Defunctland: The Demolition of Six Flags Astroworld
Vložit
- čas přidán 30. 05. 2018
- GO SUPPORT MARC DURKEE AND HIS MUSIC!
/ darcmurkee
Text-Based Sources:
scholarworks.sfasu.edu/cgi/vi...
www.dafe.org/articles/darkride...
Buy Defunctland T-Shirts:
teespring.com/stores/defunctland
Donate on Patreon:
/ defunctland
In time for its 50th Birthday, Defunctland takes a deep dive into Houston's much beloved former theme park, Six Flags Astroworld.
Follow Defunctland on Social Media:
Twitter: / defunctland
Facebook: / defunctland
Defunctland Subreddit: / defunctland
For more great content, visit defunctland.com
Get in touch with Defunctland: contact@defunctland.com
Hey everyone! I hope you liked the video! Make sure to go check out Marc’s channel on the description. He made the cover for the credits and he is incredibly talented! I will be updating the description with some of my text based sources soon. Have a great week!
Defunctland TRAVIS SCOTT IS ON ALBUM MODE
(this is related to Astroworld)
I AM IN LOVE WITH THE INTROS. ❤ i do miss the brad pitt cameos tho
You say at 22:20 that the Astrodome remains unused and abandoned, but Wikipedia says that parts of it have been demolished and that it is currently the subject of a revitalization project.
I subbed!
You should do a Defunctland on the Excelsior Amusement Park that used to be in Excelsior, Minnesota on the shore of Lake Minnetonka. It had a roller coaster and a bunch of other rides. The park is long gong, but one of the rides, a carousel that was at the park from the very beginning in 1925, is still in use at Valleyfair Amusement Park in Shakopee, Minnesota. The park had a dance hall, too, that hosted both the Rolling Stones and the Beach Boys. Apparently the Beach Boys were booked when they were still unheard of, but by the time their performance date rolled around they had the number one record in the country. The story goes that so many people showed up for the show that the roller coaster was damaged from people climbing on it.
I like how the backstory for most of these parks is "a rich guy visited Disneyland and was so impressed he wanted to make his own".
They don't make rich guys like they used to.
Nowadays it's just "a rich guy saw other rich guys getting richer by hoarding money and paying people that work for them in bread crusts so he decided to do the same."
Dalton Kraft No they don't, my town had plenty of 'pioneers' in that respect, but the end of the Industrial Revolution brought an end to those prospects.
And how nearly every one of those parks ended up as a generic coaster park anyway.
Pocket Fluff Productions Nothing generic about Astroworld's coaster lineup. Especially 15 years ago.
I like how they said “ increasingly rude guests “ was a reason for closing . Everything would be closed if that was a valid reason lol.
They meant gangs and lowlifes. Six flags in NJ attracted a lot of gangs for a while years back.
@@sup_monica3597 after Katrina things temporarily changed in Houston
w w They announced its closing a couple of months before Katrina! The irony though!
Whats crazy is this is extremely accurate! I didn’t know that season pass prices decreased! Besides the debt though, the park always had crazy employees! The 2000’s were great there! Too many fights though! I never heard of anything else horrible besides that fact. I miss Astroworld!
To be fair, everything is kinda closed at the moment unfortunately.
Lesson learned: do not name anything "Astroworld" it never ends well
BAHAHAHAHA
Unfortunately 🥲
Oh my god 😭😭
i mean astroworld was the 2nd best trap album of 2018 so thats 1 thing i guess
Whats the #1 ?
I love how so many of these stories end with "Increasingly profit oriented corporate heads gutted all artistic and creative value while trying to buy more and more before realizing this was unsustainable and have to close."
I feel like there's maybe a recurring lesson that could be found here...
That's what Mitt Romney does, buys businesses and guts them. Leaves folks out of jobs
Hey it’s space mountain de la terre à la lune and it’s predecessors, gutted of artistic merit for profits
Good and evil right and wrong we are at war and its a battle of souls... same people different timeline diff place... Looper
@@flurpoid Because aggressive expansion boosts the share price. Money is all these people care about.
I think the lesson is next time hire Walt Disney's Corporate heads
Tbh that wasn’t very Sicko Mode of Six Flags
Baconpancake00 IM SCREAMING
glaze WHY ARE YOU SCREAMING
Anti Vax Mom CAUSE THAT WAS FUNNY
andioop
@@amorseraph stop
"Poor guest-to-monster relations" is my favorite phrase of the whole month, I think.
I agree! lol
I just love that they had an Abominable Snowman before Disney, but theirs was some guy in a fursuit going "RAR".
I'll venture a guess that some riders would throw garbage at him.
I think thats the #1 cause of divorce these days
xingcat up there with "fireworks, clowns and torture devices" and "they forgot to ask France"
Who else is here with little-to-no interest in theme parks but got stuck in a CZcams loop of this guy's videos because he made you genuinely interested in theme parks?
Damn, I thought I was the only one. They're just so Interesting-
more than little
There are 3 of you
make it 4
Yep.
I was there on the last day. I was just a kid. I cried so much that day. I finally had the courage to ride the rides I was scared of because it was my last chance. The Viper was always my favorite.
Viper was my first rollercoaster. Loved it as well.
The viper was the least scary of the scary rides and that’s where I drew the line 😄
Ah, the Viper. My first and last foster ride. 😂
@@MsJmb1980 Same here, I was 10 years old or so. Rode it with my father.
That last year I made sure to ride every ride that was operable. He was right about the cheap babysitting thing. I can’t remember ever going with my mother or father lol.
Cool! I wasn't expecting to be in this video. But yep, there I am at 15:05 (Batman the Escape) the guy in bright colors on the left in the first row. I had to ride the coaster 27 times in a row for different camera shots. I wasn't even one of the paid actors. I was an extra, just like all the people sitting behind me (employees of the park). While I was having to do the extra shots, everyone else were getting their free Batman t-shirts (their payment for participating). BTW, the three sitting next to me in seats 2, 3, and 4 are the actors who got paid whatever for the commercial.
