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COTA Land
Austin, Texas
OPENING IN 2025
 Park News - (11/28/2024) While we’re still aways out from the opening of the COTALand theme park, the Circuit of the Americas did open a new attraction this week, a new race themed outdoor mini-golf course.
The new attraction is open just in time for guests to experience along with the Peppermint Parkway drive-through christmas light experience, open now through Dec. 29th.
(10/8/2024) COTALand's Circuit Breaker (Vekoma Tilt Coaster) Goes Vertical
(9/28/2024) An interview with the local news takes time to discuss the plans to build COTALand over at the Circuit of the Americas racetrack in Austin. We get some great shots of the new Palindrome coaster has was just installed over the past several weeks, while they discuss the financial plans to develop the park. It is said that they’ve raised $40 million out of a targeted $65 million goal to build the park, which they hope to have ready to open sometime in 2025.
(7/2/2024) Palindrome Update
(6/30/2024) Palindrome Track Install Complete
(2/2/2024) The video says it all... with an incredible look at the new train design for Circuit Breaker that not only looks cool... but sounds cool too.
(1/29/2024) After much silence, a long awaited update about COTALAND was issued during the ACE South Central Winterfest event. According to a presentation from Matt Hughey, the plan is now officially to open COTALAND in 2025. Construction is proceeding now on Palindrome, which they hope to be complete by April or May, then crews will soon begin work installing Circuit Breaker.
Some pictures of the new train for Circuit Breaker were also shown, revealing that it will have on-board audio as well as on-board lighting effects.
(1/7/2024) A reader was able to fly their drone near COTALAND and snapped up a great image of all the supports and track pieces on site for the future Circuit Breaker (Vekoma TILT) coaster. I’m really hoping we start to see some vertical construction photos of this and Palindrome this year.
(12/29/2023) I’m not sure how long this clip may stay up, but Midway Mayhem did post a quick reel showing off black Circuit Breaker track now sitting on site at COTALAND. I knew we saw much of this sitting on site in another post elsewhere about a month ago, so nothing appears to have vertical yet for this, but I’d imagine they would build the previously announced Palindrome coaster first anyway.
Now if only COTALAND would get on the social-media ball and start posting updates all around about what is going on, that would certainly be appreciated by everyone.
(11/26/2023) Are things finally starting to move forward at the proposed COTALAND park in Austin? We’ve heard that work preparing footers for the park’s Palindrome coaster (Gerstlauer Infinity Coaster) has begun after a prolonged delay, with the track pieces having been on site for some time. Meanwhile a post on facebook is apparently showing off track and support segments arriving for Circuit Breaker, the park’s Vekoma Tilt Coaster. The only odd thing is that while the supports still appear to be white, the concept ride’s former red track shown in the concept art has now been replaced by all black track, based on what has arrived.
(7/12/2023) According to this article the pieces of a new roller coaster along with other rides lie scattered around the parking lots at the Circuit of the Americas as part of the planned COTALand amusement park. Unfortunately it was confirmed that COTALand won’t be ready to open in 2023, with delays in the fabrication process for several major attractions to blame. Elsewhere rumors have blamed some of the delay on permitting issues as well, but at this time there seems to be no solid timeline as to when the park might be ready to open.
I imagine we won’t have a better idea until we start to see the majority of the rides go vertical.
(5/6/2023) After a bit of a silence, the local news reports that a new site plan has been filed with the city of Austin for “COTA Land” for review. There are few details about the 21-acre park beyond that, other than saying it will be located near turns 19 and 20 of the race track and will include about 30 rides, including three roller coasters. This would include the current Texas Wildcat that is already operational on the property as well as the previously announced Circuit Breaker and Palindrome coaster projects.
With the plans now filed with the city, hopefully upon approval work will begin to be fast tracked to get some of the new rides and attractions already on site installed and running.
2022?? - Skyblazer - DELAYED - (11/17/21) According to a release from US Thrill Rides, they have sold their first Skyblazer attraction, which will be going to Austin, Texas in the Circuit of the Americas (COTA) amusement area. The Skyblazer will hoist 18 riders at a time into the sky before dropping them 200 feet into the massive swing arch. Look for the Skyblazer to be ready to open in Spring 2022.
?? - Palindrome - (7/2/2024) Screamscape has heard that COTALand is expecting to start the testing process on their new Palindrome roller coaster as early as mid-July if everything goes as planned.
(6/30/2024) More good news for the new COTAland park, as the track install for the new Palindrome shuttle coaster has now been completed. Now, we still don’t have a solid date as to when the COTAland park project is expected to be complete, I’m told that the Circuit of the Americas track has previously opened their rides to guests attending the fall F1 race, which is slated for October 18-20, 2024 this year.
With the track now complete we can only assume they will be finalizing the installation and setup of the electronics, sensors and ride computer just ahead of ride testing. So if everything goes smoothly… it isn’t beyond thinking that there may be a chance Palindrome might be ready in time for the October race.
