Six Flags Set To Close 15 Rides

The Covid-19 pandemic has thrown a wrench into the operating budgets of amusement parks around the world. Some parks have decided to operate with a shortened season, while others have decided to close (and even remove) rides in order to save money.

In a 2020 chain wide Q3 conference call, Six Flags confirmed they would be eliminating 15 under-performing rides across their chain of parks to reduce maintenance costs and free up significant capex resources. The rides would be closed based on an analysis and ridership numbers.

“Optimizing our rides will save us enough capex to fund a new ride every single year” said Mike Spanos, Six Flags President and Chief Executive Officer. “Our park Presidents, engineers and maintenance teams have studied the performance of each and every ride, calculating the cost against the ride’s throughput productivity. We now know which rides to redeploy across parks, which rides need to be refurbished, and which can be removed entirely. We are eliminating 15 underperforming rides this year, reducing maintenance costs, and freeing up significant capex resources”.

As the current season is set to begin, Six Flags has begun to scrub references for rides (and waterslides) across numerous parks in the chain. Typically, scrubbed references from the website or app is an indication of an upcoming ride’s removal. As of now, these are the rides which references have been scrubbed across both web and app:

• Six Flags America: ZoomAzon Falls – Bodyslide – Scrubbed on Map, Website, and App

• Six Flags Over Georgia: Sky Buckets – Skyride- Scrubbed on Map and listed as “closed for season” on the app. All references within the park have been removed.

• Frontier City: Tumbleweed – Chance Rotor- Scrubbed on Map, Website, and App

• Great Escape: Giant Wheel – Ferris Wheel – Scrubbed on Map, Website, and App

• Six Flags St Louis: Superman Tower of Power and Moon Antique Cars – Scrubbed on Map, Website, and App

• Six Flags Discovery Kingdom: Harley Quinn Crazy Coaster – Scrubbed on Website and App

• Six Flags Darien Lake: Grizzly Run – Scrubbed on Website and App

Outside of those four removals from all park sites and corresponding apps, there are other ride references being scrubbed inconsistently among the platforms — such as rides that have been de-listed from the park map or app, but still remain on the website:

• Six Flags Magic Mountain: Tidal Wave – Shoot the Chutes – Delisted from park map on the app
• Six Flags Darien Lake: – Sleigh Ride – Himalaya – Delisted from park app

There are also rides delisted from the park’s website, but still have an active mobile site and app listing:

• Six Flags Great America: – Crazy Bus – Scrubbed from web (dated mobile version is still active).

• Six Flags New England: – Nightwing – Slingshot – Scrubbed from web (dated mobile version still active)

• Six Flags Darien Lake: – Darien Lake Railway – Scrubbed from web (dated mobile version still active)

• Great Escape: Wahoo Racer – Mat Slide – Scrubbed on Website

• Six Flags Discovery Kingdom: The Ark- Pirate Ship/Swinging Ship ride – Scrubbed from Website

Aside from the rides that are just not operating in 2021, as of now, the only confirmed total removals are the ones from Frontier City, Six Flags St. Louis, and Six Flags America. The Sky Buckets ride at Six Flags Over Georgia appear to be in a state of being deconstructed. This is a developing situation, so take everything with a grain of salt until the park makes a statement. Stay tuned as we will update the list……

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