SOUTH WHITEHALL TWP, Pa. – Dorney Park and its parent, Cedar Fair Entertainment Company, will present a plan tonight, Feb. 16, for a new attraction on the site of the former Stinger roller coaster.
According to a brief posted online, the application to be presented to the South Whitehall Township Planning Commission includes plans “to construct a new 161.67 foot attraction on the site of the Stinger Roller Coaster” on a 2.7-acre area.
- Dorney Park has plans for a new attraction
- It will sit on the site of the former Stinger roller coaster, which was demolished in 2018
- The plan calls for the new ride to be 161.67 feet tall
Dorney Park Project 2024 P by LehighValley Newsdotcom on Scribd
For those who remember, the Stinger was Dorney Park’s short-lived inverted shuttle roller coaster model developed and manufactured by the Dutch company Vekoma. It was open 2012 to 2017, and previously ran as Invertigo at California’s Great America from 1998 to 2010.
How might Dorney’s new ride measure up to existing attractions? According to its website, these are the tallest attractions in the park for thrillseekers:
Steel Force
Steel Force remains the tallest attraction at Dorney, and was the tallest free-standing roller coaster and the first to top 200-feet on the East Coast. The height of the main drop is 205 feet (the drop takes riders below the main structure), while the second hill is 161 feet. The third hill on the coaster tops out at 100 feet, and the final hill is 85 feet.
The coaster remains the longest steel roller coaster on the East Coast. It tops out at speeds reaching 75 mph.
Dominator
Dominator is a 200-foot tower that truly dominates Dorney’s skyline over South Whitehall Township. It gives riders a feeling of weightlessness and elevation change as they ascend and descend the tower.
Riders get to choose between two towers — one launches upward from ground level, reaching a maximum height of 160 feet before slowly returning to the ground. The other slowly lifts riders to a maximum height of 175 feet before swiftly dropping them back to the ground.
Possessed
For comparison’s sake with the proposed new coaster, the tallest point on the nearby Possessed is 185 feet (making it higher than the new ride would be).
This dueling-tower suspended impulse coaster twists and turns and inverts riders along 704 feet of U-shaped track.
You may have ridden this one at other parks before it arrived at Dorney. It was known as Superman: Ultimate Escape, Steel Venom and Voodoo at three other amusement parks. It has run at Dorney since 2009.
Talon
At 135 feet tall, Talon is shorter than the proposed new ride being pitched. It has a vertical drop of 120 feet and a vertical loop of 98 feet.
Other elements of Talon that make it a screaming good time include a zero-gravity roll, a simultaneous loop and roll, an inclined spiral, an S-curve, corkscrew spin and a spiral.
Talon opened May 5, 2001, as the tallest and longest inverted roller coaster in the Northeast.
Demon Drop
If you ever wanted to know what it felt like being dropped from the top of a 10-story building, check out Demon Drop.
This elevator-style ride goes up 131 feet, has a vertical drop of 60 feet in about 2.5 seconds, goes into a curve and you end the ride lying down.