In case you're wondering, I worked for Astroworld for 11 years total (86-88, 91-93, 01-05) and was there on September 12th, 2005 when everyone at the park got the news of the closing. A sad day that was. No one knew it was coming....
As a child, I remember my parents taking me to Astroworld in the late 90s/early 00s and loving every second of it. Thank you for the work you put in that made families like mine so happy :)
I'm being honest idk if I would ride a coaster 27 times for a batman shirt lol
@Crazy_Sarah Da Fangirl if I'm being honest I prob would also lol
Matt The Awesomer I rode Grease Lighting 32 times in a row. It paid to come on the week days. Not so crowed. I miss them days!
So they announced that the park would not reopen for the next season on or after the same day the park closed for the last day of the 2005 season?
shout out to travis scott for demolishing astroworld a second time in 2021
Yo mama
A true role model and poster boy to be admired and emulated.
Came here being just barely aware of what Astroworld was, and now I'm crying over a closed theme park I never even attended??
Defunctland has a way of doing that to you. And me. And everyone.
I know what you mean. I was in Houston for 6 months in 1971, and was able to go there 3 times! When I heard of its demise, I felt devastated.
Funny how all the cited reasons for closing the park were basically "we stopped reinvesting and the park got bad 😔"
God forbid there should be anything left in Houston to attract visitors.
There is, but it sucks
Not true - hurricanes and natural disasters occurring in OTHER PLACES drive plenty of "visitors" (refugees) to Houston, yuk, yuk!
We still have the Downtown Aquarium, the Theater District and the Astrodome itself, but I agree. We lost a piece of our identity when Astroworld was demolished
@@prairiewolfedogg calm down caveman
@@cynco61 hehe, it is so easy to be a caveman online :)
This really tugged at my heart.
The next time a car with a Texas plate cuts me off, or is a jerky driver, I'll blame it on the pain of losing Astroworld. I'd be bitter too.
im from texas and i can confirm this is true
We all would. What Premiere did was SCUMMY. Guess that's Corporate greed for ya tho...
Yep... quite accurate my friend
I teared up and I’ve never even been to Texas! Definitely on the bucket list though!
@@comettamer They had little choice. If like Atlanta, it was a scary hell hole. In 2018, the company settled $35 million lawsuit from kid beaten by gang outside the gates.
Another excellent video. It's sad that the name Astroworld is now synonymous with a misguided music festival that took the lives of many fans.
Travis Scott was a really big fan of this park growing up as a kid. The now infamous concert was held at the Southern Star Amphitheater, located in the now defunct, you guess it, six flags astroworld.
@@sweatyskinfolds1385 came here to see if anyone pointed out that this was probably the inspiration for Travis’s original “Astroworld” album, tour and now infamous concert. Even the text is very similar.
@@drewgriffing7447 we been knowing that since 2017
Yeah. Travis Scott sucks anyway, because he played at the Super Bowl instead of Sweet Victory.
@@drewgriffing7447 “even the text is very similar” bro he literally named it after the theme park it isn’t rocket science 💀
As a Texan and and someone that worked at toys r us, I've learned that corporate greed ruins everything
Hey there fellow Texan! Do you think that this Hofheinz is any relation to the car dealership in DFW? (Edit: misplaced question mark)
Well said! Same goes for me as a Northerner...NASCAR, some of favorite video games, and Toys R Us all are now not the same anymore cause of the damn suits
I think Houston needs another theme park. Maybe they'll get another one eventually
as a wisconsinite who worked at toys r us, i can concur
Best theme park trip of my life was when 6 of us paid in advance for a weekend at Astroworld around 1990. As we drove there early in the morning (2 1/2 hour drive), the sky opened up and it rained so hard that we could only drive about 30 mph on the interstate. We got to the motel and our hearts sunk because all of Houston was scheduled for heavy rains the whole weekend. We decided to at least go there and walk around since we had already paid for it. When we arrived about 2 hours after the park opened, we were the 6th car in the parking lot. Apparently all the locals saw the weather report and stayed away. After about an hour or so, the rain stopped and we were able to walk right on the rides. Absolutely no lines! The whole day was like that. Every now and then it would sprinkle, but we needed the break because we were so tired of riding so many attractions in such a short time.
The entire day there were absolutely no more than 50 guests in the park. Many times our group would be the only people in a given section. It was wonderful. Eventually we got to know a lot of the other guests by name because we saw them so much. We were so exhausted so we slept in the next morning. The next day it was also forecast for rain, but not as bad as Saturday. We parked in the second row of parking, but still there were no more than 250 people in the whole park. What a memory! I was so upset when they suddenly closed down, because I had been there many times as a kid starting in the 70s.
Out of all the times I went as a kid, I remember this happening once. I have no idea what year it was but early 90s is probably about right. We went in despite the rain.. I remember getting to ride the batman ride in under 10 minutes. Just racing through the queue. I did the cyclone 3 times in a row lol. It was the best visit ever.
I grew up going in the early 2000s, and this happened to us once. We lived near Beaumont so it took about 2 hours to get there. My sister rode serial thriller about 12 times in a row with no line. Best day ever
I had a similar experience in 1997, no lines and great fun!
Nice story, sounds made up...
That sounds magical. I had a similar experience at a local amusement park called Lagoon in Utah. Usually the place is packed, being the only major non-corporate park in the upper part of the state. But after the rain subsided, it was a nice, pleasantly cool day.
Stop making me cry over places I've never been
Spencer Valek Welcome to my world.
Same here
I have a friend who lived in Houston, and it's painful for him to come back to Houston after having lived in Japan for over a decade now.
fr i started crying
Same So saddd
watched this one with my mom who went to Astroworld as a kid in the 70s/80s, she pointed to the Cyclone and said, "That's the one I almost died on!"
As a vendor for another Six Flags park, I saw the Premiere Parks takeover from a slightly different point of view. It's absolutely disgusting what they did to the original chain. I avoid them like the plague they are, now.
