Are We At the End of the Third Golden Age?

[Hyde]

2024 has emerged as a landmark year for the amusement park industry. Two major rivals, Cedar Fair and Six Flags, have finally merged to form a monolithic conglomerate. World record roller coasters are encountering various fates: some are inching closer to fruition, like Falcon's Flight; others are facing demise, such as Kingda Ka and Dodonpa. And those that hold on by what feels a thread, like TT2 operational for only four days, and Formula Rossa down for most of the year.

As we look forward to significant new investments in the upcoming year—both with large new parks opening, such as Epic Universe and Six Flags Quiddiya, and new roller coasters like YoY, Mine-Cart Madness, and a slew of Six Flags attractions—I can't help but wonder if we've crossed a threshold into a new era of roller coasters, distinct from the tone of the past two decades. Have we unknowingly concluded a Third Golden Age of roller coasters?

Let me explain with some broad historic strokes of the coaster industry:

First Golden Age (1920s - Great Depression)
The Roaring Twenties proved beneficial not only for the economy but also for tourism. Roller coaster technology was ripe for investment, allowing designs to evolve from simple side-friction models to more advanced structures featuring upstop wheels, chain lifts with anti-rollback systems, and other innovations that enabled taller, faster rides. According to Coaster101, 1,500 new coasters were built throughout the 1920s and 1930s—a massive increase in coaster population that was sadly cut short by the Great Depression and the subsequent economic slump that affected the broader tourism and leisure industry.


Second Golden Age (1970s - 1980s)
Again led by technology and planning innovation, quickly met with new investment dollars in the post war boom economy (particularly here in America), the second Golden Age is often credited to start with the opening of The Racer at Kings Island in 1972, as the first amusement park to open with a roller coaster as the marquee attraction (rather than dance hall, other attractions, etc.). We saw another groundswell of roller coasters hitting the market across wooden and steel alike, again given helpful boost on other technology breakthroughs (Matterhorn Bobsled Steel Tubular Track design in 1959, This was given a helpful booster again on innovation through inventions of steel tubular track, polyurethane wheels, and inversion designs that catapulted Arrow, Schwarzkopf, and other designs throughout an amazing 20-year run. "Peaking" out at 200 ft., 70 MPH+, and 7 inversion counts (e.g. Moonsault Scrambler, Magnum XL-200, Shockwave SFGA) of roller coaster designs from such humble beginnings is absolutely remarkable, fostering roller coasters we cherish today.

But what of the Third Golden Age?

There's still an open question of when a Third Golden Age of roller coasters would be credited as start. By and large, the mid-to-late 90s as Cedar Fair and Six Flags started the "Coaster Wars" is a good mark, becoming clear the two chains would compete in a tit-for-tat market economy, both courting the same coaster manufacturers to build ever larger, faster coaster prize. Other global amusement parks, too, would begin spinning up their own coaster works (Alton Towers, BPB, Port Aventura, Parques Reunidos, International Disneys, etc.), giving furtive ground for new coaster technologies to explode (e.g. magnetic and hydraulic launch, "hybrid" designs from RMC, alternative seating and riding styles like 4D and wing). Just as Golden Ages before, the roller coasters being made now would have been mere dreams and unfathomable 10-20 years prior.

And as we wait to herald a breach of the 500 ft., 150 MPH record by Falcon's Flight in the new year, I can only wonder if we're at the end of an era as we face other, earnest indicators that usually mark a closure for these seasons:

• Decline of Technologic Breakthroughs and Frequency of New Concept: In general, we have seen the breakthrough inventions of the 2000s (Hydraulic launch, Magnetic launch, RMC hybrid designs, new inversion designs) play out their hand, and see widespread adoption throughout the 2010s/early 2020s. These inventions are still creating masterclass coaster designs, but moreso iterations on existing work than genuinely new attractions.
• Consolidation of the Market: We are only still grappling with what the Six Flags/Cedar Fair merger will bring, but one thing has already been made clear by a rash of new ride closures - inherently lower market competition can spell slower/delayed new ride rollout. Rather than competing against your neighboring park (e.g. the 90s Coaster Wars), competition is moreso the Amusement Park industry vs. other leisure activities.
• Other External Preference Shifts: The collective industry proved quite resilient, emerging from COVID-19 as a massive disruption to tourism (save Conneaut Lake committing light arson), but other emergent threats remain as the park-going population has seen significant changes in leisure preference post-2019. Concert attendance, for instance, hit an all-time high this past year; an example of other alternatives to attending your local amusement park.

Although I do not have an exact round of stats and figures in hand (and gladly welcome others' perspectives!), these would feel like possible indicators of the close of a Golden Age, especially if we saw marked gaps in new coaster additions and designs over the next 3-5 years.

 

[Pokemaniac]

I've been thinking that we're definitely seeing the end of some era recently, but I'm not quite sure why exactly, it's a combination of many factors. It just seems that the coaster scene I grew up with is coming to an end. In many cases, this is true in a very physical sense. Several of the exciting, huge coasters that were built to huge fanfares at the turn of the millennium are now being closed and dismantled, not to be replaced with anything at the same scale. That has become too expensive. Many of the big thrill parks now seemingly go much longer between new attractions, which also seem to be smaller and cheaper than the white-knuckle coasters of the 90's. Manufacturers seem to lean heavier into small-package rides than before; even B&M seems to mostly build family coasters now. The CF/6F merger seems to signal an end to chain-to-chain competition for thrill parks in the US. Hyperion aside, the park scene in the UK seems to be in absolute tatters compared to the nineties. For a while, China seemed to hold up the market for huge coasters, but there is definitely a slowdown now. The cost of going big has risen too high to be worth it for all but the biggest parks.

