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SIX FLAGS GREAT AMERICA
Chicago, Illinois
Six Flags Theme Parks
Park News - (5/30/2026) Huge news from Six Flags Great America as the park has confirmed that for the first time in years the legendary dual-track wooden coaster, American Eagle, will resume true side-by-side racing operations this season! They say that the iconic 1981 wooden coaster hasn’t regularly raced its trains in nearly 10 years. Returning Park President, John Krajnak, noted that bringing back the racing aspect is a primary way they are leaning into pure nostalgia for the park's milestone 50th Anniversary celebration.
Well done Six Flags, so good to see this happening!
(5/9/2026) Look for extra security and a police presence in place at Six Flags Great America today and possibly tomorrow as one of those dreaded “Teen Takeover” events was being hyped as the gathering site for today at some point. The flyer is a bit more scary than usual, as it seems to promote the idea of chaos with statements like, “”IF YOU SCARED STAY HOME” and “BRING THE VIOLENCE”.
Six Flags has been on top of these as they come up, and has mostly been successful at blocking them from happening thus far, with the exception of the fights that broke out at Six Flags St. Louis, which was sold and now under the control of Enchanted Parks who was apparently caught off-guard on their opening day.
(2/12/2026) According to a local news report Six Flags Great America appears to have the Camp Cartoon area of the park, removing the last two flat rides as well, Crazy Bus and Yahoo River, leaving only the Sprockets Rockets family coaster. So it appears that they’re clearly making room for something new, which could very likely be for that new kids area they were once planning for 2026, which seems to have been delayed until 2027 now.
Follow the link to see the site before it was cleared as well as some work taking place on other areas of the park, including to Raging Bull and American Eagle, and the cleared space from the former Go-Karts as well.
(1/15/2026) I had not heard this one before, but apparently a guest at Six Flags Great America has now filed a lawsuit against the theme park company after they report to have fallen while trying to get out of the Superman: Ultimate Flight roller coaster. The story claims that the coaster did not enter the unload area properly, and the rider fell getting out and injuries their knee.
The odd thing is that this is a B&M Flyer style coaster, and the things bothering me here that was not described in the report is exactly what went wrong with the unloading. Unlike B&M Inverted coasters, the Flyers don’t typically feature a platform that rises and lower during loading/unloading, and instead the seats themselves raise up into a flying posture before dispatch and lower back down into a regular inverted seating style posture before unload. There are some oddities, such as restraints that lock around the riders ankles as well, so if a rider tried to get out while a leg was still restrained, that could obviously cause an issue, but I always thought those restraints were connected to the release of the main restraint, so that all would open at the same time, or none would open.
2026 - 50th Anniversary Celebration - (6/5/2026) Six Flags Great America has announced that they are planning to show a documentary called “Along For The Ride” that will detail the park’s 50 years. Look for it to premiere in the park sometime this summer.
I didn’t notice this until now, but the park also updated their logo a few months for for the 50th, and the words “Great America” are now shown in the park’s original red and blue logo style as first used back when it was opened as Marriott’s Great America. I only mention it because Six Flags Magic Mountain has also been getting attention for bringing back the original “Magic Mountain” logo font as well this year. So it will be interesting to see if this happens anywhere else.
(3/19/2026) Six Flags Great America will celebrate the park’s 50th Anniversary this season, with the celebration running from June 20 to August 9th featuring new entertainment, limited-time offerings and special guest experiences. This includes an new nighttime spectacular which will include a stage show, a parade with floats and a light-up drone show in the sky on Friday to Sunday nights. The park will also feature a special “Legacy Museum” guests can tour, special Anniversary merchandise, the return of the Ice Cream Parlor, new entertainment offerings, special food items, photo ops and more.
 2027 - New Kids Area - Under Construction - (8/3/2026) According to a new rumor, there is a chance that the new kids area coming to Six Flags Great America in 2027 just might be Snoopy / Peanuts themed. The Cedar Fair parks were known for having the exclusive use of the Snoopy / Peanuts IP across North America for their theme parks while Six Flags was more focused on the Looney Tunes characters for their parks. Ever since the merger, there has been a bit of a debate on if the merged chain should perhaps focus on just one IP over the other, rather than keep both, but the question no one has been able to answer yet is which IP might prove to be more popular. Certainly, adding Snoopy and pals to a major Six Flags theme park would be a great way to test out which IP seems to perform better with park guests.