Some six flags park are treated better than others such as great adventure fiesta Texas magic montain and great America
@@staringcorgi6475 Fiesta Texas sucks lol
Could you give us some details? My regional park is Six Flags New England, and it has my absolute favorite coaster ever, so I’d like to know what they did.
Six Flags Over Texas has most, if not all the best rides now. Some rides from Astroworld were moved there. I'd give them a chance.
@@kyber452, over Texas is my local park. Just came back from Fiesta Texas last weekend. I feel it’s superior but that could be me visiting SFOT at least 50 times lol
I was there the last day it was open. I remember everybody stuck around until the very last hour yelling "Hell No! We won't go!" and children and adults alike crying as they had to escorted through the exit gate. To this day, the people of Houston are still sad and bitter about the loss of Astroworld
You can thank Kieran Burke and his HARD Right Republicans for tearing it down and selling it off just to make a quick profit.
Penelope Petite Yeah, I can only imagine how deeply pissed off and deeply hurt folks were on closing day. I got relatives across the way over in Dickinson and League City and they attended Astroworld FAITHFULLY!!!!
I SURE wish I could've gone before SORRY ASS Kieran Burke and Premier Parks decided to demolish Astroworld!!!
BUT.........too late now!!!!😟
Typical miserable dinosaurs love to bring everyone down along with them. And it ended up not being worth the $$$. So sad.
Well, Houston ran his ass out of the City and Town. Because he cost us $75 Million Operating Losses.
Burke was a Tom Delay Lobbyist anyway, Something should have told Warner Bros that selling off Six Flags to Premier was a BAD idea.
people got stuck in rides everytime I went, there wasn't a visit were people didn't get stuck in a ride because it broke.
You forgot to mention the effect of hurricane Katrina. The loss of the New Orleans Six Flags park really hurt the corporation when it was already down. This accelerated their desire to liquidate a park in another hurricane zone.
Kieran Burke wanted to get rich by selling the land, only to get fired because after it was sold Six Flags didn't receive as much as Burke told them they would get. Greed is a dangerous thing!
I live in New Orleans and pass Jazzland (six flags) every single time I go to school. It’s literally just sitting there collecting dust, it’s like a ghost town
Astroworld weathered a few hurricanes in its time. It wasn't as poorly placed as Jazzland.
@@selanryn5849 Yes, I head they had to repair the Texas Cyclone and delay it's opening because of a hurricane in 1980.
No that's not true, Six Flags was actually going to dump New Orleans just like they ended up doing with Kentucky Kingdom. The only difference is the hurricane happened first. Six Flags had problems way beyond New Orleans.
Well, that snapshot of an article on Travis Scott and AstroWorld at the 22:46 mark certainly hasn't aged well. Anyways, great video as always.
still one of the greatest hip hop albums ever, and its tour was top tier despite the unfortunate final show
@@christianstoneroussesu4584 You mean the one where Travis Scott was responsible for encouraging mobs of people to murder each other and did not stop the show to help his own fans?
@@jalapeno1119 we all know what happened. doesnt change the fact that it was a massively popular and successful tour from an all time great album
@@jalapeno1119 not even what happened.
@@jalapeno1119 not only is that not what happened but the tour ended years before the tragedy
I remember riding the sled and it breaking down in the cold room, we nearly froze to death but the abdominal snowman kept us entertained.
Was the snowman bit cold?
Houston famously had "the worst weather of any city in America", and I believe they pioneered OUTDOOR air conditioning there. Otherwise, visitors would be dropping like flies.
Several of the things I saw in Astroworld in 1971 were later used in the expansion of Hershey Park (in Hershey, PA) in the mid-late 70s.
I love how each episode has a completely unique intro.
A unique and incredibly well made intro, at that!
@@CJdude22 Agreed, the presentation in these videos is really great
“Poor guest to monster relations” ...sounds like me visiting the in-laws
The Ambivalent PS2 Bloke 😂😂😂
R.I.P. AstroWorld….you gave my friends and I some great memories from 85’ to 88’. My first roller coasters….Excalibur and Texas Cyclone. And my first concert… Depeche Mode 88’!! If only I could be a teen again…I’d do it all over! Thank you
Sorry to hear that was your first concert.
@@AndrewBarsky there’s no reason to be a dick, man :/
@@AndrewBarsky WHY?? DEPCHE MODE is an ICONIC, Legendary Band; Many would give an arm and a leg to see them in 88'🥰
@@AndrewBarsky Justin Bieber was your first concert btch
I remember when that section was Country Fair instead of Nottingham. Excalibur was called Dexter Frebish Electric Roller Ride. Good times.
That ending eulogy made me feel sad about AstroWorld and I never even went there
Good. You never want to return again.
"Poor guest-to-monster relations..." I'm dying!
What does that even mean?
@@Wow-cr2ll They did not like the yeti in the mountain ride
@@Wow-cr2ll that’s why it’s funny, we don’t know
The Abominable Snowman would first appear in a surprise "pop-up" location and yell at guests to scare them. The cars then took a dip & turn and then braked for a slow crawl through the cold Room (we called it the Freezer Cave lol 60º to 65ºF air; felt awesome on hot Houston days). The Snowman had a passage that would allow him to reappear in the Cave and yell/taunt the guests. Soon guests started throwing objects & trash at the monster and, because of the slow-moving section, a few guests got out of the cars and threw some fists. Do you know what it's like when the Snowman has to finish his shift with a black eye? Lackluster performance ensues, "raaar . . . . sons-of-bitches." :-O
That intro was absolutely incredible.
Right?! If ya know ya know.
Hi Max Box, love your videos man
He has become a pro at these intros
Makes me want to give him a fist full of dollars for that great intro.
@@ajjackson1526 What would it take for a few dollars more?
