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Attraction / Development News - (10/30/2024) According to the latest updates, construction has now stalled out completely on the $2.5 billion American Heartland Theme Park project previously announced for Oklahoma. In fact, apparently the project is now officially delayed for at least the next three years by a series of “temporary challenges”.
    Screamscape readers will recall that I had high doubts about this project appearing at all when they announced that the first phase was not to be the theme park, but instead they just wanted to build an RV Park, and claimed that the highly promoted theme park would happen about three years later. Since then the group has had construction liens filed against them for non-payment of the early work that had started on the RV park.
 
    (9/5/2024) Things are not going smoothly with the proposed American Heartland Theme Park project it seems. I can’t say that I’m surprised, as the proposal was a bit ambitious for something they wanted to open by 2026. In our last update back in May 2024, it was reported that design firm, FORREC, had filed a $5.5 million lien against the developer over not being paid for their work to design and create the plans for the proposed park.
    This week the local news has confirmed that all work on the project has been halted due to non-payment issues, with Crossland Construction now filing their own $350,000+ lein against against developer, Mansion Entertainment Group and OGB Holdings for non-payment. Meanwhile they have yet to resolve the lein filed previously by FORREC, so the bills are now stacking-up.
 
    (5/12/2024) Things just took a sour turn with the proposed American Heartland Theme Park project. According to news reports Canadian theme park design firm, FORREC, has now filed for a $5.5 million lien over not being paid for “design work and planning” by the proposed theme park group.
    This isn’t the end-all of things for American Heartland by any means, as liens of this nature are not unheard of. According to a statement issued to the local news from Mansion Entertainment Group, they claim their policy is to “not to pay for work until it has been submitted and a comprehensive review of the work has been performed. ” This review has not yet been scheduled and they do plan to “rectify this situation as soon as possible.”
 
    (2/18/2024) A couple of small updates came out this week for the proposed American Heartland theme park project. They are narrowing down the site for the new park as being ‘near’ the town of Vinita, Oklahoma, with a hope that it could be open by 2026. Of course, since they haven’t even started on it yet, that’s a lot of work to get done in a short period of time, so we’ll have to wait and see.
    The other bit of news was the announcement that an agreement has been formed with PepsiCo to be the exclusive soft drink provider for the resort.
 
    (10/21/2023) According to an official update the proposed American Heartland project in Oklahoma has confirmed that they will break ground on the first phase of the project on October 30th. Before you get too excited, this isn’t for the actual theme park, but just for the Three Ponies RV Park & Campground project.
    Once this is done, let’s hope they follow through and begin work on the theme park next.

 
    (9/17/2023) According to a local news update, things are moving forward on that American Heartland theme park project. According to the new update, town leader in Vinita say that a groundbreaking ceremony on the $2 billion project is “imminent” and that construction jobs are already being fills for the project. However… remember what I reported before… the first phase of the project is to build the planned RV Park part of the project, long before they begin work on the theme park and the rest of the resort, which to me sounds more like the old saying about putting the cart in front of the horse, instead of the other way around.
    Either way, it sounds like they should be some kind of activity starting up before the end of the year.
 
    (7/21/2023) File this under the “I’ll believe it when I see it” category, but a massive new theme park project called American Heartland was announced to be in the works for Oklahoma. According to the news bits, they would like to open a 125-acre theme park as early as 2026 along Route 66 near “Vinita” in NorthEast Oklahoma.
    The $2+ billion plan includes the construction of a theme park with six themed lands (Great Plains, Bayou Bay, Big Timber Falls, Stony Point Harbor, Liberty Village and Electropolis) that will be full of rides and attractions. Plans are also said to be in place to build a 300-room hotel with an indoor waterpark as well as a 30-acre Campground & RV Park.
    What sounds a bit odd is that the RV Park is actually the first thing slated to open, possibly in Spring 2025, at least a year ahead of the theme park. This seems contrary to most plans, where the main attraction would open first and then once successful, then later resorts can be added to make it a multi-day destination. By starting with the campground/RV park first, it just makes me worry that the true focus may be on the RV park, and that the theme park itself could never get built.
    They did come up with a nice little model of the proposed theme park itself however, showcasing a lot of nice theming and various attractions. So check it out below.