(6/14/2024) The new Palindrome roller coaster is being installed at a very rapid pace at COTALand in Texas. Some fantastic photos of the progress have been posted to their Facebook page this week.
(9/30/2023) At long last, construction on the new Palindrome coaster at COTALand is now under way!
(10/24/22) Just posted to Facebook the other day, COTALAND was seen showing off the new trains for their Palindrome coaster from Gerstlauer. While I haven’t see any kind of construction footage from the site for the coaster, you can see lots of support pieces are also on site in the background of the photos.
(11/18/21) The mystery Gerstlauer Infinity coaster has been announced as Palindrome, and it will be a unique looking shuttle coaster experience coming to COTALand in Austin by late 2022. Based on the animation, the coaster would send cars up a vertical lift hill and drop through into a course that ends with a large spike, before rolling backwards through the entire course, coming to a stop again rolling backwards up the first drop and into a brake zone / track switch at the bottom that would send the cars back to the station. Another interesting thing is that the coaster will fly over (inverted) the main road into the park area, so it will definitely be a showpiece for COTALand.
It is interesting to go from a place that I’ve never even heard of, to a place that is adding some major new attractions. This will be a place to keep an eye on going forward and the plan is to have the coaster up and running in time for the Formula 1 race next year. Check out the animation for yourself below.
???? - Circuit Breaker - DELAYED - (10/8/2024) New pictures from COTALand show that the tower and some of the track for the tilting first drop on Circuit Breaker (Vekoma Tilt Coaster) have now been installed, which you can see below. I teased on social media about how there might be a “Race” to see who can open their Tilt Coaster first, the reality is that Cedar Point’s ride (Siren’s Curse) is virtually guaranteed to open first, even though they haven’t even started vertical construction yet.
The main reason is that COTALand is not set to open in early 2025, and isn’t really expected to be ready to open until maybe late 2025 under the best of circumstances. There are a number of items delaying the progress and opening of any new rides at the Austin, Texas location that just don’t have an easy solution right now.
Regardless, I’m happy to see the great progress the construction crews at now making at putting up the park’s two new roller coasters ahead of the opening.
(12/10/2022) Some new concept art I haven't seen before showing off the new Circuit Breaker coaster (Vekoma Tilt Coaster 2.0) concept coming to COTALAND in late 2023 can be found at Blooloop this week, including an aerial view of the whole layout.
2023 will be a big year for Vekoma, as the company will open three high profile rides in North America (Big Bear Mountain at Dollywood, Tron Lightcycle/Run at Disney’s Magic Kingdom and Circuit Breaker) as well as a number of bit name international projects at parks like Hong Kong Disneyland (Wandering Oaken’s), Liseberg (Luna), Furuvik (Lightning), three coasters at Energylandia and a number of new coasters to various Fantawild parks opening in China.
(11/20/22) Circuit of the Americas has revealed the promotional video for their new Circuit Breaker roller coaster project that will bring the very first Vekoma Tilt-Coaster to North America.
(4/2/22) COTALand is at it again and just surprised everyone with the announcement of the first Vekoma Tilt Coaster coming to North America with a custom layout. Coming in 2023, COTALand is calling this coaster Circuit Breaker and it will feature two trenches, four inversions and a couple of exciting looking pops of airtime along the way.
The first Vekoma Tilt Coaster design was called Gravity Max and it opened way back in 2002 at Discovery World in Taiwan. The concept never caught on at the time and Vekoma never made another one until now.
Now, you may be thinking you’ve seen pictures of a few new ones in China that have opened over the past 6 years, including a dueling version (Battle of Jungle King) but all of those are actually clones of the Vekoma concept created by Chinese roller coaster maker, Jinma Rides, also known in the industry as Golden Horse. If you’ve heard of “Golden Horse” before, the company has become well known in the industry for creating “knock-offs” of various popular coaster designs in China.
So Circuit Breaker will be the first time Vekoma has returned to the concept and based on the track design and that incredible looking first inversion element, they are now adding their modern and fun looking design concepts to the mix in order to revive the Tilt Coaster concept for a new generation.
(1/24/22) COTAland dropped a teaser at the ACE Winterfest event regarding their future plans. Apparently the attraction has another coaster in development that will open in the Fall of 2023 and will be “Americas First and only ______ Coaster.”
So fill in the blank with whatever you can imagine. The rumors are already running a bit crazy with what it could be, so allow me to add my own two-cents into the mix. Considering they have already established a relationship with Ride Entertainment and Gerstlauer to provide their first roller coaster, I wouldn’t be surprised if they return to that source for their second coaster. Perhaps following up Palindrome with some kind of new Launched coaster. My second hunch looks more to the idea of bringing some kind of “first” coaster design to America that does not already exist, and if we go with something more compact and budget friendly, my second hunch may be to build America’s first “Double Heart” coaster from Zamperla.
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