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Golden Ticket Awards 2018

Benjsh

Benjsh

TS Member
Favourite Ride
Steel Vengeance
I haven't got the full winners list yet to copy and paste sadly.

However some highlights....

Best new ride: Steel Vengeance (no shocks there)

Best Steel: Fury 325 (again not really a shock)

Best Woodie: Phoenix at Knoebels (European woodies missing from top 10)

Best park: Europa (5th year running)

Best Water Ride: Valhalla (wooohooo)

Best dark ride: TOT (Orlando)

Best indoor coaster: The Mummy (Orlando)

Phoenix is on the bucket list too. Heard very good things about it considering the height and layout aren't anything groundbreaking.
 
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Here's the complete list @Benjsh, taken from Behind The Thrills:

Best Theme Park: Europa Park-Rust Germany (5th year in a row)

Best Waterpark: Schlitterbahn-New Braunfels, Texas (21st year in a row)

Best Wooden Coaster: Phoenix at Knoebels, Elysburg, Pennsylvania

Best Steel Coaster: Fury 325 at Carowinds, Charlotte, North Carolina

Best Indoor Coaster: Revenge of the Mummy at Universal Studios Florida

Best New Ride: Steel Vengeance at Cedar Point, Sandusky, Ohio

Best New Waterpark Ride: Ray Rush at SeaWorld Orlando

Best Shows: Dollywood, Pigeon Forge, Tennessee

Best Dark Ride: Tower of Terror at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, Walt Disney World Florida

Best Walkthrough Funhouse: Kennywood Mifflin, Pennsylvania

Best Carousel: Grand Carousel at Knoebels, Elysburg, Pennsylvania

Best Landscaping: Busch Gardens Williamsburg, Virginia

Friendliest Park: Dollywood, Pigeon Forge, Tennessee

Best Waterpark Ride: Wildebeest at Holiday World, Santa Claus, Indiana

Best Water ride: Valhalla at Blackpool Pleasure Beach, Blackpool, England

Best Kids Area: Planet Snoopy at Kings Island, Mason, Ohio

Best Marine Life Park: SeaWorld Orlando

Best Food: Knoebels, Elysburg Pennsylvania

Cleanest Park: Holiday World, Santa Claus, Indiana

Best Christmas Event: Smoky Mountain Christmas at Dollywood, Pigeon Forge Tennessee

Best Halloween Event: Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios Florida

Best Children’s Park: Idlewild Ligonier, Pennyslvania

Best Seaside Park: Santa Cruz Boardwalk, California

Seems like a good, albeit slightly unsurprising, year for the GTAs! I look forward to next year's event!

Even though I don't necessarily agree with every award, I do enjoy the Golden Tickets each year! A few overall thoughts of mine include:
  • I'm not remotely surprised to see Steel Vengeance win Best New Ride of 2018 considering how everyone raves about it! I'm also not at all surprised to see Europa Park win Best Park, so well done to both parks in this regard!
  • I'm not too surprised to see Fury 325 win Best Steel Coaster, but I must admit that I'm a little surprised to see Phoenix win Best Wooden Coaster.
  • I'm not sure if anyone else agrees with me, but I am surprised that Blackpool Pleasure Beach never wins the award for Best Seaside Park, as I personally think that the operations are brilliant, that the whole atmosphere of the place is wonderful and that the park has gone where no other seaside park has gone before with regards to additions in the past! Also, I feel that BPB has an extremely wide variety on offer!
And finally; congratulations to all the parks that won awards!
P.S. Here's the Behind The Thrills link: https://behindthethrills.com/2018/09/top-theme-parks-honored-with-annual-2018-golden-ticket-awards/
 
I personally don't give a monkeys about the golden tickets awards. The only rides that matters are the ones that I enjoy riding. No amount of golden tickets awards or any other awards or other people opinions on what is a good ride, don't count as we all have different taste in rides.
 
I have to agree @RoyJess. I don't think the Golden Ticket Awards is really a very true measure of parks worldwide in honesty, it seems a bit bias towards American parks... which admittedly does actually make me even more happy that Europa won the "Best Park" category.. :D
 
There's a debate to be had if Wildfire should even count as a wooden coaster in the first place to be fair. A lot of the structure is made from wood of course but are the RMC topper tracks strictly wooden coasters? Not for me.

I haven't ridden it either but I'd expect it to make my top 10 if whatever list it falls in as it's exactly the type of ride I enjoy.
 
When you look at some of the winners, as well as the top 10 wooden and steel coasters, it makes it even more of an amazing achievement that Europa-Park have won the best park award for 5 years in a row. I thought with SteVe that Cedar Point might grab the award back, yet SteVe did not even win best steel coaster!!

Just look at the list of top 50 steel coasters, it's laughable. Diamondback at 10, Blue Fire at 18 above the likes of Helix, Skyrush, Nemesis and Kumba, Storm Chaser at 47, Raging Bull present but no Silver Star and the fact that Whizzer is in there at all.

And the top 50 wooden coasters? Phoenix at 1 and Twister at 50, hmmmm.

:)
 
Danny said:
Which is more the reason to believe these awards are absolutely deluded.
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I personally think Wicker Man is great, and that Alton should be extremely proud of this achievement! It came joint 4th alongside Oscar's Wacky Taxi at Sesame Place! Icon was not even nominated, however... Oscar's Wacky Taxi must be one heck of a coaster!
 
238 coasters will have opened this year, of which only 5 will the Golden Ticket Awards of heard of or even considered.
 
speedy said:
I can't even remember what else opened in 2018 o_O
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Well, Icon opened in 2018 alongside Steel Vengeance, Twisted Timbers, Time Traveler, Wonder Woman Golden Lasso Coaster, Twisted Cyclone, RailBlazer, HangTime...
 
It may be worth pointing out that the main reason for the Mitch Hawker poll existing is the extremely poor methodology of the Golden Tickets - basically a closed shop of people who are supposedly well travelled fill in their ballots and the winners are determined by the most popular. This is CLEARLY biased towards more well known parks/rides/whatever.

The Hawker poll sought to eliminate this bias as you could only affect the placing of rides you'd actually been on.
 
Robert.W said:
And not forgetting those that opened in mainland Europe this year – Valkyria, Fēnix, Hyperion... to name just a few! :)
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Wow! Thanks @Robert.W; I completely forgot about Mainland Europe for some reason! Wicker Man has really beaten out a lot of awesome rides, then!
 
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