It is very unfortunate this park closed due to corporate greed, it was one of the top six flags parks. Hopefully houston gets a new theme park soon
Houston Native here: yeah it was just really disappointing. We all loved it, and we want it too return, but we all saw the writing on the walls. Like you said it was clear the company had abandoned it to disrepair. 😭
Man, I never knew how heartbreaking the story of Astroworld was. I genuinely feel bad for the people in that area because a shitty company with shitty management deprived them of a theme park for essentially no reason. Another great episode, thank you.
the company failed and was bought out
Six Flags is pretty awesome now.
Yeah, not gonna lie. Seeing the vid was more painful than I thought. H-Town (Houston) local.
TheRealConcertKing as a teen when it closed I was really sad. Loved that place.
I am right there with you. It was great to see the rides in action again.
The Texan Defunctland subscriber dilemma: when you see this notification, you're so excited, but as you watch the video you realize you're still not over the heartbreak...
You already know...
Honestly, I'm from Canada and I feel the devestation from here.
I moved away from the Houston area in 2000 and last visited the park in April 2005, a few months before the decision to close it was made. I was so glad that I didn't know that visit would be my last ever, it would have been awful. I want to cry now after watching this video :'(
I ain’t that sad! We still have six flags over Texas! In the wonderful city of Arlington! ;)
FOR REAL, I WAS BORN IN TX and I still can't get over them tearing down the park of my childhood.
I worked there for three seasons in the late 70s. The pay, as you might imagine, was dismal, but to this day, it's still by far the most fun I ever had getting paid.
I was telling my family about how I've been watching these videos and mentioned Astroworld, and apparently we've been to Astroworld. It makes sense, as we lived nearby when I was a small child, but to think I got to go to this park but can't remember and can never go again has left me feeling a ways. I may not remember it, but there's an Astroworld-sized hole in my heart now.
This was so sad. Astroworld was so beautiful and it just went out like a light, ayy, yeah, like a light, ayy, yeah, like a light, ayy, slept through the night, ayy, knocked for the flight, ayy
WaddleBuff” haw haw anime is so underrated!”-Nelson Muntz
It's slept through the flight and knocked for the night dummy
Oh my gosh💀💀
That's literally all of his songs...just sound effects garbage
Rlly😂
This was probably the most depressing episode of the Defunctland series. Nicely done!!
The Space Mountain episode truly bummed me out.
A lot of comments talk about how Astroworld is just the Travis Scott festival now and those are actually connected.
Travis Scott’s Astroworld album was called that because he visited six flags astroworld as a kid often and was really fond of it.
Also I’m pretty sure the infamous event was held at the defunct Astroworld
wasn't held at the NRG Park?
current me if i'm wrong
The festival WAS NOT (nor had ever been) held at the defunct Astroworld grounds
@@brandyeduncan7285 Well yeah, cuz the original grounds is a giant open space. They held it as close to OG Astroworld as they could, IE, right across the street.
*it's not an open space
It's overflow parking for the rodeo.
CURSED LAND
Always a shame when a perfectly nice theme park gets screwed over by a new, incompetent company.
Of course.
Your vids make me feel nostalgic for eras I was never apart of
I think that's what the internet is really for.
It makes me nostalgic to a time *and* place I’ve never been
This is so true
i think it's rather because you still grew up consuming content from those eras like old movies etc because when they weren't that old yet they were basically everywhere so you'll have experienced those eras second hand to some extent growing up
I felt the same watching this video. It was clear that since things like scary roller coasters and stuff we take for granted today like air conditioning used to be a huge deal, this theme park really was something magical when it first opened. Now the bar is so high since we can all go online and see crazy stuff anytime any day. Even still, it’s sad that the real problem that led to the demise of this park was debt.
Closed, citing reasons:
- "Decrease in quality of staff."
- "Increasingly rude guests."
- "Poor attendance."
I love the CEO spin put on that. Your company is so far in debt you can't fund innovation or quality staff (better pay/benefits get that), so guests are naturally disappointed/pissed off. Hence, attendance drops.
But we'll blame everyone else for this one.
Make no mistake, the Great Recession probably only hastened the inevitable when it came to their bankruptcy (which happened a few years after AstroWorld shut down in 2009).
I agree the company did it to itself, but regarding the "rude guests", that really meant less families and children and [to put it nicely] more groups of people looking for trouble.
A little extra security and park operations takes care of that. " Babysitting" was the correct phrase for what happened.
Burke the Moron had started drastic Budget Cuts during 2004, by the Summer of '05, Security at Astroworld was becoming a joke.
Not just that, but underpaying staff/not hiring enough staff, will worsen the 'quality' of the existing staff, as they are being stretched too thin.
I went there a few times as a kid; and when my sister moved to Houston she lived in an apartment complex near the edge of the property, looking over it and seeing it completely empty was always surreal. Like being in a parallel universe where it had just never been.
I know I’m a little late to the party, but can we please get a video on Six Flags New Orleans. This Hass to be one of the few parks that I have a vague memory of, and I specifically remember going a few times when I was a kid.
I want to say it’s still abandoned, and it has been since Katrina. Please consider this as a possibility for one of your videos?
Bright Sun Films made a whole 90 minute documentary film about it, apparently. Similar channel to Defunctland and Yesterworld.
@@gfox9295 yup
No one told me that Astroworld closed when I got out of the military in 2006. I told my dad when I got home that I’m gonna go there that weekend. It was not a good weekend, and I’m still bitter about Astroworld closing down.
Same thing happened to me when I visited home after getting married. Planned on sending a day there during that week off. It didn't happen.
sounds like it would have been a shitty either way, It had little to no maintenance or upgrades the last 10 years of it's life, why pay them for that shit?
Hang onto your memories. It’s better that you didn’t go, it would have just spoiled them. Towards the end it was nothing but a bunch of punks and gangs roaming around. Families were afraid to go there.
I'm sorry, but thank you for ur service
@@SIE44TAR yep "they" have ruined a lot. How many malls have died because of crime issues.
