/20/10) More new pictures of the Haunted Castle can be found on the park’s Facebook page. (2/17/10) A new construction video showing off the progress on version 2.0 of the Haunted Castle has been posted to YouTube and embedded below for your enjoyment.
(2/15/10) Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk will be k eeping the Haunted Castle name for the rebuilt dark ride experience, though a new version of the logo has been created and already posted in the new park brochures. (2/10/10) I’m told that The Vault Lazer Maze attraction is now set up again in a new location next to Desperados. I’ve also been given some fun news about new scenes that we can expect to see in the new Haunted Castle when it opens. For starters, I’ve been told that the rotating cars will begin your journey by traveling backwards down a creepy “tower spiral” section of track to the basement level. At the bottom, the cars will quickly spin around forward where you will encounter the first of many new surprises. Other scenes to expect include a trip through the Royal Kitchen / Banquet, Wine Cellar, Ghastly Caves, a Murky Swamp, a Torture Chamber / Dungeon area, a crypt full of coffins, a castle “furnace” scene and possibly some kind of scene of the underworld. (1/15/10) A new construction video from SCBB showing off the Haunted Castle has been embedded below.
(12/23/09) The official Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk Facebook page has posted some pictures of new characters going into the new Haunted Castle. Meanwhile a reader sent in a picture showing off the surface level view of the construction site as well as telling us about a permit notice posted elsewhere at the Boardwalk. The permit is to add seven cantilevered decks that will extend 4 feet over the beach at various locations along the boardwalk, as well as adding two new seating areas. (11/25/09) We’ve heard that the construction timetable for the new Haunt at SCBB is going along really well so far and that they are ahead of schedule. If all goes well, expect to see the new ride ready to roll by Memorial Day Weekend. (11/4/09) A great time lapse video showing off the construction progress so far on the new Haunted Castle at Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk has been posted to YouTube and embedded below.
(10/26/09) A couple of pictures showing off a couple of new creepy insect inhabitants of the new Haunted Castle ride can be found posted to the park’s Facebook page. (10/19/09) It seems The Vault: Laser Maze attraction didn’t last long at all, as it was demolished along with the remaings of the old Haunted Castle building. Speaking of the Haunted Castle, all new construction pictures have been added showing off concrete being poured down into the underground level of the new future building structure. (9/22/09) Ne w construction pictures from the Haunted Castle can be seen here. (9/15/09) You can find a video showing off some of the Haunted Castle’s demolition here as well as take a look at the sign they’ve put on the fence. (9/14/09) The demolition of the old Haunted Castle ride began on Friday. I wasn’t expecting them to rip apart so much of the building actually, but it’s like they needed to let the light of the sun shoot in there to cleanse it of the old evil before they can begin anew. You can see pictures here. (9/9/09) We’ve got a few bits of info about the new Haunted Castle ride coming next year. The current ride is said to be only about 6,000 square-feet while the new version will expand into new space, dropping down into a basement level, and be around 10,000 square-feet. The plan is to reuse some classic elements from the current ride, mixing them in with all new elements. (9/4/09) The local news has posted an article about the history and future of the Haunted Castle attraction. (8/20/09) I’ve been sent a few facts about who is involved in the new Haunted Castle project. All new track and ride cars will be coming from I. E. Park (Italy) which will likely be based on this dark ride system. The overall design is being done by R&R Amusement Designs, with some scenic effects coming from Duncan Designs while the Animatronic and other action pieces to be provided by Sally Corp. (8/8/09) I don’t know if they’ve signed the contract with them or not, but we’ve heard that SCBB was considering hiring Sally Corp. to handle the upgrade to the Haunted Castle dark ride for next season. (8/6/09) The official Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk page on Facebook issued a notice yesterday that the Haunted Castle will close on August 23rd so they can work on a new “Haunted” ride to open in June 2010. While they are thinking about keeping the Haunted Castle name for the new ride as well, they are open to suggestion for other new name ideas. They also posted that same preview video we found earlier to YouTube for everyone to see.
(5/3/09) While we wont get to enjoy a new Haunted Castle in 2009, I’ve heard that the project was simply put on hold for another year due to the uncertain economy in the hopes that things will be more normal in 2010 when they do plan on opening it. On a related note, we were sent a link to an interesting video that was discovered on the official SCBB website that shows off concept artwork for the new ride. (4/30/09) According to a few e-mails that came in today, SCBB decided to delay the Haunted Castle project until next year because the Sea Swings opened so late (Fall 2008) that they will promote them as the new 2009 attraction instead. (4/23/09) According to one of our readers who dropped into the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, the Haunted Castle was up and running, and still the same old ride as before. It looks like the poor economy has caused the park to delay their plans upgrade the ride once again. Anyone know more? (8/26/08) Screamscape sources obtained some interesting new artwork showing off what seems to be the New Haunted Castle at Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk. In addition to seeing the concept artwork for the new exterior of the ride building, there was also a sketch showing off the basic look of the new two-bench ride cars that will have a roof and appear to be able to rotate. (2/21/07) A Screamscape source claims that with all the other work taking place around the SCBB for the big 100th Anniversary, plans to add a new dark ride to replace the Haunted Castle may have been bumped back a year. The new ride system was described as being a classic dark ride style without any sort of guns to shoot at targets, which seems to indicate they may be shooting for a true scare ride. We have heard something about it using roundish cars, which is either just a design choice or perhaps this ride may allow for spinning. We've also heard that the attraction is expected to be two stories tall, starting on the boardwalk level and dropping down a floor underground to the beach level.
2011/2012 - New Coaster - Rumor - (5/18/10) While so far the rumor about the coaster replacing Hurricane was for an inverted, many of you have expressed an interest in the site becoming home to a new S&S El Loco coaster like Steel Hawg. I’ve got to admit, that is a nice vision… I’d like to see one of those on the west coast too. (5/7/10) Screamscape has heard that the time is coming soon to replace the Hurricane coaster with something new. While we don’t know exactly what is in the works, we’ve heard that it may very well be an Inverted coaster of some kind… but it would have to be something small to fit into the Hurricane’s footprint. Anyone know more?
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