Now… one of our sources have pointed out that Six Flags may have been sending out some hints of their own about Snoopy’s potential arrival at the park. A new teaser for #TreeTopAdventure27 on social media posted shows a couple following a map in the park to the Yukon Territory, followed by another bracelet that clearly says “Aug. Sixth”, so it looks like we have an announcement date now set for Thursday. However… there may be another much more hidden clue buried in this video… the background banjo music being played is thought to be the same song used on a PEANUTS clip of Snoopy and his siblings playing in a band. Another very hidden item is if you look closely at the man’s left arm (holding the map), he’s got a green bandanna tied on by the elbow. You can barely see it, but our source believes it looks similar to an item for sale that features Snoopy on it, but to be honest, that may be a bit of a stretch.
There is the inclusion of the Yukon Territory sign as well, which could likely mean that the entire land will be transformed into whatever this new theme is, which could also mean that the Logger’s Run flume ride could be given a makeover as well. Kings Island did this with the park’s old Log Ride by rebranding it as Charlie Brown’s Rushing River Log Ride during that park’s Camp Snoopy expansion. Previously it had also been known as Race for Your Life Charlie Brown, named after the title of a Peanuts animated special where the characters go on a wild river raft race.
(7/30/2026) While we haven’t heard much more from Six Flags Great America about their 2027 plans, a source did reach out to say that a company that has does quite a few ride installs at the park was spotted on-site earlier this summer taking pictures and measurements of the four flat rides in the former Wiggles World area (now Kidsville). The thought now is that maybe they were looking into what it would take to move any of them into the 2027 project area.
We’ll just have to wait and see…
(7/26/2026) The latest video teaser from Six Flags Great America gives us a clear look at the new footers that have been poured for the upcoming new family roller coaster along with the hashtag, #TreeTopAdventure27 along with the message “Nature’s next aviators sprout here”. They added another one of those mis-spelled bracelets hanging from a tree, this one says “SOTERCA” which can be unscrambled into the world “COASTER”.
Previous teasers had bracelets with the word “PAYKPRAL” and “TERITCR”, the first can be turned into PLAY and PARK or PLAYPARK, and the later one can be turned into CRITTER. So… Critter Playpark Coaster? Oh… and the second video also shows off the lifthill of the park’s current Sprocket Rockets family coaster as well, which isn’t too far away from where the new coaster appears to be going on the old go-kart track site, and was the only thing left standing after the rest of Camp Cartoon was removed. So Sprocket Rockets will likely be rethemed to fit into this new territory project as well.
(7/25/2026) A reader sent in a quick photo showing off the green track and brown supports for the park’s rumored 2027 suspended coaster project that are sitting backstage at Six Flags Great America.
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(7/23/2026) While I have no pictures to share, Screamscape has been told that green coaster track with brown support pieces have begun to arrive at Six Flags Great America for the park’s 2027 project. Our source also mentioned that earlier this year there was a large wooden crate spotted in the park on the site of the former Go Kart track that had a tag on it saying, “Six Flags Great America SFC Phoenix”. If true, they believed that the text was in reference to a Vekoma Suspended Family Coaster, and there just happens to be a layout model named Phoenix, the first of which was installed at Deno’s Wonder Wheel park in New York.
So is Six Flags Great America getting ready to add their own Phoenix clone as part of the 2027 addition? We’ll have to wait and see, but in the meantime, has anyone else spotted track and supports for a new coaster at the park?
(7/11/2026) Six Flags Great America has released an odd teaser for whatever they have planned for 2027. It looks something of a “nature reel” kind of feel, but includes a strange bracelet that says “TERITCR” and the text “Where nature roams free #TreeTopAdventure27”.
Previous rumors on Screamscpae indicated that the park was planning to add a new kids themed area of some kind of 2027 that was originally confirmed by the corporate office in 2024 as something they had originally planned to do for the 2026 before it was delayed by a CapEx reduction program in 2025.
