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Universal Studios is about to build a new signature ride: a high-tech roller coaster full of lights, music, loops, twists and turns — and a quick trip over the heads of people walking through the nearby CityWalk entertainment district.

The Hollywood Rip, Ride, Rockit is planned to be big, bright and brash enough to become the new visual symbol for the theme park when the coaster opens in about a year. Universal Orlando officials said Tuesday that it also will feature enough digital technology to appeal directly to what they refer to as the “YouTube culture.”

Universal Orlando officials said the coaster will rise 167 feet into the air and feature numerous loops and corkscrew turns. Rockit — the first big, outdoor thrill ride for Universal Studios — is set to open in spring 2009.

It will provide another link in Universal Orlando’s recent chain of big new attractions. An overhauled version of an old ride, renamed Disaster!, opened in January. The Simpsons Ride, a 3-D fantasy-simulation ride replacing the old Back to the Future, is set to open in a few weeks. And several still-undisclosed attractions are to open together in late 2009 as the “Wizarding World of Harry Potter” in Universal Studios’ sister park, Islands of Adventure.

The flurry of activity follows a dormant period of nearly three years during which Universal offered no big new rides.

Although it will be the tallest coaster in Central Florida and one of the fastest in the state, the Rockit will be nowhere near the tallest or fastest in the amusement-park business. But like the Incredible Hulk in Islands of Adventure and several other Florida coasters, it aims to use innovation and novelty to make up for any lack of record-setting height or speed.

“We like to go for the best,” said Mark Woodbury, president of Universal Parks & Resorts’ creative division — though Universal would not comment on the project’s cost.

Rockit will offer high-energy video displays in the waiting line; high-intensity, color-changing LED lighting and digital audio and video effects during the ride; and various engineering innovations.
‘A whole new level’

And unlike any of the other big roller coasters in Central Florida, Rockit will loom over its park’s entrance and beyond. Universal plans to squeeze its track between the Jimmy Neutron’s Nicktoon Blast ride and the Sharp Aquos Theatre, which houses the Blue Man Group show. From there the track would run along the boundary between Universal Studios and Universal’s sound stages, then rise over the fence to twist over the sidewalks of CityWalk, outside the theme park — a brightly lit, scream-filled advertisement for the park.

“We like to look at this as taking the thrill ride to a whole new level, both physically and figuratively,” Woodbury said. “It’s iconographic in its position. It’s going to do some things no ride has done before. And it combines entry into the digital age with the ability to customize and personalize the ride for each rider.”

That particular digital-age feature will allow riders to select their own music and create a music video of the ride. Afterward, a rider could download the video and use it on personal Web pages or video-sharing sites.

But the ride — which Universal officials had referred to for months by the code name “Project Rumble” — still draws principally on the basic thrills of a roller coaster: speed, height, loops, corkscrews, twists, turns and drops. Universal officials said Rockit would have several signature moves and a record-breaking loop, though they would not elaborate. The artist’s rendering that they released shows the track climbing a 167-foot-tall peak, then corkscrewing downward, twisting eight times.
‘It’s a natural for us’

The ride’s Internet-based theme digresses a bit from Universal Studios’ original theme, which was all about “riding” the movies. But Universal officials insisted that the coaster will justify the inclusion of the word “Hollywood” in its name — a term also adopted earlier this year by Walt Disney World when it renamed its rival movie-studio theme park.

“We’ve always fancied ourselves as embedded into the Hollywood culture with Universal. It’s part of our essence. It’s a natural for us,” Woodbury said. “The name is very specific to the attributes of the ride. It combines creating your own movie, to customize it; that’s the ‘rip’ part. You can download it to your personal site. And you ride it, of course. You have the ‘Rockit’ part, which combines the thrill and the music.”

BREVARD COUNTY — Dozens of Brevard County economic leaders gathered Wednesday to discuss closing the so-called “Space Gap,” and saving thousands of jobs when the shuttle program ends in 2010.

Approximately 3,500 high-tech jobs are on the chopping block surrounding the soon to be non-existent orbiter program.

The end of the shuttle program also begins a nearly five year gap of the U.S.’s inability to put astronauts in space on its own.

