Silver Dollar City opens $10M coaster to public

Branson’s Silver Dollar City theme park today opened its 2013 season today with the debut of its new $10 million wooden roller coaster, Outlaw Run.

The park’s biggest investment in a single ride in the past decade, Outlaw Run is designed to reach a top speed of 68 miles per hour and rise more than 16 stories before dropping riders 162 feet at an 81-degree angle. Constructed by Hayden, Idaho-based Rocky Mountain Construction Group, Outlaw Run spans 6 acres and was built with 800,000 pounds of steel, 500,000 feet of lumber, 4.4 million pounds of concrete and 5.6 miles of welding, according to Springfield Business Journal archives.

Spokeswoman Casey Freeland said the park expects an additional 70,000 people this season. Average year-long attendance for the 55-acre park is about 2 million.

“We pushed to take the classic wood coaster to a place it’s never been before by applying modern technology and techniques to traditional wood coaster building methods,” said Brad Thomas, senior vice president of Silver Dollar City Attractions, in a news release.

According to the release, the ride:

• includes 2,937 feet of track;
• has nine locations for airtime;
• is 1 minute and 27 seconds long;
• has the world’s only 720-degree barrel roll on a wooden coaster;
• has two trains, with room for 24 passengers apiece; and
• is the world’s only wooden coaster to flip upside down.

Designed to utilize the natural landscape, two or more trees were planted for every one removed during construction.

SDC last opened steel coaster Powder Keg: A Blast Into The Wilderness in March 2005 –for $10 million – a conversion of former coaster Buzzsaw Falls. The following March, the theme park unveiled The Grand Exposition, an $8 million, two-acre expansion modeled after World’s Fairs in St. Louis, Chicago and Philadelphia.

Founded May 1, 1960, SDC is owned, operated and managed by Herschend Family Entertainment Corp., which employs nearly 2,000 people in the Branson area and owns, operates or partners in 26 entertainment, tourism and hospitality properties in 10 states, according to BransonSilverDollarCity.com.