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Fantasy Island, Skegness, England

KingNemesis said:
Tom said:
Fantasy Island has everything under any definition of a resort. You're obviously not familiar with it.

I am familiar with it... Just to me it doesn't deem worth of the resort title...

Okay, ill be reasonable and say yes, it may be a two day park (although most of my visits deem it not to be so)...

I just don't agree with you saying that Fantasy Island deserves the resort title more than Towers, that just doesn't make sense to me.

Sorry - I meant no disrespect, it's just that although it is a working class resort it has much to do well into the night. The park is open into the night during the summer for a start!
 
Tom said:
KingNemesis said:
Tom said:
Fantasy Island has everything under any definition of a resort. You're obviously not familiar with it.

I am familiar with it... Just to me it doesn't deem worth of the resort title...

Okay, ill be reasonable and say yes, it may be a two day park (although most of my visits deem it not to be so)...

I just don't agree with you saying that Fantasy Island deserves the resort title more than Towers, that just doesn't make sense to me.

Sorry - I meant no disrespect, it's just that although it is a working class resort it has much to do well into the night. The park is open into the night during the summer for a start!

No, neither do i :)

Yes I agree that Fantasy Island has a lot of nightlife but it helps that it is situated in a seaside town that can be very busy so I feel they have to put it on otherwise there would be less in the area to bring things in which puts towers in a difficult spot as the only people coming in is people for the park / hotel and stuff :)

The problem is that the word resort is tossed around so much it has lost meaning in today's society.
 
Big improvement for Volcano. It was beginning to look a little tatty and tired!

Shame the new train for JO will probably never run like :p
 
Maybe that's why the work has been done? Apparently it's been at Vekoma for a while now, so hopefully so serious work has been done and it will now run regularly.
 
Fantasy Island has gone in to administration, according to the news report, it will run as normal for the rest of this season.

BBC News said:
A seaside theme park that attracts up to 40,000 visitors a day has gone into administration.

Fantasy Island, a 41-acre site in Ingoldmells near Skegness, employs 52 permanent and 120 seasonal staff.

The appointed administrator said no job losses are expected during the summer but gave no indication of the park's long term prospects.

A spokesman said Fantasy Island will continue to operate "as normal" while its finances are reviewed.

Oompah band
The theme park is also home to what claims to be "Europe's largest seven-day market" and 340 static caravan pitches.

As well as rides the park, which opened in 1995, has many live acts throughout the season, including a British oompah band and various tribute acts.

Duff & Phelps Ltd, which has been appointed as administrator, said the company owned by Conduit Skegness would continue as normal until the various businesses on the site had been assessed.

Paul Clark, from the administration team, said: "Fantasy Island is an important leisure destination and as we head into one of the busiest months of the year it is very much business as usual.

"Customers should be assured that this will not impact their experience, whether they are visiting the rides, market or one of the shows.

"It's also important for employees to know that their jobs will not be impacted during these busy summer months and we look forward to working with the team."

He said it was too early to say what would happen over the winter, but added the business was being treated as a going concern and potential investors were welcome to register their interest.
 
If the park does close down, which is likely unless they have got money to invest or get bought what does everyone think will happen to odessey? Will the scrap it or will another park buy it?
 
If we all go expecting it to close and have a big meet there we could well end up sercuring the future of the park! :p
 
I can't see the park closing down, I expect a new owner will just be found. It's in quite a prime seaside location surrounded by caravans (I bet they own quite a few there as well!) and even if the fair doesn't make them that much money I bet the market does.

I went a few weeks ago with @Sammy and have no plans to return again soon!
 
I hope they close down.

There are too many theme parks in the UK. If some of the crap ones shut down then it could benefit the good smaller parks like Drayton or Lightwater. The market is pretty sparse at the top end (hence Paramount Park) but far too fiercely contested at the bottom end.
 
It won't close down. This has happened before and will most likely happen again until they find someone to run the place properly.

In saying that though, they've done a good job so far this year.
 
I hope they close down.

There are too many theme parks in the UK. If some of the crap ones shut down then it could benefit the good smaller parks like Drayton or Lightwater. The market is pretty sparse at the top end (hence Paramount Park) but far too fiercely contested at the bottom end.

I couldn't agree more. I can't stand seaside 'parks' anyway. BPB included (sorry.)

If all these crap ones shut down, more visitors for Drayton and the likes; hopefully resulting in higher/better investment.
 
I would agree that some of the smaller parks are a little pointless as they are all quite repetitive and seem to contain similar rides to each other. However, if they were to close, the local economy wouldn't benefit as many of these areas rely on tourism so, without the seaside parks, the areas could fall into disrepair which I wouldn't want to see anywhere.
 
I hope they close down.

There are too many theme parks in the UK. If some of the crap ones shut down then it could benefit the good smaller parks like Drayton or Lightwater. The market is pretty sparse at the top end (hence Paramount Park) but far too fiercely contested at the bottom end.

The problem with that theory is that Fantasy Island is miles away from Drayton, Lightwater or any other park so its closure probably won't make a bit of difference on guest figures.
 
Whoa, what's with all the FI and other seaside parks bashing??

Adventure Island - Rage
Fantasy Island - Jubilee Odyssey and Millennium Coaster
Pleasure Island - Boomerang
Blackpool Pleasure Beach - Too many landmark coasters to name
Great Yarmouth Pleasure Beach - The Rollercoaster

All decent parks for an afternoon during a seaside holiday, with okay signature attractions.

In my opinion, the impact that ANY of those parks, besides BPB, has on any of the inland parks is absolutely minimal - entirely inconsequential in terms of visitor numbers! The vast majority of seaside attractions are purely seasonal and depend entirely on holiday makers. Those people who visit DMP and ATR are not going to turn their noses up at those parks to visit the seaside to grab annual passes!

I'm not surprised to hear FI is on it's last legs to be honest, purely because the visitors to the 'park' are counted when they set foot on the market, and in fact many of them never place a rear-cheek on a ride. Who will be brave enough to pay out to save the place??
 
Did I read people want parks to close down?

Guess I am relatively on my own in hoping they get a decent investor to actually make the place decent and worthy of a trip to the seaside for a couple of days to enjoy the place.

Fantasy Island actually seems to have undeveloped potential to me, and some decent rides to start building a park from, not to mention parks on the coast to me have a special atmosphere when they're developed properly.

By this logic the northern area would basically have BPB, Lightwater, Flamingo Land and Fantasy Island. I think the seaside parks have dual potential especially if they have accommodation attached.

Can they attract a visitor base that can support a bigger park that's the question for me, it's a strange place to get to for most of the country when you consider the likes of BPB, even Alton etc, not far from big motorway networks.
 
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