The Space Coast Economic Development Commission has already successfully saved some jobs, but said the group needs to be aggressive to get even more.

“It was highly competitive, highly sought after. Those other states didn’t sit around and want to give away this opportunity, cause that’s the thin edge of the wedge. And once you bring that assembly work in here, there’s other work that can be tied to it,” said Lynda Weatherman from the Space Coast Economic Development Commission.

Leaders are working to get private companies to work out of the Kennedy Space Center, bringing jobs for at-risk space program workers.

TAVARES - When the dragon boats gather today, organizers will not be surprised to see a few breathing fire.

Fierce competition is expected at the Sixth Annual Dragon Boat Festival in Wooton Park.

“If the teams are into it, they get better at it,” festival chairwoman Becky Claffy said. “If they’re not, they fall off, so every year it gets more competitive.”
From the first heat Saturday, organizers will be prepared. They have hired a Canadian dragon-boat team to manage the races and handle disputes.

The free two-day event will feature about 27 teams, the same number as last year, but fewer will be local. More out-of-town teams will use the race to qualify for regional championships.

To encourage local teams, organizers give an award for fastest community team as well as an overall championship. A local team could win both.

Grace Genetia hopes that team will be hers. Last year, Wun Fun Cru took the local honors, but Genetia hopes experience added to intense practice — two or three times a week for six weeks — will help them achieve the big prize.

“Last year, we were seventh overall among 79 teams in the Tampa races,” she said.

Opening ceremonies include a performance by the Orlando Taiko Dojo at 6 p.m., team roll call at 6:30 p.m. and the awakening-of-the-dragon ceremony at 6:45 p.m. when red paint is applied to the dragons’ eyes.

The Taiko Dojo performs again at 7:20 p.m. People can eat, drink and dance beginning at 8 p.m.

On Saturday, 500-meter racing heats begin at 9 a.m. and continue until each boat has raced three times, with the fastest teams facing each other in a final heat.

Shoreside entertainment begins with the national anthem, sung by Andrew Johnson of the Lost Cats, at 9 a.m., and includes martial-arts students performing dragon and lion dances at 9:15 a.m., and the Dragon Legends, a Chinese acrobatic group, from 10:30 to 11:30 a.m.

There will be a seaplane demonstration at 12:30 p.m.

An egg roll-eating contest begins at 12:45 p.m. Dance performances, a yoga demonstration and music fill out the afternoon.

Giant white tents and mulch paths sprawl across Central Park in Winter Park, and artists in their booths await the crowds.

The 49th annual Winter Park Sidewalk Art Festival begins at 9 a.m. today and runs through Sunday at 5 p.m. Entrance is free.

“Everybody’s scrambling like mad,” Carole Moreland said of the festival.
When: 9 a.m.-6 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 9 a.m.-5 p.m., Sunday.

Where: Along Park Avenue and in Central Park,

Winter Park.

Call: 407-672-

6390.

Online: wpsaf.org. 

MUSIC SCHEDULE
Friday

*4:30 to 5:30 p.m.: Winter Park High School Band

*6 to 7 p.m.: Robert Harris

*7:30 to 9 p.m.: Richard Elliot

Saturday

*10 to 10:45 a.m.: Rollins String Ensemble

*11 to 11:45 a.m.: Rollins Brass

*Noon to 1 p.m.: Duvall Dance Academy

*1:30 to 2:30 p.m.: Lauren Lester

*3 to 4 p.m.: Jazz Spy

*4:30 to 5:45 p.m.: Les Sabler

Sunday

*10 to 10:45 a.m.: Time Out Flute Ensemble

*11 a.m. to noon: Pop Shop

*12:30 to 1:30 p.m.: The Cook Trio

*2 to 3 p.m.: Jazz Professors

*3:30 to 4:45 p.m.: Brian Simpson

Moreland and about 500 volunteers are set for an art festival that attracts nearly 350,000 people every year. The streets from Canton Avenue to New England Avenue in downtown Winter Park are closed off for the entire three days of the festival, Moreland said.

This year, 225 artists from 38 states and Canada are participating, said Carolyn Bird, a member of the festival’s board of directors.

