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Six Flags Quiddiya

gclough79 said:
I'm really not concerned about sand damaging the ride, it hasn't damaged coasters in Dubai, why would it in Saudi? any environmental factors will of been all considered long before this was built by people way more qualified than us. I'd think the main issues could come down to the crazy amount of LSM's on this ride and how they will wear over time along with multiple sections where the ride could end up vallying. It'll require a lot of maintenance from a large team of mechanics to keep it running.

I honestly believe this is the maximum we will see in our lifetime, it's ridiculous how many records this ride has broken and it's probably somewhere very close to what is possible in terms of modern day rollercoasters engineering.
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My own level risk tolerance I guess, I will just let other people be the test subjects first ;). It would be interesting purely from an engineering standpoint to know just how fast a coaster could safely launch before the bearing wear was just too much as I guess in theory there’s not really an upper limit to how _high_ they can go, just need a longer chain and some more support beams..

The one record I’m surprised has not fallen really is the Smiler one. I don’t mean the record for stinkiest restraints of course.
 
dave___ said:
My own level risk tolerance I guess, I will just let other people be the test subjects first ;). It would be interesting purely from an engineering standpoint to know just how fast a coaster could safely launch before the bearing wear was just too much as I guess in theory there’s not really an upper limit to how _high_ they can go, just need a longer chain and some more support beams..

The one record I’m surprised has not fallen really is the Smiler one. I don’t mean the record for stinkiest restraints of course.
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I hear what you're saying, I remember when I first decided to travel from the UK to SFGA to ride Kingda Ka back in 2018 and my first experience of that ride was that it was on the limit of what I could comfortably tolerate and enjoy on a rollercoaster. I rode it again in 2024 and my opinion really hadn't changed much so there's almost certainty an upper threshold.
 
You can see its absolutely hauling at the bottom of that drop with the LSM's launching up the arch and the airtime will be ridiculous as you crest over the top. It looks to be somewhere between 6-7 seconds of sustained floater, it'll probably feel like you're about to be sucked out of the train...combine that with the height and then straight into a 535ft drop o_O

If this doesn't end up being the greatest rollercoaster ever created then it's a total failure, that's how high my expectations are of it.
 
DiogoJ42 said:
I'm feeling it's going to be one extreme or the other. There's still every chance this could turn out to be the next Ring Racer.
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It could be, but with the investment going in, the company building it etc...I very much doubt it. It'll have teething problems for sure but nothing that won't be fixable.

What shocks me most is how much the coaster community seems to want this coaster to fail, instead of celebrating it's caused a huge amount of negativity. You can guarantee if it has been built in the states, there'd be nothing but praise and excitement.
 
DiogoJ42 said:
I'd say it's not so much that people want the ride to fail, more the country it's in. ;)
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Yeah you're right, hence why I'm saying if it had been built in the states it would be a different story.

For me I couldn't care less that its built in Saudi, sure it's a country with a turbulent past and some questionable policies but they're trying to change that image, it worked in the UAE so there's no reason it cant in Saudi.
 
tayspru said:
IMG_6924.jpeg

Totally worked in UAE
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I mean lets not hijack this thread and turn it into a foreign policy debate, but you're singling out one thing about that country you don't agree with and using that as the basis of your entire argument which you could do about many countries.

You could for example say the UK is a horrendous country, not worthy of visiting due to its problems with illegal immigrants crossing borders, acting lawlessly and draining the economy...but that wouldn't be very fair would it?

There are many good things about the UAE and I'm sure Saudi.
 
gclough79 said:
For me I couldn't care less that its built in Saudi, sure it's a country with a turbulent past and some questionable policies but they're trying to change that image, it worked in the UAE so there's no reason it cant in Saudi.
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The UAE has been far more susceptible to embracing Western tourism than KSA has. Even with the 2030 vision, there are still several areas they are not willing to compromise on.

The difference between Dubai being the UAE's tourist hotspot and Riyadh being the closest city to Qiddiya is night and day. Even with the tourism going into Dubai, the parks there (and down on Yas in Abu Dhabi) are ghost towns. Visiting was an absurd experience. Riyadh is not a major tourist city by any stretch, and it's still a good 40 minutes away from Qiddiya. Even if people were hoping for this to be successful, the cards simply aren't stacked in the location of Qiddiya's favour.

Add to the fact that Miral are pumping billions more into Yas Island with the major Potter expansion at WB and Disney, any whiff of potential new tourists for the park scene is going to be going to UAE, not KSA. You can be off the plane at Abu Dhabi and into the parks in a relatively comfortable time frame. The same can't be said for Qiddiya when the nearest major international airport is over an hour away, and then there are no other major destinations nearby.
 
gclough79 said:
For me I couldn't care less that its built in Saudi, sure it's a country with a turbulent past and some questionable policies but they're trying to change that image.
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For me, there’s a significant gap between changing the image, and changing the reality.
 
Oh yeah, plenty of countries I have no intention of ever visiting, no-matter what. I swore I would never set foot in the USA when the introduced the Patriot Act.
..... And then I found the online coaster community.
But I still stand by my principals.
 
You stand by the important people???
Principles swashbuckler!

Going back to page one of this topic makes amusing reading...so many people so certain that this ride would never, ever, happen.
History can make fools of the best of us.
Personally, I think this might happen.
 
BSwiss said:
For me, there’s a significant gap between changing the image, and changing the reality.
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Granted, but that can happen over time, plenty of countries have turbulent pasts but overtime that can change...a recent example of this is Dubai in the UAE.

Lets be honest, everybody on this forum would only ever go to Saudi Arabia to go to this park for a couple of days, maybe spend a day in Riyadh and then leave, would that really be so bad? Even if it meant you had to tolerate some foreign policies you didn't believe in for a few days?
 
gclough79 said:
Let's be honest. Everybody on this forum would only ever go to Saudi Arabia to go to this park for a couple of days, maybe spend a day in Riyadh and then leave. Would that really be so bad? Even if it meant you had to tolerate some foreign policies you didn't believe in for a few days?
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If that policy in question is the criminalization of your own identity and sexuality, then yes, it would probably be quite bad. The UAE's fundamental opposition to homosexuality is a little more existentially threatening than the picnic ban at Blackpool Pleasure Beach.

Dubai is becoming marginally more progressive, but the reality is that they were forced to look the other way on these matters for reasons of the bottom line. They couldn’t rinse wealthy Westerners while enacting draconian policies, so they mellowed out, or at least they did so wherever the money was. To me, this isn't true freedom; it’s just privilege.
 
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