It's like the industry never quite recovered after the financial crisis, but kept going on the momentum it had built up until then. And now, after Covid, the momentum is petering out, the hardware of the pre-crisis era is too old to keep operating, and too expensive to replace.

I expect it to get even worse, too. So many of the traditional thrill parks in the US and Europe built almost their entire backbone coaster lineup in the decade between 1996 and 2006, and assuming a similar operational lifespan for all of them, they will be retired at a similar rate soon-ish, leaving the parks in question with huge holes in their lineups. And those are coasters at a scale that wouldn't be remotely affordable to build in the same numbers nowadays. What will be left of the industry leaders then? And how much worse will it be for smaller parks?

 

[Matt N]

To offer slightly less of a doom and gloom perspective, what I think has happened that could be a contributor is that the industry has shifted away from pure thrill coaster hardware somewhat since the 1990s and 2000s, and that rather than an industry in decline, we’re simply seeing an industry in transition.

One point I’d raise is that in recent years, we’ve seen quite a rise in theming and immersive experiences at parks, and a focus on things like dark rides. Even the likes of Six Flags and Cedar Fair have arguably leant more into theming in recent years, and in the last 10 years, we’ve seen things like the big ticket Justice League dark rides at the Six Flags parks and the Triotech dark rides at the Cedar Fair parks. Parks like Disney and Universal are doing better than ever, as are the likes of Europa Park, Efteling and Phantasialand, and the common thread between these parks is that they all focus on theming and experience over pure ride hardware. Consumers want more than pure coasters on a car park these days, so with this newfound emphasis on theming and experiences, the pure coaster hardware will naturally take a back seat compared to its front and centre position in the 1990s and 2000s.

The other thing I’d attribute the decrease in the number of large coasters being built to, as well as an increased emphasis on theming and experiences, is an increased emphasis on families. Families are what make parks money, and I think a lot of places realised that after the 2000s. The 2000s were a big era for thrill seekers, but what was the result of Six Flags’ big blowout on thrill coasters, for example? The company went bankrupt, and ended up having to make some big about turns to bring families back. The one thing that has happened in recent years, to counteract the lesser rate of big coaster construction, is that family coasters have begun cropping up at a much greater rate and have grown so much more interesting. 20 years ago or so, you had a very distinct line between family and thrill coasters, with little middle ground between the “family coasters” that were little more interesting than a Vekoma Rollerskater or wild mouse and the “thrill coasters” that were big, hulking machines. But in recent times, that middle ground has become so much stronger, the line between family and thrill has grown far more blurred, and the “family thrill coaster” has really risen in prevalence.

While we may not be in the golden age of the big landmark thrill coaster anymore, I’d argue that we’ve entered a new golden age, that of the “family thrill coaster” that aims to cater to the widest audience possible. The ivory towers of “thrill coasters” with 1.4m/54” height restrictions are increasingly becoming a concept of the past, and new builds are aiming to capture the hearts and minds of a far wider audience. While we were seeing loads of big thrill coaster builds in the 2000s, we were not seeing these brilliant middle ground family thrill coaster builds in anything like the quantity we are now, and I’d argue that the family thrill coaster and making things enjoyable for the widest possible audience is where innovation is now focused. The likes of Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure and Big Bear Mountain would have been an alien concept 10-20 years ago, but they are now two utterly revered family coasters that please young families and thrill seekers alike. You also have the Intamin Multidimensional Coasters and rides like Uncharted; it seems like quite a few of these will be cropping up in the coming years.

We may not be seeing big thrill coasters built in the same quantity anymore. I don’t deny that. I think they are still getting built at a reasonable enough quantity, and I think we will continue to see them get built and have a place within parks, but the thrill coaster boom era of the 2000s is definitely over and some of the thrill coaster ambition and bombast of that era is now gone. With that being said, I’d argue that we are seeing a new boom era of a different kind emerging; that of the family thrill coaster and the themed experience. And I, for one, don’t see why that can’t be equally exciting as the one that came before it!

 

[owenstreet7]

I personally think we've passed the Third Golden Age of the 90s and Early 00s a little while ago and are in a new era right now. I'd agree with Matt and say it's the age of more accessible thrills.

It isn't just the family thrill rides but we are seeing more thrill rides being accessible to more riders than ever before.

An example is that in Six Flags, we've got Iron Menace and Dr Diabolical which would've ordinarily have been 1.4m thrill machines being 48 inch/1.2m coasters. The RMCs have typically got 1.2m height restrictions and the highest most common height requirement typically is now 1.3m which is typical on Mack and Intamin's most thrilling coasters.

I think 1.4m height requirements are a thing of the past and anything new will be 1.2m and 1.3m. The one time I'd see another 1.4m will be at a Merlin park or on a B&M imo.