Idora Park Coasters
Kelly
Tribune Chronicle.
Kelly
Idora Park's owners consider toppling roller coasters
By BRENDA J. LINERT and JOE GORMAN
Tribune Chronicle
YOUNGSTOWN Already contemplating city-imposed deadlines for
cleanup of
asbestos-filled debris left after Idora Park's historic ballroom
burned to the ground
Monday, park owners also are considering demolition of the
property's remaining roller
coasters.
"There are numerous groups that have been trying to prevent us from
tearing down the
(park's attractions)," park owners' attorney Matthew J. Blair said
Friday.
"We have offered to allow them to take the roller coasters down as
long as they funded it
and had proper insurance and bonding. At this point, we are going
to have to probably,
this summer, demolish the remaining roller coasters."
Blair represents Mount Calvary Pentecostal Church, which purchased
the 26-acre
amusement park in 1985. After falling behind on the property taxes,
the church lost the
property in a foreclosure and sheriff's sale a few years later, but
repurchased it in 1994.
Idora Park had closed for good in 1984 due to poor attendance and a
fire that damaged
the Wildcat roller coaster.
Part of that wooden structure still stands, along with its sister
coaster, the Jack Rabbit,
which has been saved from three devastating fires at the park,
including the one on
Monday that destroyed the adjacent grand ballroom.
"Like everybody else, as a child we went to Idora Park and I think
we are going to miss
the park, but it's really been gone a long time," Blair said on
behalf of the church's pastor,
who was out of town Friday and unavailable for comment. "If
somebody could come up
with the necessary funds to move the coasters and would have the
necessary insurance
and bonding, we would welcome that.
"Right now we have immediate steps that need to be taken with the
ballroom structure.
That will probably involve tearing down the roller coasters as
well," Blair said.
According to the book "Idora Park: The Last Ride of Summer," by
Youngstown State
University professor Rick Shale and Charles J. Jacques Jr., the
Jack Rabbit roller coaster
first opened with the name "Dip-the-Dips" in 1914.
It had a 4,000-foot-long track constructed of yellow pine and went
an average of 23
mph. Ten years later, the park remodeled the coaster, adding a new
63-foot first drop
and renaming it the Jack Rabbit.
The Wildcat roller coaster opened for the first time with the 1930
season. With its tunnels
and banked curves, it has been called one of the greatest coasters
built in the 1920s.
Park rides and equipment were put up for public auction Oct. 20 and
21, 1984, months
after the gates had closed for good. Neither the Wildcat nor the
Jack Rabbit was sold,
but cars from both were auctioned off.
Youngstown city Councilman Michael Rapovy, D-5th Ward, who serves
the area of
Idora Park, said he has met with city officials recently about the
possibility of tearing
down at least the Wildcat roller coaster, along with its two
adjacent buildings. He said the
buildings are a safety hazard because of their rotting, wooden
floors.
"A child could die in one of them and you wouldn't know until their
bones were
discovered," Rapovy said.
Meanwhile, Blair said park owners have entertained an offer from
officials at western
Pennsylvania's Conneaut Lake Park wanting to relocate the wooden
Jack Rabbit roller
coaster to Pennsylvania.
On Friday, Gene Rumsey, a trustee at Conneaut Lake Park,
acknowledged that past
operators at the park had contemplated relocating the Jack Rabbit
from Youngstown to
Conneaut Lake, but that idea was no longer an option due largely to
the costs involved.
"We wouldn't be able to do that. We don't have the money," Rumsey
said. "We have put
in three new rides this year, (but) nothing of that magnitude."
Blair said Mount Calvary has not actively marketed the coasters but
would not rule out
offers by others to disassemble and move them.
"We were certainly willing to allow them to do that," Blair said.
"We are going to pay
substantial costs in demolishing roller coasters. If somebody was
willing to come in, we
would not charge them to take the roller coasters."
Already hurting for cash and located in an economically depressed
area, Blair said raising
the funds to pay for cleanup of the asbestos-laced ashes from the
ballroom blaze could
create a huge financial burden.
This week, Youngstown's Deputy Director of Housing and Demolition
Michael Damiano,
sent a letter instructing the church to begin cleanup within 21
days. Damiano said the
church must retain a certified asbestos consultant to supervise the
work and must
immediately erect temporary fencing around the hazardous area.
Blair said he has not yet spoken to the church's pastor but did not
believe the ballroom
was covered by fire insurance.
In a phone conversation Friday, Damiano estimated that cleanup of
the
asbestos-contaminated remains would cost more than $100,000.
Prior to Monday's fire, Damiano and other city officials,
dissatisfied with the church's
response to their requests to secure the area, had begun gathering
price bids for asbestos
removal and demolition of the building. He said the average
demolition bids ranged from
$80,000 to $100,000 with asbestos removal ranging from about
$110,000 to $135,000.
Councilman Rapovy agreed that access to the park was easy.
"People would call me up and they'd ask me if Idora Park had
reopened because there
were so many kids running around in there," he said.
