Theme Park Seized, Bluey, Epic Universe Tunnel, and More!

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Etnaland in Sicily, Italy Has Been Seized By Authorities

Authorities have claimed that the park owners of Etnaland in Italy, have been violating a number of environmental rules. Some of which include:

• Burning and Burying trash in a field

• Dumping pool water(untreated and full of chemicals still) in a lake

Right now the park remains closed. Hopefully a rather large fine will bring it back open, as well as rules in place for how to dispose of trash and pool water properly.

You can now dispatch your own rollercoaster!

I recently came across an instagram post from someone that had purchased a very unique coaster product, a ride operation board. It had all the buttons and switches you would expect a real life ride operator would use. It works with one of the best ride simulation games out there, Ride Sims. This is a game where you can operate and dispatch rides from some of your favorite theme parks around the world: Carowinds, Sea World Orlando, Universal, and the list goes on!

I wanted to ask the creator of this panel, Coaster Climax some questions about it. Here is what they had to say.

What inspired you to make a ride control panel like this?

I have always lived for theme parks and wanted to operate rollercoasters. However as I don’t have a park in working distance, it lead me to find games like ride sims, no limits 2, etc. Once i played a lot with them i felt the realism was lacking and that a full control panel would be really cool, however I couldn’t find any for sale online.

So this is where i decided to build my own! From doing computer science in college I knew I would have no problem being able to program one. So I found a board that would be easily programmable and buttons/switches and started wiring. With some simple programming I was able to build a fully working panel. This was very basic and 3d printed but worked well enough or me to play.

This control panel looks pretty complex, tell us a little bit about how it works.

My panels work off an arduino leonardo board with C# programming. They are all connected through 12 separate pins and each pin determines a state of either high or low. For example if you press the dispatch button, and disconnected to pin one. Pin one will read high. And then with it plugged into a PC or any device, it will replicate a keyboard press to dispatch the ride. The same thing works for the LEDs but in reverse.

What has been the feedback so far about this control panel?

The feedback I have received so far has been amazing for something I just make at home, everyone has been loving them. I think they’re such a unique product, and really enhances the game experience, it makes playing all types of games so much more enjoyable.

If you could choose one ride in real life to be an operator of, which would it be and why?

I think if i could operate any ride I would have to choose rage at adventure island Southend on sea, as this is my local park and is what started my love and passion for rollercoasters. Without this ride, I wouldn’t have the life and friends I have today, and operating it would be a true honor.

If you want to get your own ride panel, use the code Parkineer5 and you can save 5% off your order!

Elon Musk’s Boring Company Chosen For Universal Transit System

The Shingle Creek Transit and Utility Community Development District has voted to bring The Boring Company on for transportation infrastructure improvements. Allegedly, this might connect Universal Citywalk with Epic Universe via Tunnel.

How likely is this to happen?

The water table in Florida is extremely high. That’s why Disney had to add feet of dirt to their park prior to opening. I can expect Epic Universe did something similar prior to starting construction. Building a tunnel in Florida seems very hard to do. You would have to contend with a lot of water seeping into the project. While this isn’t a hurdle that is insurmountable, it does make it hard to bring to life.

Anything is possible with money. It seems like right now the Boring Company might just be coming up with a plan and cost that will need to be approved first.

Would this tunnel system be exclusive for Tesla cars like the system in Las Vegas? If so, I can imagine the capacity of this being rather low.

What other systems could connect the two universal parks here? The problem is there is a lot of land between the two parks that Universal doesn’t own. Building a monorail like at Disney World would be very very expensive. The next best option would be a Skyliner type system, that uses gondola’s to transport guests.

It’s very cheap to build this, extremely high rates of moving passengers, and would be incredible cool seeing all the views from a couple dozen feet above the ground versus inside of a tunnel.

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Theme Park Stock Watch

From the last 5 days of stock changing as of Monday Night

It seems that Citigroup updated their reports to move Six Flags from a “Buy” rating to a “neutral” rating. They have a $20 target price on the stock.

Other firms have also dropped their target price of the stock. Morgan Stanley has set theirs at $17. Goldman Sachs Group went from $23 to $20. And there are other firms that have done similar.

Six Flags just is not doing well. They have a ton of combined debt from the merger, costs to operate parks are rising, and they have to run more and more promotions to get people in the door.

Their All-parks pass is an incredible good value but seems like a race to the bottom in terms of price. I think it was roughly $20 a month would get you access to the entire park network. That should hopefully be higher if they thought better of their parks. I would love to see the parks improve in quality more, which would warrant a higher cost pass, which would give them more budget to work with improving their parks/adding new rides.

Right now, ride after ride has been delayed or cancelled. They’ve torn down some fan favorite attractions in hopes of saving money on maintenance and not replacing them with anything.

Six Flags needs to turn around fast to re-build its fanbase.

From The Editor

Woooh! The third week in a row I’ve published a newsletter. It’s coming out pretty close to the wire but it’s still out nonetheless. I think that Coaster Climax was one of the first people I’ve interviewed for this newsletter. Let me know your thoughts on that!

Do you want to see more people interviewed and if so who? Fellow content creators like Coaster Studios, Park Pros, etc? People that run theme parks? or someone else! Respond to this email with who you want to see interviewed next in this newsletter!

I have a few things I still have to send out in the mail to some of you readers. For this week’s giveaway, respond to this email with the phrase “I like to go fast” and your mailing address. I’ll send the first 10 people something in the mail!

As always, if you want to support us, consider either visiting our sponsors in our newsletter(if we have one) or subscribe to us on patreon below!

Last week I asked if you were going to Six Flags Qiddiya in the next year. 75% of you said you were not, and the other 25% either said yes or maybe. With Aquarabia opening in March, I strongly urge everyone to consider going! It’s incredible!

Alton Towers Reveals Bluey Coaster Design!

I absolutely love the design of this. I would love it if when the coaster comes into the station, Bingo(the orange dog) says to Bluey(the blue dog) “Nice Parking Spot Rita.” This would be a perfect throwback to what happens in the show.

In case you havn’t guessed it, this will be a family coaster and won’t contain any extreme elements. It will follow the Heeler family as Bluey/Bingo go around the backyard and get into trouble!

The queue for this ride will be interactive as well. You’ll go inside of the Bluey’s house and will have some fun play activities you can do in line while you wait. There will probably be some great spots for photos as well.

The new coaster opens in the spring of 2026!

News At A Glance

• Silver Dollar City recently made a post alluding to some kind of announcement happening on February 16th. Let’s stay tuned and see what it’s about!

• A Mountain coaster caught fire in the Pigeon Forge Area. The attraction was part of Skyland Ranch. It looks like the mountain coaster was at least partially damaged in addition two large barns that were lost in the fire. No animals were hurt and all have been reported to be safe.

• A new movie from the producers of Fall and Obsession is being developed where a group of teens sneak onto a rollercoaster and get stuck hundreds of feet in the air.

• Barracuda Strike opens on March 7th at Sea World San Antonio. This new inverted roller coaster will reach speeds of 44 mph and have a 90 foot lift hill. It will be more geared towards families.

• Glenwood Caverns have filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy after they lost their $205 million lawsuit against a death at the park.

Earn Cool Stuff By Referring Friends to the Newsletter!

Time is running out to claim some of these items. In the next month or two, we’ll be changing out some of these prizes (like the coaster wheel) and either increasing or decreasing the number of referrals needed.