In the final months of Peter Hadden's ownership of Pleasurewood Hills, plans were underway to introduce two new roller coasters to the park. These plans were never realised and soon after Grevin et Cie took control of the park.
Pleasurewood Hills have kindly provided Unofficial Pleasurewood with a designers mock-up which gives an insight into what might have been.
Ah yes, that good old mystery of 2004! Glad too see some actual evidence of it finally.
Considering how the park felt very run down around that era, it surprises me that they had the finances for two new coasters, with one of them being a Vekoma SLC! Were there not any planning applications for them?
Great to see these after I think we read somewhere on the net (Screamscape?) that Vekoma had confirmed the sale of two family coasters to Pleasurewood Hills at a trade show. This is great to see..would have shaped a very different future for the park if they had gone ahead (good or bad who knows). Fantastic material coming from the park, hopefully they find some more!
During the show the sale of another Junior Coaster with 335 meters of track and a Family Suspended ride, both to Pleasurewood Hills in the UK, have be announced. The Family Suspended Coaster is the first installation of this kind in Europe (there are rides for example at Paramount´s in the US), offering a track length of 342 meters. Last but not least there will be a standard SLC for Magic Springs and Crystal Falls amusement park in the US.
The reason I mentioned SLC is that RCDB had it down as a custom SLC with two inversions: sidewinder and corkscrew. I remember that like it was yesterday.
But it does look like it was just going to be a family suspended coaster. In whcih case, I'm glad this didn't go ahead. At the time the park already had two family coasters in Rattlesnake and Cannonball Express, I can't see what adding two more mediocre family coasters would have done for the park.
These coasters were brand new and probably cost a fair amount. Not knowing what business plan the Haddens had in mind it's difficult to tell but an investment of this size could have meant that the park would eventually been in too much debt not making enough money and could have closed. We know it was very close to succumbing a few years later. I think it was a good thing they didn't come but I'd love to see a clean fresh Vekoma family coaster to eventually replace SITG.
I wonder if the Mouse was to make way for these in 2004? I know we can't see the entire leaflet, but I can see mentions for both Rattlesnake and Cannonball, not the Mouse.
Interestingly, we would have had the Cannonball Express and Thunder Express!
I wonder if the Mouse was to make way for these in 2004? I know we can't see the entire leaflet, but I can see mentions for both Rattlesnake and Cannonball, not the Mouse.
An interesting point, Martyn. I didn't think of that. I have another scan of a different section of the same leaflet. Notice the absence of Magic Mouse.
What I meant was I reckon The Haddens must have had investment of sorts, probably private, for the capital to buy 2 brand new rides. What I think then must have happened was for some reason the investment fell through and they then had to sell or potentially go bust and close. I think the sale to G and C was a result of it not happening in my opinion. I could be way off the mark though!
Of course good point. Perhaps the sale of the park came out of nowhere (did G and C seek out the park or was it put up for sale?) and was too good to pass up on?
Awesome! The map doesn't show where the new coasters would have been by the looks of it, although it's a really busy map! What are those Frisbee rides like? They look pretty good!
