The New Kentucky Kingdom

Park looks fantastic. Last time I was there was in 1997. It'll be nice to visit again after not being there for so long. Thanks for the awesome pics. Can't wait until July to ride Lightning Run...Coaster looks great!

The park looks fantastic, thank you for the pictures!

Ed Hart have done an amazing job! I didn't really doubt he would do a great job. The last year I have been actually goggling him and listening to some radio interviews he has done the last three years about the re opening, and he is just so easy to listen to, and say some really wise things.

Lightning Run looks fantastic, and so does the new water park section, If I would ever visit I would probably look forward to the insane looking drop slide the most, quickly followed by LR and the Larson tower.

Great pictures. One friend who rode Lightning Run told me it's the new and improved mega lite. Interesting!

If he have been on a megalite then I will respect his opinion, otherwise meh..

Park and especially lighting run are looking great. Really looking forward to try it out for myself in two weeks. Just hope a bit of the hype has died down a little as the thought of waiting two and a half hours is a little bit scary.

This is why I'll be going during the week while the local kids are still in school . But the idea of a huge crowd on opening day does concern me a bit. The park isn't really that big and the entire staff is new. Hopefully they can keep up. The last thing the park needs is word spreading around the community that "Kentucky Kingdom still sucks."

The park looks fantastic, thank you for the pictures!

 

Ed Hart have done an amazing job! I didn't really doubt he would do a great job. The last year I have been actually goggling him and listening to some radio interviews he has done the last three years about the re opening, and he is just so easy to listen to, and say some really wise things.

 

Lightning Run looks fantastic, and so does the new water park section, If I would ever visit I would probably look forward to the insane looking drop slide the most, quickly followed by LR and the Larson tower.

 

Great pictures. One friend who rode Lightning Run told me it's the new and improved mega lite. Interesting!

 

If he have been on a megalite then I will respect his opinion, otherwise meh..

I have had the chance to ride both the megalite and Lightning Run. My personal opinion is that I like Lightning Run better. I rode in the back seat. Wow! The first two drops are epic. All of the elements come at you quicker than the megalites. There is airtime everywhere and it's ejector air. A nice surprise is the twisting airtime hill prior to the S-curves.

Joe Draves, Ride Centerline, Chance and Kentucky Kingdom have a winner on their hands. Besides Lightning Run, the park looked beautiful and Thunder Run is running better than I have ever remembered it.

As far as operations, it was taking the staff about 5 minutes to dispatch trains. Large people and tall people were having difficulties with the restraints. The bars may lock on people, but It has to reach a certain point for the sensors to trigger. So they were spending way too long on each lap bar. Most trains had at least 3 to 4 guests having difficulties.

Jonathan

I have had the chance to ride both the megalite and Lightning Run. My personal opinion is that I like Lightning Run better. I rode in the back seat. Wow! The first two drops are epic. All of the elements come at you quicker than the megalites. There is airtime everywhere and it's ejector air. A nice surprise is the twisting airtime hill prior to the S-curves.

Great review, would love to try it someday!

Out of your seat for the whole ride on Lightning Run - sounds fun! I really need to get here. Lightning Run seems like the surprise coaster for the 2014 season.

Wow! The entire park is looking really great. I do agree with a lot of the other comments on here saying that the park really needs some more shade, and even more so in the water park. However, it's been really exciting to see the process of bringing the park back to life, and the fact that it's open again truly is amazing. The water park looks like it has a great selection of previously existing slides as well as some excellent, new slides from ProSlide. Deep Water Dive looks insane (on a level of Veruckt), and the entire water park should be a crowd pleaser for years to come.

As far as the dry side of the park goes, I'm really glad to hear that Lightning Run is providing a good ride experience. It looks great, and hearing that it has some great airtime makes me hope that models like it will come to my local Six Flags one day. It is a bit worrying that LR had a 2.5 hour wait. Although it was the first day of operations, I hope the park has enough capacity to fit the local demand, especially in these first few years when they're down two major attractions. Overall, this park is looking really exciting, but I don't see myself going there until 2016 when all the major attractions have been reopened.