Artists are competing for $67,500 in awards, which include a Morse Museum award for $2,500, 10 awards of excellence at $2,000 each, 20 awards of distinction at $1,000 each, and 30 awards of merit at $500 each, Moreland said.

Also, a $10,000 Best of Show award is given to one artist. The festival purchases the piece of artwork and donates it to the city, Moreland said. All previous Best of Show winning artworks are on display at the Winter Park Public Library.

The judging process begins today, and the winners are announced at about 2 p.m. Saturday, Moreland said.

She said art-festival workers deliver balloons to the winners’ booths and host a big dinner for the artists and their guests Saturday, where they are presented with their checks.

Browsing artwork isn’t the only thing to do at the festival. It also offers entertainment, food and children’s activities.

A big jazz concert takes place on the north lawn of the park from 7 to 9 p.m. today.

“That brings out people on blankets at 6 o’clock in the morning trying to reserve a spot,” Moreland said.

The children’s activities are abundant.

In the Children’s Workshop Village this year, eight local museums will have hands-on projects for children, Bird said.

In addition to that, there will be eight huge tents for the Orange County public- and private-school art displays, Bird said. Local art teachers selected the best student pieces from grades K-12 to display.

A Best of Show award will be given to a student at the high-school level, and each student will receive a certificate

Central Florida’s theme parks saw modest-to-strong growth in attendance last year, displaying resilience within an otherwise softening local tourism market, according to a new report.

The report, produced by a research company and theme-park trade association, concludes that 2007 was a particularly good year for Walt Disney World, a decent year for Universal Orlando and a year of modest growth for SeaWorld Orlando.

The study, to be published today, says that Disney’s Magic Kingdom topped 17 million visitors, retaining its title as the busiest theme park in the world. The report also includes seven Orlando-area theme parks among its ranking of the 10 busiest parks in the U.S.
The attendance estimates, produced by Economic Research Associates and the Themed Entertainment Association, are completely unauthorized and unofficial. Disney, Universal and Busch Entertainment do not release attendance numbers for their individual parks, nor do many other companies. But in the absence of any standardized, authorized figures, the annual ERA/TEA attendance study provides the industry’s most widely cited gate estimates.

The report has its critics, particularly Busch Entertainment Corp., which owns SeaWorld, Busch Gardens Tampa Bay and eight other parks. Busch spokesman Fred Jacobs said Thursday the 2006 ERA/TEA estimates were almost all significantly lower than Busch’s own attendance counts, and that he had complained strongly to ERA about that. Another knowledgeable Busch source provided the Orlando Sentinel with internal 2007 gate counts for two Busch parks that were both higher than what ERA/TEA is reporting today.

John Robinett, senior vice president of ERA, a Los Angeles-based company, defended the report’s accuracy and said Busch Entertainment’s complaint is a minority view.

The study’s overall assessment of 2007: a year of steady business in the United States, where the theme-park industry is mature and stable, but one with widely varied results elsewhere in the world.

“I think it was business as usual,” Robinett said. “Orlando did quite well this year. Southern California was a little slow. The Midwest was modest. You add it up, and it was a year of modest and healthy growth, which is to be expected at this point in our industry.”

Disney’s Animal Kingdom continued to ride Expedition Everest — its big roller coaster that opened in early 2006 — to new heights of popularity, according to the report. In 2006, that coaster was credited for driving an 8.6 percent gain in attendance for Animal Kingdom. Last year, the ride and the new Finding Nemo show pushed the park’s gate up another 6.5 percent — the best growth rate in Florida for a second year in a row.

Robinett said that, based on published visitor counts for the Orlando area, its theme parks appear to have had a better year than the local tourism scene overall and showed few ill effects from the weakening economy or high gas prices.

“I think it shows in some ways the parks can control their own destiny,” he said of the report, which is being published today in two trade publications, InPark Magazine and Park World Magazine.

Outside the U.S., Robinett said, Europe’s theme parks had strong growth, Asia’s were weighed down by bad years at a couple of parks, and Latin America’s had mixed results. Tokyo Disneyland was the busiest park outside the U.S., with 13.9 million visitors. Disneyland Paris was Europe’s busiest, with attendance totaling 12 million.