Ugh, the feelings. As a native Houstonian, it broke my heart when Astroworld shut down. My dad actually called to give me the news. It was such a part of childhood; simply driving through Houston and seeing those coasters. It was cool because Astroworld wasn't in some outer-ring suburb, but right there in the heart of the city so its skyline was as much a part of Houston as any of the other buildings.
Kieran Burke took a big hole out of our City for what he and his Cronies did.
DUDE! I remember when I was in the Texas Childrens Hospital, I would ALWAYS look out the window out towards the direction of Reliant Stadium and see Astroworld! It was so cool seeing it from far away. Sort of like a treasure that gets away from you. Nice seeing the Dungeon Drop go up and up and then DROP!
Yup. And RUN out of H Town and Disgraced.
My family drives from Canada to go to the rodeo every winter... i was glad i got to go a couple times :)
No park meant so much to me than Astroworld. It was the 1st family vacation I remember as a child back in the early 80s. I found myself in Houston in August 2005 because hurricane Katrina had destroyed my hometown New Orleans. With nothing to do we was just thinking about a cure for bordom, we saw that they were having a toy drive at Astroworld so we decided to go. The price of a $10 toy for admission was a no brainier. I was so glad to be able to go one more time just 2 months before it closed for good. Kinda bitter sweet because if Katrina never happened I would only have the foggy memory of a 6yo. It was a delightful walk through memory lane. So sad to think it is gone forever.
I used to go to a watering hole in the boonies of Houston, and when Astroworld closed the landowner of the watering hole bought Bamboo Chute and actually intended to rebuild it so it would go into his watering hole. The last time I went out there the ride was in pieces on the road leading into his property. Totally insane.
Houston native here. Grew up going to AstroWorld in the 90's and 2000's. It is still so sad to drive buy there and see an empty field. So many memories of hot sweaty days spent running around there w/ my bff every summer. I never had a bad time. RIP Astroworld. :(
I remember going there and every time it would rain, there is a very distinct medal smell. Kinda like the smell of iron (of course). Now every time it rains, I always think of rainy days at Astroworld.
I never went to Astroworld and somehow I have nostalgia watching this video and feel as if I was really there wow
The nostalgia is very real for me. The Antique Taxis, the cable cars( Astroway) , Tidal Wave. Its a shame that Six Flags screwed us over on that one. By the way Six Flag is now on their second stint of ownership for a local water park called Splash Town.
Many theme parks have rides that are almost mass produced as you can find duplicates at other parks and such around the globe. A couple of the parks I've visited in my lifetime had their own versions of many of the rides at Astroworld and slowly lost them over time. In a way I have my own nostalgia for what Astroworld was and even though I was never there I am saddened to hear that the park is gone. Lots of memories of good times I can never have again. : (
Same..And I’m From Atlanta!🤣..I’ve Never Even Stepped Foot In Texas..And I Have Family In Houston Lol.
I've visited Houston many times a year because most of my relatives live there. one thing that all my relatives have in common was their love for astroworld and I never really knew why, but now I do.
Living in Houston from the age of five to the age of 25 I only got to go to Astroworld a few times. Having been to Disneyland, and Disney World in the '80s I have to say Astroworld was top notch entertainment. It was clean, safe, and fun. Parents had no problem dropping their kids off to wander the park alone all day.
One day a few years ago I opened Google Maps and decided to look in on Astroworld only to find a flat barren field. I was completely floored. I could not believe it. It was always packed yet I cannot remember ever having to wait in lines for rides.
Though it was only a small part of my childhood as I hadn't been there too many times, it was a major part of my childhood memories, and a subject often talked about between classmates, and friends.
I'm a native Houstonian and my family has lived there for ages (so much so that my middle name is Houston) and some of my happiest memories of my childhood are at Astroworld. Specifically, Greased Lighting. It was me and my dad's favorite ride. We're both avid rollercoaster riders and we never got tired of that ride.
One time, in particular, was the best. It was in October when the park would turn Holloween-themed, and my dad and I stayed until the park was closed. We went to ride Greased Lighting one more time before we left, finding that there were only 2 or 3 other people in line with us. We got in the back (our favorite seats) and rode the coaster, but when we returned, the operator said to sit tight before we got off and hit the button to go again. We ended up riding it, like, 4 or 5 times, switching seats each time. It was a blast.
I really wish I could have had the chance to share the same experiences with my future children. But I sure am happy I have those memories.
Yes! That was the whole deal with Greased Lighting! You rode it, raaaaannn down the ramp, raaaannn back up and rode it all over again! Repeat 5 - 50 times lol :)
We would get season passes and go for 2 hours every Sunday morning. One day there was a big power outage, and the only rides running were Cyclone (which I was too scared to ride then) and Tidal Wave. We went on Tidal Wave like 10 times in a row, stumbled dripping to the concession right next to it to get warm pretzels (given away, since no patrons were there to sell them to), then back for another few rides. Epic Sunday.
Great story. Thanks for sharing.
1st roller coaster ride ever was Excalibur. Will never forget that night. First time going up the hill on Texas Cyclone, will NEVER forget the fear. And running down that ramp and back around on greased lightning from sundown to close...that was my favorite.
Been in that same boat! me and my brother rode it 20 times standing up through the loop! the lap bar didn't keep crazy kids sitting down!
Short story:
I remember when I was 5 or 6, Astroworld was still open, and I had always dreamed of going there. I found out eventually that my aunt had a season pass and she had planned to take my sister and I one day during the summer to the park! So the night before, my parents wanted to relax since they would finally have a day to themselves, so we went out to grab some fast food for dinner so they wouldn't have to cook.
We grabbed a bunch of McNuggets and brought them home, and I snacked on them here and there between playing my N64, eventually getting a stomach ache from having a bit too many and not being able to sleep from excitement. Towards the end of the night, I went to my parents room and told them I didn't feel good, and ended up throwing up in the bathroom, but only once. My Mom felt picked me up and we slept in the living room, a bowl next to the couch just in case.