Wow! The entire park is looking really great. I do agree with a lot of the other comments on here saying that the park really needs some more shade, and even more so in the water park. However, it's been really exciting to see the process of bringing the park back to life, and the fact that it's open again truly is amazing. The water park looks like it has a great selection of previously existing slides as well as some excellent, new slides from ProSlide. Deep Water Dive looks insane (on a level of Veruckt), and the entire water park should be a crowd pleaser for years to come.

As far as the dry side of the park goes, I'm really glad to hear that Lightning Run is providing a good ride experience. It looks great, and hearing that it has some great airtime makes me hope that models like it will come to my local Six Flags one day. It is a bit worrying that LR had a 2.5 hour wait. Although it was the first day of operations, I hope the park has enough capacity to fit the local demand, especially in these first few years when they're down two major attractions. Overall, this park is looking really exciting, but I don't see myself going there until 2016 when all the major attractions have been reopened.

Not to worry, I have faith that the KK Lightning Run crew will get the dispatch times down much lower. We are having a training session tomorrow with two train operation and will hopefully be getting more operators trained. There are also plans for a test seat for the front of the queue which should help with the sizing issues.

Amazon Day was a crazy way to begin our first day of operation and the crew did a fantastic job under very extreme circumstances with really no experience.

-Brian

Oh and I'm not just saying this because I worked on it, but holy crap! Lightning Run is the real deal and totally blew Anne and I out of the water. First drop is amazing and it just keeps getting better and better after that! This coaster is truly worth the trip out to Kentucky Kingdom.

-Brian

Guess i need a day trip to Kentucky Kingdom. Lightning run looks sweet!

The ACE Spring Conference had a pit stop at KK on Saturday from 12:00pm - 3:00pm. I never made it to KK when Six Flags operated it, but overall the park looked great and seemed ready for prime time. KK provided lunch for ACErs and the food was great (prime rib and chicken).

The park was very crowded because of the Amazon preview and the crowds grew as the afternoon wore on. They cleared the queue lines at Lightning Run and Thunder Run for us and we had two hours of ERT. Both coasters were running great. Thunder Run is a great woodie. KK has a hit on their hands with LR. Loved the air time in the back. Only got 1 ride on LR because the wait, but will definitely love to ride LR again. Couple of reasons the line for LR was so long on Saturday; it was the first day for the Ops actually running the ride with riders, so they were learning as they went along. Riders were instructed not to touch the lap bars, the ops had to lower them. The ops tried really hard to accommodate people of size, spending several minutes before making them take the walk of shame. Lastly, only one train was operating on Saturday. When they add the second train and the Ops get more familiar with the ride, wait times should be reduced considerably.

Overall, myself and all fellow attendees were impressed with the new KK and the two coasters. Hopefully, more coasters will be added or brought back to life soon.

Great shots! Thank you for the trip report. The park looks great.

The ACE Spring Conference had a pit stop at KK on Saturday from 12:00pm - 3:00pm. I never made it to KK when Six Flags operated it, but overall the park looked great and seemed ready for prime time. KK provided lunch for ACErs and the food was great (prime rib and chicken).

 

The park was very crowded because of the Amazon preview and the crowds grew as the afternoon wore on. They cleared the queue lines at Lightning Run and Thunder Run for us and we had two hours of ERT. Both coasters were running great. Thunder Run is a great woodie. KK has a hit on their hands with LR. Loved the air time in the back. Only got 1 ride on LR because the wait, but will definitely love to ride LR again. Couple of reasons the line for LR was so long on Saturday; it was the first day for the Ops actually running the ride with riders, so they were learning as they went along. Riders were instructed not to touch the lap bars, the ops had to lower them. The ops tried really hard to accommodate people of size, spending several minutes before making them take the walk of shame. Lastly, only one train was operating on Saturday. When they add the second train and the Ops get more familiar with the ride, wait times should be reduced considerably.

 

Overall, myself and all fellow attendees were impressed with the new KK and the two coasters. Hopefully, more coasters will be added or brought back to life soon.

Speaking as a "guest of exceptional size", can you make an assessment or guess-timate on what proportions people being turned away were?

I'd hate to miss this ride on Mini New Hotness.

Whenever I see brand new pictures of the brand new Kentucky Kingdom, I get so excited I could wet my pants . . .

Excuse me for a moment . . .

