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Oakwood Discussion

If Aspro are aiming to move certain attractions to their overseas parks presumably they will have needed to secure the relevant planning and construction permits at those parks.

Makes sense to leave them in Wales whilst this process is completed so not to waste any money in moving attractions until permissions are all secured?
 
Also, the same applies if they are selling any rides. Given the park only announced closure 5 months ago, the rides weren't going to be moved off-site/dismantled overnight.

The 2025/2026 closed season will be when we see the most activity on site.

I love a good conspiracy theory. However, I feel security on site is simply due to the assets they still have/to prevent those who were trespassing into the park in March/April. The lack of any movement/removal of rides is either due to processes for relocating rides to other parks or processes for selling rides. The upkeep of the land is to keep it presentable and appealing for when it is eventually sold (or just some very dedicated people still working there).
 
Plus if your cutting the grass and looking after the area it makes spotting trespassers easier as well.

Oakwood being relatively out the way also makes it easier for them to dismantle and keep on site any rides there planning on moving to other Walygator parks. In theory they can get all the ground works done and then ship the parts over from Wales and erect them. Not have to store them on the car park at Walygator were anyone could go and look at them and then move them again at a later date.

I would hope that once Aspro have removed what they want ride wise they actually keep anything they don't want (the buildings, megafobia) in one piece for any potential buyers. Basically please dont do a Southport Pleasure Land.
 
John_P said:
I would hope that once Aspro have removed what they want ride wise they actually keep anything they don't want (the buildings, megafobia) in one piece for any potential buyers. Basically please dont do a Southport Pleasure Land.
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I really hope someone buys Megafobia or it gets rolled into Bluestone.
 
Basically yes, and they somehow got the council to let them tear down the Cyclone which would've at least given a new operator something to build a park around.

Hopefully the fact that Aspro have nothing else in the area would make them think its best to keep Megafobia standing when they look to sell the land.

Even then if the new owners do demolish it they can say it wasn't them that did it.
 
The issue of course with the talk of Megafobia being saved, is that the longer it’s left standing there doing nothing, the less likely it will be that they can get it into a state where it can re-open.

It’s sitting there, exposed to the elements with little to no maintenance being done on it. I know when Alton Towers mothballed Toadstools, they tried to re-open it two years later, but it had been sitting doing nothing for so long that it wasn’t salvageable. I’d imagine the same can be said for The Ultimate and Loggers Leap. They only managed it with Sub-Terra because of it being completely indoors.
 
Enter Valhalla said:
It’s sitting there, exposed to the elements with little to no maintenance being done on it. I know when Alton Towers mothballed Toadstools, they tried to re-open it two years later, but it had been sitting doing nothing for so long that it wasn’t salvageable. I’d imagine the same can be said for The Ultimate and Loggers Leap. They only managed it with Sub-Terra because of it being completely indoors.
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I don't believe that is the correct narrative on any of those examples of scrapped rides.

None of those rides were scrapped because the park attempted to revive the after several years SBNO and subsequently there was a maintenance issue that prevented the reopening. They were all essentially scrapped at the point they became SBNO, but the parks had no plans for the site so it was more cost-effective to leave them in situ until there was a viable reason to remove them.

The reason Twirling Toadstools was mothballed was the same reason it was scrapped. As I understand it, the park knew exactly what was needed to fix the ride, but ultimately it was at a price that Merlin wasn't willing to pay for a 30+ year old ride.
 
Squiggs said:
I don't believe that is the correct narrative on any of those examples of scrapped rides.

None of those rides were scrapped because the park attempted to revive the after several years SBNO and subsequently there was a maintenance issue that prevented the reopening. They were all essentially scrapped at the point they became SBNO, but the parks had no plans for the site so it was more cost-effective to leave them in situ until there was a viable reason to remove them.

The reason Twirling Toadstools was mothballed was the same reason it was scrapped. As I understand it, the park knew exactly what was needed to fix the ride, but ultimately it was at a price that Merlin wasn't willing to pay for a 30+ year old ride.
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So leaving a ride sitting there doing nothing doesn’t make it harder to get it reopen? Rides need to be constantly maintained. If you leave them sitting there with no work being done to them, exposed to the elements, it is going to be much more difficult to get them open when that decision is eventually made.

You may well be right that, in the case of the rides above, they had already decided they were going from the first day of closure, but the point I was making is that for every day Megafobia sits there idol, the less likely it is that we’ll ever see it running again.
 
We are in the general area this week (on a holiday booked before the closure was announced 😕).

It's notable how many blanked out brown signs there already are, with plenty of oakwood signs still standing. Other things in the area have been closing too. At some point the cumulative loss of attractions will become a problem.

Local young family attractions (folly farm and the dinosaur park in particular) seem well attended. But then, it is August, I can well believe it's different the rest of the year.
 
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