ERA’s sources include statistics furnished directly by some theme-park companies, historical numbers, financial reports, the investment-banking community and local tourism organizations, among others.

Robinett said some companies cooperate with the ERA/TEA effort and express confidence in the estimates. Busch is not one of them.

A Busch Entertainment source, who spoke only on condition of anonymity for breaking with the company’s usual policy, said that SeaWorld Orlando’s 2007 internal gate count was in the range of 6.2 million, while Busch Gardens Tampa Bay’s attendance was in the range of 4.5 million. The ERA/TEA estimates released today report 5.8 million for SeaWorld and 4.4 million for Busch Gardens.

Speaking for those and other Busch parks, Jacobs did not confirm those numbers, but he said the ERA/TEA combined estimate released last year for all nine Busch parks open in 2006 — 21.7 million — was more than 1 million visitors less than the company’s internal count.

“As far as other companies are concerned, they might be accurate numbers, but I can tell you they are not accurate numbers for our parks,” he said.

Robinett acknowledged Busch’s complaints but said the easy way to avoid such discrepancies would be for Busch and other theme-park companies to officially release their attendance figures.

“You know how our numbers can get more accurate? If the operators give us a little help,” he said. “And many of them do.”

A free St. Patrick’s Day concert showcasing Hootie and the Blowfish and other recording artists will be at Celebration Town Center on Saturday as part of the Robert Gamez Celebrity Weekend, a fundraiser that will benefit local charities.

“This concert will be an amazing opportunity to see some of this generation’s greatest musicians in a one-of-a-kind show,” said Michael Nunez, public-relations and marketing director at Celebration Town Center.

Additional acts scheduled to perform are Jimi Jamieson of Survivor, Mike Reno of Loverboy, John Cafferty and Michael Antunes of Beaver Brown Band and Larry Hoppen of Orleans.

The concert will begin at 7 p.m. and will continue until about 11 p.m. Hootie and the Blowfish will perform at 9 p.m.

The Robert Gamez Foundation aims to provide assistance to children’s health and education programs in Central Florida and meet the needs of physically challenged children through playing golf.

Since its inception in Central Florida five years ago, the foundation has raised more than $1 million and provided grants to organizations including Help Now Shelter, Celebration Health, Boys & Girls Clubs, Celebration High School, Children’s Home Society and Make-A-Wish.

Celebration Town Center is at 701 Front St.

For details, call the center at 407-566-4007 or go to celebrationtowncenter.com.

Across Volusia County, Easter egg hunts are planned for Saturday. Here are the specifics.

The county is sponsoring hunts and other activities — including games, moonwalks and slides — at three locations. Admission is free.

*10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Gemini Springs Park, 37 Dirksen Drive, DeBary. An egg hunt for all ages begins at 10 a.m., and a special-needs hunt is set for 10:30 a.m.

*Noon to 4 p.m. at Mary DeWees Park, 178 N. Gaines St., Oak Hill. An egg hunt for children ages 2 to 4 begins at 3:45 p.m., and a hunt for children ages 5-10 begins at 4 p.m.

*10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at Bicentennial Park, 1800 N. Oceanshore Blvd., Ormond Beach. An egg hunt for all ages begins at 3:30 p.m. Special-needs children are welcome.

For details, call Volusia County Leisure Services at 386-736-5953.

Deltona will have its EGGstravaganza at 10 a.m. at Dewey O. Boster Sports Complex, 1236 Saxon Blvd. For details, call the parks and recreation department at 386-878-8900.

Holly Hill’s Easter Egg Hunt will be from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. on the lawn of City Hall, 1065 Ridgewood Ave. For details, call 386-248-9460.

Also, the Lutheran Church of Providence, 1696 Providence Blvd., Deltona, will have a community Easter egg hunt at 10 a.m. For details, call 386-789-3300.

Sky divers will compete for prizes and bragging rights during the annual Shamrock Showdown sky-diving competition this weekend in DeLand.

Spectator admission and parking are free for the contest Saturday and Sunday at the DeLand Municipal Airport, 1777 Langley Ave.