Okay, with that taken care of, I just wanted to say that I will be visiting that park in two weeks as part of the three park tour ( Holiday World and Kings Island are the other two parks I shall be visiting ). I'm sure it'll be better compared to my last visit years ago when "Sick Flags" was running it. And since I will be visiting the park on a weekday, I'm hoping the lines won't be too long ( then again, I've visited some parks on a weekday and they were CROWD-DED!!!).

"OH THE SUN SHINES BRIGHT ON MY OLD KENTUCKY PARK . . ."

The park looks brand new. Thanks for the great pictures. Much success wishes to KK!

Thanks Everyone, for your Comment's. I LOVED Lighting Run, it's a Air Time Monster. The only reason the line was 2 1/2 hrs. was because they were only running the Green Train, the Purple Train had arrived Wednesday and hadn't completed testing. They do put the Lap Bar down Snug, I never noticed the Leg Guards, but your still comfortable and come up on the Hills. All the quick turns are taken very smoothly and fast. The First Drop is the Best, but I also like the Twisty S-Curve, before the final 3 Bunny Hops.

The Park in Whole looks Great, they still have some Landscaping and final touches to do, but all in all in Looks Fantastic. The Employees was tested on Preview Day, I heard Amazon had 22,000 People plus the ACE Members, so I'm sure they will get better as the Season goes along. When I worked at Kentucky Kingdom , I remember going back each Season and training New Employee's on Everything. It takes Time to Teach and Certify New Employee's, if done properly. This Crew is Starting New, Ed brought back some People he worked with originally, but 90% is NEW.

Thanks Everyone, for your Comment's. I LOVED Lighting Run, it's a Air Time Monster. The only reason the line was 2 1/2 hrs. was because they were only running the Green Train, the Purple Train had arrived Wednesday and hadn't completed testing. They do put the Lap Bar down Snug, I never noticed the Leg Guards, but your still comfortable and come up on the Hills. All the quick turns are taken very smoothly and fast. The First Drop is the Best, but I also like the Twisty S-Curve, before the final 3 Bunny Hops.

 

The Park in Whole looks Great, they still have some Landscaping and final touches to do, but all in all in Looks Fantastic. The Employees was tested on Preview Day, I heard Amazon had 22,000 People plus the ACE Members, so I'm sure they will get better as the Season goes along. When I worked at Kentucky Kingdom , I remember going back each Season and training New Employee's on Everything. It takes Time to Teach and Certify New Employee's, if done properly. This Crew is Starting New, Ed brought back some People he worked with originally, but 90% is NEW.

The park (and especially Lightning Run) look great and I'm excited about visiting during the New Hotness trip in a couple of months, but I do have one question. How do you go about deciding which words you capitalize? I tried to determine if there was some sort of pattern or hidden code, but I couldn't figure it out. I'm not trying to give you a hard time - you use punctuation and sentence structure, so it's not hard to read...I just find it peculiar.

Thanks Everyone, for your Comment's. I LOVED Lighting Run, it's a Air Time Monster. The only reason the line was 2 1/2 hrs. was because they were only running the Green Train, the Purple Train had arrived Wednesday and hadn't completed testing. They do put the Lap Bar down Snug, I never noticed the Leg Guards, but your still comfortable and come up on the Hills. All the quick turns are taken very smoothly and fast. The First Drop is the Best, but I also like the Twisty S-Curve, before the final 3 Bunny Hops.

 

The Park in Whole looks Great, they still have some Landscaping and final touches to do, but all in all in Looks Fantastic. The Employees was tested on Preview Day, I heard Amazon had 22,000 People plus the ACE Members, so I'm sure they will get better as the Season goes along. When I worked at Kentucky Kingdom , I remember going back each Season and training New Employee's on Everything. It takes Time to Teach and Certify New Employee's, if done properly. This Crew is Starting New, Ed brought back some People he worked with originally, but 90% is NEW.

 

The park (and especially Lightning Run) look great and I'm excited about visiting during the New Hotness trip in a couple of months, but I do have one question. How do you go about deciding which words you capitalize? I tried to determine if there was some sort of pattern or hidden code, but I couldn't figure it out. I'm not trying to give you a hard time - you use punctuation and sentence structure, so it's not hard to read...I just find it peculiar.

I was just putting strong emphasis on certain words, sorry, I tend to do that in my writing.