Theme park designs that changed the game

1. Carousel

Few things are more syn­ony­mous with fair grounds and theme parks than the carousel. Invent­ed by New York mas­ter carv­er Charles I.D. Looff in 1876, who attached his carved wood­en ani­mals on to a mov­ing cir­cu­lar plat­form, the carousel may lack the speed and tech­nol­o­gy of most mod­ern attrac­tions, but is still beloved by vis­i­tors of all ages around the world.

2. Ferris wheel

In 1893 organ­is­ers of the Chica­go World’s Fair issued a chal­lenge to cre­ate an attrac­tion that would over­shad­ow the grandeur of the Eif­fel Tow­er in Paris, which had host­ed the World’s Fair four years ear­li­er. While Gale Fer­ris Jr only man­aged to build a 264ft wheel, dwarfed by Gus­tave Eiffel’s 1,063ft iron behe­moth, it car­ried 36 cars hold­ing up to 60 peo­ple, giv­ing an impres­sive total capac­i­ty of 2,160. What’s more, the Fer­ris wheel would go on to become a main­stay of theme parks the world over for the next cen­tu­ry.

3. Wooden coaster

While not the first wood­en coast­er to be built, Leap-The-Dips at Lake­mont Park in Penn­syl­va­nia today stands as the world’s old­est oper­at­ing ride of its kind. Built in 1902 by the E. Joy Mor­ris Com­pa­ny, the ride was forced to close in 1985 due to dis­re­pair, but a suc­cess­ful fundrais­ing cam­paign led to its restora­tion in 1999. Stand­ing at a mere 41ft, the ride is quite tame by mod­ern stan­dards, but has been named a nation­al his­toric land­mark and is still bring­ing in crowds to this day.

4. Steel coaster

Mat­ter­horn Bob­sleds was a rev­o­lu­tion in roller­coast­er design. Dis­ney­land intro­duced the world’s first tubu­lar steel coast­er in 1959 which meant, unlike con­ven­tion­al wood­en rails, the track could be bent in any direc­tion, paving the way for the loops and corkscrews that we know today. It is said that Walt Disney’s orig­i­nal con­cept was to give guests the expe­ri­ence of tobog­gan­ing down a snowy hill.

5. Immersive storytelling

A 1960s indoor boat ride with singing dolls doesn’t sound like much, but It’s A Small World at Dis­ney­land in Cal­i­for­nia remains one of the park’s most revered attrac­tions. Fea­tur­ing more than 300 audio-ani­ma­tron­ic dolls in tra­di­tion­al cos­tumes from around the world, singing an annoy­ing­ly catchy theme song, the ride was orig­i­nal­ly cre­at­ed as a trib­ute to the UNICEF 1964 New York Fair, but became a huge hit and moved to Dis­ney­land where it is still going strong.

6.Dark rides

Dark rides have been around for years, such as the first 1930s ghost train at Black­pool Plea­sure Beach or the ubiq­ui­tous Tun­nel of Love of yes­ter­year, but they real­ly came into their own in the late-1960s. Disneyland’s

Adven­ture Thru Inner Space was the first attrac­tion to use the patent­ed Omn­i­mover sys­tem, with rotat­ing pods that con­trol line of sight and ani­ma­tion show­ing rid­ers what’s it’s like to be shrunk down to the size of an atom. Though the lat­ter closed in 1985, Flori­da Dis­ney World’s pop­u­lar shoot­ing-gallery game, Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin, still uses the same sys­tem, with rid­ers able to spin around in their car­riages while fir­ing infrared lasers to help Buzz in his bat­tle to defeat the evil Emper­or Zurg.

7. Inverted coaster

Mag­ic Moun­tain and Cedar Point have been bat­tling it out for the crown of “roller­coast­er world cap­i­tal” for four decades, ever since they com­pet­ed to build the mod­ern loop­ing coast­er in 1976. Mag­ic Moun­tain pipped Cedar Point to the post by just a week with the cre­ation of the sin­gle-inver­sion coast­er Rev­o­lu­tion, though the latter’s corkscrew includes both a ver­ti­cal loop and dou­ble-corkscrew. Full Throt­tle at Six Flags Mag­ic Moun­tain in Cal­i­for­nia, how­ev­er, cur­rent­ly stands as the ride with the tallest loop at over 127ft.

8. Trackless attractions

Pooh’s Hun­ny Hunt in Tokyo Dis­ney­land, while not one for thrill-seek­ers, was a ground­break­ing track­less dark ride built in 2000. Based on the Win­nie the Pooh children’s books, the ride uses a unique “local posi­tion­ing sys­tem”, enabling com­put­ers to move each car­riage from room to room, fol­low­ing Pooh and his friends in their search for hon­ey in the Hun­dred Acre Wood. Adren­a­line junkies may well steer clear, but Pooh’s Hun­ny Hunt is Fantasyland’s most pop­u­lar attrac­tion.

9. Multi-sensory

Mul­ti-sen­so­ry attrac­tions were the inevitable next step in theme park evo­lu­tion, using advanced tech­nol­o­gy for a ful­ly immer­sive thrill ride. The Amaz­ing Adven­tures of Spi­der-Man at Uni­ver­sal Orlan­do is one such attrac­tion, sub­merg­ing vis­i­tors in a 3D vir­tu­al real­i­ty where they fol­low the com­ic book hero in a mov­ing car through city streets and over build­ings, includ­ing a sim­u­lat­ed 400ft freefall. Jour­ney to the Cen­tre of the Earth, the 2001 dark ride inspired by the Jules Verne nov­el, is also note­wor­thy. The Toyko Dis­ney­Sea attrac­tion trans­ports vis­i­tors on a min­ing car­riage through cav­erns, mush­room forests and earth­quakes into the heart of Mount Prometheus, using light, sound, heat and motion for a com­plete, mul­ti-sen­so­ry expe­ri­ence.