Landscape of Recreation II: (Amusement Parks) (World of Environmental Design, V. 6)

Rating:
Summary: Great coverage, Lousy examples
Review: This book would have the potential of being an excellent resource of theme-park design precedents, illustrations, site plans and overall design studies if only the author didn't select so many of the world's most uninteresting, unattractive and/or poorly designed parks. A lot of the parks are from Spain, Italy, and other European countries and are therefore unfamiliar to many American readers. A number of the sample site plans and elevations are sloppily layed out and rendered by the designers which indicates to me that the architects didn't think much of their own designs. After comparing many such plans with photos of the finished parks, it shows. Yet the author praises the designs for their functional successes. But if no one wants to visit these parks, of what importance is their functionality? On the other hand, there are a great number of defunct amusement parks that were very well designed, very functional, very scenic, and very enjoyable. Such parks went out of business for one reason or another. But their failures are interesting and can inform future designs. For example I'd be very interested to read about and study the plans of Lion Country Safari California which went belly up in 1984. There is a lot to be learned from such a creative and bold attempt at plopping humans into a wild animal reserve and at the same time, running a lush and beautiful subtropical walk-through entertainment area with a lake, river boat ride, petting zoo, retail shops, train ride, live shows, elephant rides etc. How did they accomplish this? Did it work? Why did the park struggle to remain open? Could it have been designed differently and achieved higher succes? Basically I'd prefer much more in-depth studies of truly outstanding, aesthetic or unusual themeparks and zoos rather that coverege of junky looking places like Ameriflorida '92.