That is compounded by the fact that the park's main entrance is a
long way off a main
road, Rapovy said.
Rapovy said he was in the ballroom just two weeks before the fire
checking on a
resident's complaint to police that a man was in the ballroom.
"It wasn't in that bad a shape inside," he said. "Structurally, it
looked pretty good."
There were signs of life in the basement, Rapovy said. He and the
officers found a couch
that looked to be well-used.
"It looked like someone was frequenting it," he said.
However, Rapovy said any efforts to maintain the property or keep
people out were
useless because it is up to the owners of the property to see to
those problems.
Blair said attempts by the owners to secure the building often were
fruitless because
vandals and vagrants quickly would remove boards from windows and
doors there.
Andrew Thompson, a spokesman from the Ohio Environmental Protection
Agency in
Columbus, said the agency has been in touch with the local
pollution control agency and
also will monitor cleanup of the fire site.
Thompson said there is no state-imposed deadline on cleaning up
asbestos-contaminated
areas, but the owners will be required to submit an outline of
their cleanup plan and must
keep the location constantly wet.
"The real concern is that if they leave the material in this vacant
building without really
doing anything soon, this material is going to dry out," Thompson
said. When that
happens, he said it could become airborne, presenting a possible
health risk to people in
the area.
The church group has long had plans to convert the park property to
a religious complex.
Rapovy also said he would like to meet with Wagner to discuss the
park's future, noting it
is located in one of the few areas of the city that can be termed
scenic, which could be
attractive to prospective buyers.
"That's very good land right there," Rapovy said. "There's a lot of
potential for that
property."
Blair agreed, noting that once the property is cleared, Mount
Calvary owners would
explore all possibilities, including using outside developers to
help make their dream a
reality.
Paul Asente
> Meanwhile, Blair said park owners have entertained an offer from
> officials at western
> Pennsylvania's Conneaut Lake Park wanting to relocate the wooden
> Jack Rabbit roller
> coaster to Pennsylvania.
>
> On Friday, Gene Rumsey, a trustee at Conneaut Lake Park,
> acknowledged that past
> operators at the park had contemplated relocating the Jack Rabbit
> from Youngstown to
> Conneaut Lake, but that idea was no longer an option due largely to
> the costs involved.
>
> "We wouldn't be able to do that. We don't have the money," Rumsey
> said. "We have put
> in three new rides this year, (but) nothing of that magnitude."
Does anyone know just how much money they're actually talking about to do
a relocation like this?
-paul asente
to reply, make the return host the same as my last name
Jake Messimer
> the area of
> Idora Park, said he has met with city officials recently about the
> possibility of tearing
> down at least the Wildcat roller coaster, along with its two
> adjacent buildings. He said the
>buildings are a safety hazard because of their rotting, wooden
>floors.
> "A child could die in one of them and you wouldn't know until their
>bones were
> discovered," Rapovy said.
Umm, I just wanted to say that I found this comment a little odd (to say the
least!). Im not exactly sure what he was trying to prove with this
statement. Maybe the church should do a better job of protecting the site
from vandals and unauthorized visitors. Why are they so reluctant to
actually do anything with the site? It's been sitting there rotting away for
15 years! And they haven't done a thing except tear down a perfectly good
junior woodie and let the rest of the park rot. I don't understand what they
are trying to accomplish with the park site.
--
Jake Messimer
Downtown Disney Cast Member
X.DejaVu.SFMM.4.01
Kelly <Kell...@neo.rr.com> wrote in message
news:3AAAC0BF...@neo.rr.com...
Kelly
was the most extreme thing he could say at that time to shake people up. Mount
Calvary Pentecostal Church should have had better control over this property
from the beginning. There were some of us in '98 and '99 that would go in quite
regularly. There was an opening in the fence next to the Wildcat (among other
places) which we would use in the winter. I remember one time, after the church
had been told to secure the place, we gained entry this way. What we found was
hysterical! They had attempeted to pull the fence back down and put 2 tiny
little padlocks on it. Obviously, someone had been there before us and ripped
the fence back up without even disturbing the locks. We never laughed so hard in
our lives!
The church claims to have no money for improvements or security, yet, if you've
seen the broadcasts of their services on Sunday mornings, you know something
isn't right about this. And the cars that are parked around the church building
on a Sunday morning don't look like they belong to a congregation from an inner
city church. Yet they owe over $6,000 in back taxes on this property. It's
almost like Bishop Wagner has been rubbing everyone's noses in the fact that
they own the property and there's nothing anyone can do about it. He once made a
public statement saying that Idora would never be any kind of park again. It
seems he was treated badly there as a child and still holds a grudge. That's a
real Christian man for ya!
I am still working on getting the Icee stand out of there. I have one last shot
that I've taken and if this doesn't pan out, the fate of the last decent
building in there is pretty much sealed.
Now you're all just as confused about the situation as we are here. Maybe we'll
never understand it.
Kelly