Next thing I knew, the sun was shining through the window, I felt amazing, and I was ready to go to Six Flags! I knew I had probably just eaten too many nuggets! But upon going into my sister's room, I discovered she was gone. I looked at the time, and it was 10 AM. My aunt was supposed to come pick us up at 7 AM (we live about and hour and a half from Houston). My Mom came in, gave me a hug and apologized. My aunt had come and gone, and fearing I was sick, she didn't want me going.
Astroworld closed down a couple of months after that happened. I had missed my chance to go. Forever. I was heartbroken, and I cried for the rest of the day, never throwing up a second time.
All over some chicken McNuggets.
NotSoFoulOwl That's actually a long story. No, i'm only teasing ya.
NotSoFoulOwl similar story, about a year before it closed my friend and I we're going for the first time, and i planned on riding all the rides. I was about 10 yrs old. We get there, I ride the greased lightning, then right after it had rained all day so we spent half the time there staying dry and walking around until eventually leaving. That was the only time I went and only time I ever had the chance of going.
Sorry about that. But I hope your sister had fun.
This story made me feel really bad for you.... I wish you could had gone to Six Flags with your aunt and sister.
R/thathappened
I remember visiting Astroworld when I went on vacation to Houston way back in 2003 (or so). The lack of a major amusement park in the Houston area left a major void that has not yet been filled (at least to my understanding). It is sad to see a huge empty lot where Astroworld used to reside; the last remaining piece is the pedestrian bridge that allowed people to walk over I-610 from the parking lots (north of the freeway) to the park entrance (south of the freeway). Walking over a massive freeway definitely made the Astroworld entrance quite unique.
That said, Grand Texas, near New Caney, could fill the Houston-area theme park void in the coming years. While it would be even cooler to see the Astroworld name attached to a theme park again, I doubt anyone wants to touch that name now (sadly, after what happened at the Travis Scott concert that was part of a music festival that adopted the "Astroworld" name apparently in a homage to the former theme park).
Yup..I’m not from Houston..I’m from Atlanta..But hearing about the REAL Astroworld and seeing that name get ruined..Just hurts.
As someone who lives just a few miles away from Grand Texas, I can definitely attest to the fact that the name "Astroworld" is both memory-triggering and cursed at the same time. It's sadistic, really...
this blunt got me fucked up im cryin over the 2005 closing of a theme park ive never been to
Travis probably crying watching this
I'm crying cus it brings me memories of the first and last time I went to Astroworld. I was 9 when the amusement park was demolished.
He’s doing more than crying right now after these lawsuits....
i live a few miles from disneyland and knott's berry farm and couldn't imagine either of those places being leveled. it must have come as quite a shock to the people of houston when they lost astroworld to corporate greed. thanks for the great video.
It was a shock. Houstonians were pissed off. They turned on Kieran Burke as well.
heyyy i live 20 minutes from eachhh
You don't know the half of it.
I heard Travis Scott was supposed to reopen the park, I don’t know if that’s just a rumor
bootycakes klkkkkkk
I miss when Six Flags was more Looney Tunes than superheroes:(
Well, nowadays, superheroes are HUGE, so simply naming it “Batman” or “Superman” would definitely attract the GP
@@Howlingburd19 Oh, so that’s why, I miss Looney Tunes tho, seems more fitting, I guess, especially since they have Looney Tunes rides like Bugs’ rapids, Yosemite’s wagons, Daffy’s school bus.
Nowadays it's batman the ride or the joker
The Looney Tunes rides are as thrill seeking or intense as the DC ones though
It was better before Looney Tunes theming. Time Warner was the beginning of the end for these stately regional parks.
My parents talked so fondly of Astroworld from when they were younger. Its a shame corporate greed destroyed such a good thing.
I wasn't expecting this video to be so sad. ):
I'm looking forward to the next EBF! =D
Matt Roszak that hit me in the gut too..
I passed by the NRG stadium and looked at the empty lot on the other side of the highway with my husband, who's not from Houston and I told him about Astroworld being there once. It's very hard to pass by without reminiscing the good memories I had there.
@@AhnaSaurus20 At least the bridge leading there is still intact, original light posts and everything... And you can even see where Astrohall across the street was, too. There's a road that still curves where the side of the building would have been.
How can you make me nostalgic for a park I never went to in a state I've never been to? What kind of sorcery is this?
Hahaha, That good!
I felt the exact same way when watching the "Disaster Transport" episode.
lunaitc I've never been to Astroworld, and trust me, I'm nastolgic like you!!
There used to be a sign that sat in front of Astroworld that said "Astroworld will be open until:" and then had a sittle spot where they'd hang placards of closing times. My dad worked there as a security guard right out of high school, and after the park closed to the public thay had one final day where previous employees and their families could go enjoy the park one last time. We went, and when we were leaving they let people take pieces of the park, because it was all getting torn down anyway. That sign sits in my dad's living room to this day, and we made a placard for it with the last day it was open. My dad and his best friend have so many stories from their time working there, particularly the ones of his friend who worked the Lost World Adventure, and he'd sneak onto the roof of the boats and then swing down onto the back to scare the riders.
How is nobody talking about that amazing outro? Love that cover, gives me chills about a place that closed when I was barely a year old.
I've never even heard of this place, but that ending is super depressing, especially punctuated by that shot of the empty lot where it once stood.
As a Southern California native, I can't even imagine the emotions that I would feel if they ever simply CLOSED Disneyland or Knott's Berry Farm. I never had any personal connection to Magic Mountain, but even that would come as a bit of a shock.
Keeleon Ohms it sucked. Adding insult to injury, we always hear rumors of new amusement parks that could be coming to the greater Houston area but it's always just no shows and nothing but rumors. Nothing we know now will ever come to replace the legacy Astroworld had in Houston.
The rumors are the worst!
Well we did experience that to a degree in SoCal, and I don't mean the massive amounts of cheap, sometimes shoddy "family fun centers" that came and went. Tho nothing like Astroworld. Magic Mountain is great, but despite it being the best performer of the Six Flags parks, it's ALWAYS first up for getting shit on, because the land is too valuable to keep a park on now.
