by kevin » 23 Oct 2016, 12:36
It needs an experienced amusement park operator. The best option would be Philip Miller from Southend's Adventure Island. He was interested about 10 years ago but the fire starter wanted an ridiculously fraudulent price for the site, but if you look at the progress, investment and sheer visitor numbers the park enjoys I am convinced that he could make a success of Dreamland.
The problem is that Dreamland is stuck with this "Heritage Theme Park"tag, which it certainly hasn't lived up to. Unfortunately this has come about as a means to access lottery money but the rides that this plan was relying on have been stolen, abandoned or misplaced and the older rides that have been appearing at Dreamland have largely been travelling fairground rides, of the type traveled by Carters Steam Fair who, it has to be said, do it a lot better. Also, the rides that set an amusement park apart from a fairground are those permanent rides that are unique to that park, the Ghost train, the Fun House, the Rivercaves and other dark rides and without major investment these are never going to be built. The hope that recovering a few boats and a pump would turn into a resurrected River Caves was always, in my view, unrealistic at the best or naive at the worst. The same can be said of the other items of assorted scrap or memorabilia which were "acquired" with the financial and practical help of members of this forum.
You do have to ask the question, is Dreamland in breach of the conditions under which it obtained public money in the form of lottery grants to reopen as a heritage amusement park?