Coney Island Sweepstakes: And The Winner Is…
…likely going to be Zamperla, an Italian ride manufacturer that also happens to run the Victorian Gardens amusement park in Central Park. The City is currently negotiating an agreement and hopes to have a signed contract as early as next week. (NY Times)
Councilman Domenic M. Recchia, whose district includes Coney Island, said that Zamperla had submitted a creative proposal that set it apart from the other bidders. “You’ll love it,” he said, declining to give details. “We’ll have what the bigger amusement parks have, on a smaller scale.”
Meanwhile, Carol Albert declined to submit a bid for an Astroland return to the City, and has put the For Sale sign back on her rides. (Brooklyn Paper, CIUSA message board)
“Reluctantly, we pulled out at the last minute because we could not possibly put [a proposal] together in the six weeks that the [EDC] required,” said Albert, who sold her land to Sitt in 2006 and ran her park as a renter until 2008. “But Zamperla will provide great rides and a beautiful experience like they did with Victorian Gardens.”
In fact, pretty much everyone seems happy with this development. They certainly seem to have their act together, and I sure hope Zamperla can live up to all of this high praise. Even though I should know better, there’s just no way I’ll be able to guard my optimism this time.
Guess we’ll find out for sure on Memorial Day Weekend.
Update [8:32 PM]: I just wanted to mention, while NY1 is largely credited with breaking the story with sources inside the NYCEDC (um, newspapers, asleep at the switch much, losing out to the Robin Scherbatsky network?), Tricia over at Amusing The Zillion first noted that Zamperla was expected to win a full week ago.
Recent Comments