It closed because six flags neglected it for years in favor of spoiling their big four parks rotten all the time.
We still haven't gotten over it.
This one hits too close to home. Even though it didn't have the greatest rides, it held many great memories.
This broke my heart all over again. I spent many days and evenings at Astroworld as a kid, and then later with my own kids. I remember all those rides well. Very well done video.
Can't help but be teary eyed at this. A number of the best years of my youth were blessed with season passes to that place and I spent LOTS of time there....1980-1985.
When I was growing up in San Antonio, our family of 6 would pile in the car and drive 3 hours to Houston every summer just to visit AstroWorld. I experienced some of the happiest memories of my childhood & young adulthood there, and then it was gone. I used to beg my parents to move us to Houston just so I could get a season pass and go all summer lol. By 2005 we had Six Flags Fiesta Texas, which has turned into a fantastic park, but back then it was different. Astroworld inspired my lifelong obsession with Roller Coasters and theme parks. It really had a special charm and magic that you don’t always find in amusement parks. This video gave me all the feels, and made me mourn this beloved place all over again. Thank you for making this video ❤️
And now, my family and I trek 3 hours to San Antonio to go to Fiesta Texas! I really wish that we still had Astroworld, because we grew up there, but any reason to go to San Antonio is a good thing!
Moreck Lechat I never went to Astro world, but I spent alot of my life going to Fiesta Texas. Which do you think was better of the two?
@@ammarsiddiqui6696 Astroworld
This made me super sad. RIP Astroworld. We'll always have the memories.
I’d kill to ride the Ultratwister again 😢
The closing of the park is probably the second saddest thing that has ever happened on those premises
Batman Returns and Greased Lightening were two of my favorites 💔
@@GGsorensen The saddest being the fact Judge Linda Hidalgo denied a $105 million plan to fix up the Huston Astrodome. The fact that the stadium is sitting abandoned to this day is insulting.
The music under each of the year markers in the video and how it changed in tone was so perfect.
I used to LOVE going to Astroworld when I was a kid. Grease Lightning and XLR8 were my favorite rides. I remember when I was finally tall enough to ride the Joker, I found out the park had been shut down. I was devastated.
I'm not from Houston and I'm still pissed off poor management screwed that park over, especially after years of neglect.
its lit straight up
lmaooo
La Flame
On a island
me and cash gunna hopped on a Lear jet
Travus
Honestly, I grew up in Houston and I never really heard about this place. I did visit the stadium a few times when going to Rodeo but never heard much about Astroworld. Nice to see some of my hometown’s history here!
People SAY! A new park named Grand Texas in being built in New Caney. Their water park just opened but as far as coasters? Remains to be seen
I am sad any time someone’s home park closed. I think of all those happy memories that were made there and now these memories are now erased
“.....scorching climate of coastal Texas” is not a joke, once me and my neighbor cooked an egg on her driveway and it worked
I live in Clute, Texas and the weather right now daily is 90 F plus with a heat index of 100 F and humidity of seventy percent or higher.
Clute, Texas is coastal and one hour from Houston.
Ha! I knew it! It is possible! Thank you for sharing that memory of yours! You just proved to me that I'm not as crazy as I think I am!
Theres a reason we do not have outdoor amusement parks here in AZ. 😏
I hate how everyone who doesn't live in Texas tries to say, "yeah well it's a dry heat down there, try living somewhere it's humid." I'm like have you never checked the humidity levels in certain parts of Texas or something?
Hi, Texas native here. Astroworld deserved better, especially since the "replacement" is Fiesta Texas in San Antonio. Not that Fiesta is bad, but Astroworld looks way better than what Fiesta is today.
willow lynn or over Texas in Dallas like they will never live up to astroworld
Fiesta Diarrhea Texas!
To be fair Astro world was as amazing as it was because of how many managed it over the year. They added in different things until it was basically and city of entertainment. Fiesta Texas was the replacement. Fiesta Texas has charm but its basically an underdeveloped AstroWorld. I wish they included more.
A bit of trivia - back in the 1960's there was a hand carved/painted Dentzel carousel operating at Forest Park in Ft Worth, TX (next to the Ft Worth Zoo). When it was decided to remove it and the other carnival rides, it was sold to the group operating Six Flags. The horses were sent to the Six Flags over Texas site, where it operates still. The menagerie animals were sent to Astroworld. When Astroworld closed, the carousel there was sold, it's whereabouts are unclear now
Aww :(
The Sky Screamer’s “WHOOP WHOOP” still haunts me.
Lmbo! Ahh the memory! 😂
The production quality of this show has really gone up and it really shows.
Blaming their closure on "rude guests"...?
seriously if that was a reason literally the entire customer service industry would shut down. A bunch of people in hot weather standing in line for hours are sometimes dicks?!? This could never have been predicted
The real issue with the guests in the last years were that Premier had dropped the prices of season passes to barely above a day ticket, making it cheap for parents to drop off their unsupervised kids in the morning and pick them up after work during the summer. This meant constant fights, theft and other safety issues, leading to less people wanting to go. It was a really stupid decision, albeit hardly the only one.
@@treabono And the park's staff were not trained to deal with that, or the declining quality of the rides.
Trea Bono the last time I was there which was in the early 2000’s, I swear someone drew a gun over a petty dispute and not an upstanding citizen type... It was closing time so there was a crowd to get out. I heard shouting and then screaming and everyone started running.
This is to finish off a day where it was extremely hot, park overcrowded, rides broken down, and long wait times (but it was summer so duh), but yeah I have hated AstroWorld since then. The first time I went it was “ok” but compared to other parks, I wasn’t super impressed.
And the blacks
I didn't get to visit AstroWorld often as we didn't have a lot of money growing up but when we did... Man. I miss it. And I hold on to the memories.