Sky-diving teams will jump out of a plane at 10,500 feet and perform a series of maneuvers within 35 seconds to earn points. Each team will videotape the moves as they drop. Their chutes will open at about 3,000 feet.

After landing, the teams will turn over their videotapes to competition judges.

Competition begins at 9 a.m. Saturday. Sunday’s activities also begin at 9 a.m. For details, contact the National Skydiving League at 386-742-0754, nsl@skyleague.com or skyleague.com.

ORMOND BEACH - The paw print at Tomoka State Park measured 4 inches by 4 inches, much too big for even the biggest bobcat.

John Lohde continued to follow the cat’s trail, seeing an 8-foot gap between two sets of four prints. That would be too big a leap for a bobcat.

Only one animal could have left those tracks in the sand, providing the long-awaited evidence needed to confirm what some had suspected for years.

Related links

• Florida panther in Tomoka State Park Video

Lohde, a park-services specialist, could hardly believe it, knowing how rare it would be to find one of these highly endangered felines so far north of the Everglades.

“We tend to take panther sightings with a grain of salt, but having tracks like this is critical to confirming he’s here,” Lohde said. “We’re just as excited as we can be.”

Darrell Land, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission biologist who leads the state’s panther team, is convinced.

“We have absolutely confirmed it is a panther,” Land said of the Volusia findings.

Florida panthers once ranged throughout Florida and the Southeast, but development and habitat loss have pushed the wild cats down to South Florida.

Their extinction seemed all too certain 20 years ago when biologists thought there were about 30 animals left.

Conservation efforts have helped the population grow to about 100 panthers, Land said.

The females don’t typically venture beyond the Everglades and the surrounding preserves, but males need a large territory, so the Volusia cat is thought to be a male that would have been born in South Florida.

Land could surmise how the cat could have made its way north. “We’ve had cats before come up the central part of the state. Once they get across U.S. [Highway] 27 and into the central highlands, they’ll head to Kissimmee Prairie State Park.

“That would get him close to Orlando, and then he could work his way into the St. Johns River basin, and from there he could keep on going north if he could,” Land said.

In June 2005, a panther was killed on Interstate 95, just north of the Flagler County line. So it’s not unprecedented to have a panther this far north, he said.

Still, it’s rare to get proof. Land’s office receives dozens of reports of panther sightings throughout Florida, but very few turn out to be real.

“A lot of times, if they see the animal, it was likely a bobcat. Or if they see tracks, it’s actually a dog track,” Land said.

Rangers at Tomoka State Park, with more than 8,000 acres in northeast Volusia, have had several panther sightings during the past two years. Some park employees have even seen the cat crossing the road near the entrance to the campgrounds.

On Feb. 17, Lohde checked on a panther sighting by a local man, who is a skilled hunter and an experienced woodsman.

Lohde ventured to the northern stretch of the park, near Old Dixie Highway, when he found the tracks and followed them for nearly a mile.

Having worked in Big Cypress National Preserve in South Florida, and at a Phoenix zoo stocked with Western cougars, Lohde knew he was tracking a big cat. He studied the pattern of the tracks, seeing the clues to what the panther was doing.

“I could almost visualize it, when he got to this soft sandy soil and instead of maintaining his casual stride, he leapt to get across the sand as quickly as possible,” he said.

Lohde took plaster casts of four of the paw prints, as well as photographs, using a measuring tape to demonstrate their size.

“The quality of those photographs confirms to us it is a panther,” said Land.

Since then, Lohde has reconsidered the history of panther sightings in the area and now thinks the panther has staked Tomoka State Park as part of his territory.

The cat tends to stay on the land north of the Tomoka River, where feral hogs and deer are plentiful. The most recent sighting was last weekend on Walter Boardman Lane, a scenic road lined with marshes and massive oaks that makes up part of “The Loop,” a scenic highway in north Volusia.

It might be on that road, or along Old Dixie Highway, that the cat will be seen again. But it won’t be anywhere in the neighborhoods.

“With so much public land, he wouldn’t have much interest in crossing someone’s backyard,” he said. “These lands here are just perfect habitat for him.”