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2017 and 2018 Attractions

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I am not sure about appropriation in this instance re-posting to a public forum but it seems likely many wont be able to read it.

Is it possible you could include quoted text?
 
Basically this:

Projects
  • Alton Towers Resort - 2018 Attraction
    Starting August 2015
    Lead Creative (Project Designer)

    ***Project Currently Highly Confidential***

    Team members:
  • Alton Towers Resort - 2017 Attraction
    Starting November 2014
    Lead Creative (Project Designer)

    ***Project Currently Highly Confidential***

    Team members:
 
I'm not on linkedin. I was just searching 'Merlin Magic Making, Alton Towers linkedin' on Google, and this chaps profile came up as a link, so it's in the public domain.
 
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Whilst things seem rather tight lipped (unsurprisingly), it seems we could hopefully have two major additions in the works for the coming years.

I can see a modern flume for 2017 and coaster for 2018 potentially.
 
It's interesting to see the planned timescales involved - work began in late 2014 for the 2017 attraction and late 2015 for the 2018 attraction, so they're looking at a 3-year cycle?
From the info on the LinkedIn page we can see that cycles for Sub Terra and Octonauts took less than a year to complete, and Galactica about 18 months, so make of that what you will.
 
The time scales fit in with major attractions, would reckon these to be in mutiny bay/Katanga Canyon and Forbidden Valley. Both are on larger time scales than Derren Brown's ghost train. Is there still a chance 2017 wooden coaster is going ahead, as all the plansfor that fit into place apart from plans not being seen, and while this is very, very unlikely, would it be able to get through planning permission without us seeing, or not even require it? Obviously this is unlikely but I would expect the projects to be deleted off there if they weren't going ahead, and I can't see the flume replacement being planned in November 2014, November 2014 would fit in with the proposed timber truss construction rides early stages, and August 2015 could be when the flukes future was decided. I honestly thing everything may be back on schedule.
 
Ryan B said:
The time scales fit in with major attractions, would reckon these to be in mutiny bay/Katanga Canyon and Forbidden Valley. Both are on larger time scales than Derren Brown's ghost train. Is there still a chance 2017 wooden coaster is going ahead, as all the plansfor that fit into place apart from plans not being seen, and while this is very, very unlikely, would it be able to get through planning permission without us seeing, or not even require it? Obviously this is unlikely but I would expect the projects to be deleted off there if they weren't going ahead, and I can't see the flume replacement being planned in November 2014, November 2014 would fit in with the proposed timber truss construction rides early stages, and August 2015 could be when the flukes future was decided. I honestly thing everything may be back on schedule.
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It may not need planning permission as, as I understand it, the smilers track technically didn't need planning permission because of its location but the station building did (please feel free to tell me if I am talking nonsense).

But planning permission at towers gets very complex and I also believe that fobiden valley would require planning permission so the possible woody is probably not going to happen for next year but I think the site of the flume is one which would not require planning permission except for buildings above a certain size and up to 20m so a flume replacement could well be on the cards for 2017
 
Found out on TT that it'll be well themed whatever it is, not going to be anything on a secret weapon scale though for 2017, but I reckon 2018 will be :)
 
The station did need it but they could have made it lower. Plans are really submitted because they feel like it...
 
Also looks like the major investments are going in the Towers direction instead of Thorpe for the next 2 years at least, otherwise he would have mentioned any projects he's working on at the other parks as well
 
I would hope for a decent Flume or Water Coaster for 2017 then they woodie for 2018. But who knows at this point.
 
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I Don't think they will try to build a woodie in FV because of what happened last time. Correct me if I'm wrong, but they don't need planning permission for quite a lot of the park (x-sector, coaster corner, mutiny bay), as long as the ride is not visible, doesn't create too much traffic, and doesn't increase noise levels, which I think is the problem with most of these areas.
 
Leah said:
I Don't think they will try to build a woodie in FV because of what happened last time
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What did happen last time?

There was a proposal to build a woodie about 12 years ago with the station approximately where Thirteen is now, but AT withdrew the planning application.

Last year they put in a preliminary planning proposal for a wooden ride, which seemed to get favourable reactions from the council.
 
I'm sure they submitted pp for a fv woodie near air, but was declined due to local residents complaints over it "spoiling the beauty of the valley" and "creating noise". The plans were for 2005.
 