Well done!! I miss AstroWorld so much! I am a native Houstonian. This was where I grew up! Greezed Lightnin was my first coaster. I was hooked. I wish we had another theme park. The demolition of AstroWorld left a huge void here in my hometown.
I must admit: watching the care and dedication you put into these videos is inspiring. Watching this episode not only makes me feel horrible to see such a beloved park have such a neglected ending, but it also makes me miss my Whalem Park, which is kind of a Massachusetts version of AstroWorld in many respects.
Also...that ending teaser...I am so confused and curious at the same time.
"This was also the time that Six Flags acquired the rights to the Looney Tunes characters from Warner Brothers"... thus causing the Mandela effect where a lot people swore they saw Bugs Bunny at Disneyland?
is it Mandela if people are just too dumb/stoned to know where they were? LOL
Good pfp
Maybe it's because I'm about an hour outside of Chicago and went to 6 flags significantly more than Disney World, I didn't even know this was a Mandela effect thing.
It’s even sadder no new Six Flags parks have been built
LaPeppercorn there was a brief period mid-late 80s they may be referring to. Who framed Roger rabbit was huge then, and was a huge crossover with Disney and WB cartoons. I think I recall seeing bugs bunny at Disney world during that time.
22:48 hits different now…
So now there's 2 Astroworld's that are defunct...
Astroworlds*
so the theme was ... air conditioning
Hey! Down here where it stays near 100 three months out of the year - the tourist months - keeping guests cool was essential and genius.
Proud Texan here who went to Astroworld a lot as a kid.
Yeah, that AC was pretty darn necessary.
I still remember the huge AC vent right next to a Prop Cycle game. Talk about realistic.
Yes! Can you imagine if Disneyworld were air conditioned?? That would be truly magical. I would go much more often if it weren't so darn hot and humid in Orlando.
If you’re from Texas you’ll understand. Them mist machines by XLR8 tho....😅
@@leonardjoseph295 If I recall, they were labeled "Cool Zones."
"No theme park was safe from the 80s". Such a great line.
First went to Astroworld in 87 and was there pretty much every summer from San Antonio till the year it closed. Loved that park. The 'Batman The Escape' part brought back memories.. Like if you didnt get on that seat exactly right... OH BOY! Were you in for a painful ride.
Great video! My mom is a native Houstonian, and she grew up in the heyday of the Astrodome and Astroworld. She always told me about how much she loved these things and it's so exciting to learn about and get a glimpse into my mom's childhood memories.
I grew up going to Six Flags Fiesta Texas in San Antonio but I remember taking a trip to Houston to go to AstroWorld with my parents and aunt and uncle who lived there at the time in about 2004 after they announced it's closing. The walk over the bridge was such a magical experience, especially as a kid. You felt like you were leaving the real world and entering this magical place. You would not even know how salty people still are over AstroWorld closing. I just passed the empty lot where it used to sit a few weeks ago and it's SO weird to see. It's so messed up what Premier did to such an amazing park that could have survived for decades more. Houston is too populated to NOT have an amusement park. So many people I know from there travel to San Antonio or Dallas just to go to the parks there. It's really quite depressing.
I went to Astroworld in it's heyday in the 80's . This was when Fiesta Texas was just a plan in City Hall. It was beautiful. Fiesta Texas was independent for a few years before Six Flags bought them out. Six Flags is also destroying Fiesta Texas.
stephanie rando Six Flags and Premier destroyed a lot of great parks, imo.
THANK YOU. I grew up in Houston in the 70's and AstroWorld was a HUGE part of every summer. This video is brilliantly filmed and narrated and I got lost in memories I had forgotten for decades until now. Again, thank you.
It’s so interesting hearing about this, living in Texas in this area. My mom used to go this place all the time and she remembers when it closed. And I see the place where it used to be all the time and can’t imagine an entire theme park being there. I wish it were still here.
Dang, that Astroworld theme cover at the end hit me right in the gut
My folks split when I was young, and my dad moved to Houston. Since he was so far away I'd just spend a full month with him during the summers, and the two big things we did was go to either Galveston or Astroworld. Most of my best memories with my father growing up were at that theme park; I was winded when I was talking to some online friends, found out they lived in Houston, and asked if people still went to Astroworld only to be told it'd been torn down years earlier. I hadn't been there for a long time obviously, but in a way it was like losing something deeply personal, I don't know. Sad it's gone.
I'm from Galveston and I used to go to AstroWorld, I remember driving by the Dome one day and saw that AstroWorld was gone. I had no idea they had torn it down.
@@SamSprole it was called jungle surf water slide. We have a Schlitterbahn now.
Hed take you to Galveston? Man he mustve hated you
@@SamSprole jungle surf!!! Loved it
@@syedabood2478 it's no Cali or Florida beach towns, but it's the best the upper Texas Gulf Coast has (I say upper because otherwise someone'd mention South Padre Island ;D).
And there are cool things there. The Strand, all the old shops (like the saltwater taffy place, a good bookstore), the clipper ship in the docks, etc. It's more than just a not-the-greatest beach behind a seawall and a place to get hurricaned on.
Man, I was SO hoping you teased an ‘Astroworld’ video when you did ‘Big Bad Wolf’ and remarked “What ever happened to XLR8 at Astroworld?”. As a native Houstonian, this episode really hits home and it almost brings a sense of closure as to why this awesome place closed. I’ve been clamoring for an original theme park to come back to the Houston area and hope we get to experience that same feeling again as the first Astroworld guests experienced once upon a time. Thank you, sir. Your vids truly are treasure. :)
Unforchunly xrl8 got scrapped why did they relocated it i would like to see it at Michigan Adventure
Burke is a Scumbag.
@@Tornado1994 Yes he is. You should read his bio on Premier Parks LLC. It makes him sound so great. If forgets the fact that he caused Six Flags to eventually file bankruptcy.
@@gener2682 Burke also loves to ignore and leave out the fact that he was both FIRED by Premier Parks and was RUN out of Houston.
22:46 *FORESHADOWING*