We also know that the park removed pretty much all that remained of Camp Cartoon earlier this year and posted a series of nature / national park themed artwork along a wall in the Yukon Territory earlier this year as well. So a new nature themed kids area still seems most likely, though what attractions it could include is still a bit of a mystery. Top Top Adventure kind of sounds like a name you would give a Ropes Course style attraction, but I’m highly doubtful we would see that placed here.
(4/27/2026) Apparently Six Flags Great America has begun teasing some kind of new addition for the 2027 season. In a video interview with Marcus Leshock on WGN about the park, they show off a series of teaser images posted on walls around the park. Jump ahead to about the 1:50 timestamp and you’ll see a bunch of these posted to a wall in the Yukon Territory.
The general theme seems to be some kind of nature / national park style adventure trail vibe, so this may be a fun themed play area for the kiddies. That doesn’t mean it might not have a bunch of rides within, so we’ll have to wait and see.
(8/23/2025) Screamscape sources tell us that the planned new kids area for Six Flags Great America will likely be delayed as part of the announced CapEx reduction for next season, and is now on deck to come in for the 2027 season.
(11/14/2024) As part of an early announcement in late 2024, a press release from Six Flags today mentioned that the intention for the 2026 season for Six Flags Great America was to have a celebration of the park’s 50th Anniversary and ‘debuting a new kids’ area, commemorative events and park enhancements”.
???? - Giga Coaster / Project Rocket - (11/16/2025) The rumor mill is buzzing now about plans that were leaked for a little something called Project Rocket at Six Flags Great America. The leaked plans show off a very large coaster layout that is thought to be a proposal for a GIGA style coaster for the park. As you recall from last month’s update, a Giga Coaster was an option a park survey sent out last month along with other concepts to get feedback on. Obviously a huge roller coaster was going to get a lot of attention from something like that, so now we’re getting another look that includes the location of that project proposal, which places the coaster near the front of the park, essentially running a giant lap around the Superman: Ultimate Flight coaster, out into the parking lot towards Six Flags Drive and back again.
Now, the real question is… just how serious is Six Flags about building a coaster like this and what’s the timeline? A reader sent in the leaks plan image to Screamscape to share and tells us that this initial footprint plan had to be created for the park to make their initial zoning proposal to the city, which sounds about right based on how other big coaster plans have been forces to reveal their hands a little early when showing off the initial plans to the Village of Gurnee.
Of course the exact final layout and such can change between now and whenever Six Flags is ready to make the official announcement, but this does give everyone a good idea of the kind of ride we can expect in principle. If they’re talking about this now, timeline wise, I’m guessing the earliest we could see this happen is 2027, so stay tuned!
Oh… and this is in no way the official ride layout or animation, but fans are already hard at work creating their own interpretation of what the ride could be like online. This one is a good example, where the experience itself looks kind of like a cross between Fury 325 (Carowinds) and Orion (Kings Island), offering a tall Giga coaster experience that may be a little shorter than the fans were hoping for, leaving Fury 325 safely in place as the king of the Giga Coasters.
???? - New Attraction Guest Survey Concepts - (10/18/2025) Six Flags has begun sending out surveys to select guests to get feedback about possible future addition concepts that may be in the works. Keep in mind that not every concept they pitch for any given park may actually be intended for that particular park, as sometimes the chains will pitch ride concepts to other markets as well to gain some broader feedback on certain concepts. With that said… let’s dig into what is currently being pitched for the various parks.
The survey sent out to Six Flags Great America guests has suggested ideas such as a new “Family Thrill Launch Coaster” suitable for the younger guests as well as the whole family that would include some “themed storytelling, immersive elements” and more. So this isn’t a kiddie ride, and if they tap Vekoma for something like this, then anything remotely like Big Bear Mountain that was added to Dollywood last year would be a big winner at just about any park they would want to bring it to.
Another concept pitched for Six Flags Great America would have likely been right at home inside the park’s former IMAX / Pictorum theater building which was demolished to make way for Maxx Force a few years ago. So it seems Six Flags is asking guests how they feel about adding a Flying Theater to the park. This may also be due to the popularity of the great “Flyover” Flying Theater ride that was just added to Chicago’s Navy Pier in 2024.
While the first two concepts are clearly trying to find a way to bring more families to the park, the last concept is for thrill seekers, as they propose a Giga Coaster concept.
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