Leah said:
I'm sure they submitted pp for a fv woodie near air, but was declined due to local residents complaints over it "spoiling the beauty of the valley" and "creating noise". The plans were for 2005.
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There were plans around 2004/5 for a cross-valley woodie with the station approximately where Thirteen is now, but AT withdrew the planning application, it didn't get a chance to get declined. I think they probably did withdraw the application due to concerns about noise in the valley, but AT has never confirmed why they withdrew.

However last year there was an Environmental Impact Assessment that seemed to indicate they were looking at a cross-valley woodie. https://towersstreet.com/talk/threads/2017-sw8-speculation.3182/page-16#post-132465
 
I'm going to come in here and say let's not get too ahead of ourselves. It should be no surpise that Merlin are planning new attractions in both 2017 and 2018, the one thing you can say about Merlin is that they have a great track record of maintaining CAPEX projects, especially at Towers.
Ian P said:
It's interesting to see the planned timescales involved - work began in late 2014 for the 2017 attraction and late 2015 for the 2018 attraction, so they're looking at a 3-year cycle?
From the info on the LinkedIn page we can see that cycles for Sub Terra and Octonauts took less than a year to complete, and Galactica about 18 months, so make of that what you will.
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Indeed, and I beleive work did start in late 2014 for the original 2017 attraction. As we all know, this was planned to be some sort of wooden coaster around Forbidden Valley. Plans were in an advanced stage at around the time of The Smiler incident (although it would appear that no contracts had been signed) as shown by the submission of the EIA screening opinion.

This original project was however cancelled; if it was going ahead we would have had a planning application by now and Merlin have also confrimed that Heide-Park are getting the high CAPEX investment in 2017. Of course that is not to say that these plans may not re-surface in some form for 2018, Towers have said on numerious occasions recently that all the work in Forbidden Valley at the moment (i.e. removal of Ripsaw, Galactica, Rollercoaster Restaurant) are part of a complete regeneration of the area - I would fully expect either the 2017 or 2018 attraction to be here.
jon81uk said:
However last year there was an Environmental Impact Assessment that seemed to indicate they were looking at a cross-valley woodie. https://towersstreet.com/talk/threads/2017-sw8-speculation.3182/page-16#post-132465
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It wouldn't have been a cross valley woodie, I doubt that they would ever get planning permission for such a coaster.

Anyway, as we know Merlin work on the following CAPEX investment cycle: High, Medium, Low, Low. In terms of Towers we had; 2013 - The Smiler (High), 2014 - CBeebies Land (Medium), 2015 - Octonauts (Low), 2016 - Galactica (Low). 2017 will not be High as it should be, so it depends on whether Merlin go for a third Low year in a row or have simply swapped 2017 and 2018 around so that 2017 is now the Medium year. I would like to hope that the latter scenario has taken place.

In an ideal world we would see a new water ride on the site of The Flume for 2017 and a new family thrill coaster in 2018 (SW8). It should also be noted that a SW8 project meeting took place at the Conference Centre at Towers on Friday.

:)
 
I know this is very unlikely, but could there be a water ride in forbidden valley, and a coaster in mutiny bay/Katanga Canyon, obviously it's a very low chance of it happening, but I presume the original SW8 plans have been withdrawn. We also have to remember ripsaw was also partly a water ride, and Mutiny bay would be an easier place to plan a coaster from what I'm aware of. They say expect to see updates to the flume site this season, for what we know it could be for 2018 as no one has noted the flames removal hasn't started, and that'll be quite a long job in itself id guess. Plus there's the lake there, which I think will be drained, and filled in or a new water system allowing treated water in only. We don't know when the construction is going to start, if it starts before scarefest I'd expect a 2017 ride, but if it's in scarefest-fireworks it could take at least 8 months to build with all the other work needed to the site and that would make it June by the time construction would be finished, one thing I don't expect is a ride opening in June, so I reckon it could very well be more than a water ride, and it could be the 2018 project, let's face it, no one is 100% sure what is going where and when. I do expect a 2017 ride, but there is still a chance on that site being home to the 2018 project. Also has anyone asked them what's happening with the ripsaw site, don't think they've commented about it outside of the blog.
 
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