More than 11 years have passed since Six Flags New Orleans closed for Hurricane Katrina and never reopened. Since then, the abandoned, decaying amusement park has become a symbol for the lingering effects of the historic storm. But a plan to reopen Six Flags New Orleans could soon be one step closer to reality.
First, a little background: the park originally opened as “Jazzland” in 2000 before being bought by Six Flags in 2002. It reopened as Six Flags New Orleans in 2003.
The owner of the park since 2009, the New Orleans Industrial Development Board, received an offer from the company planning to buy the park (and surrounding land — 224 acres in total) for $3.26 million. The group, TPC-NOLA, Inc., is led by themed entertainment consultant Tonya Pope and a team of amusement industry professionals.
The team’s multi-phase plan would begin with a mixed-used development with a focus on retail shops and dining — possibly opening as early as 2018. The team hopes that development would attract business that would eventually support the park once it reopened.
Unfortunately, the January meeting where the development board would have voted on Pope’s offer has been rescheduled to February 14. But in the meantime, the team did share an updated site plan for the amusement park on the “Jazzland Park” Facebook page below:
One of the most noticeable changes to the park would be a new, larger entrance plaza as seen in the bottom right corner.
Through various replies in the Facebook posts, the team indicated that both the MegaZeph and Jester roller coasters would be restored in addition to the construction of a wild mouse and suspended coaster.
Below is a selection of concept art that was released in 2013. Although dated, they give an idea of what this team is proposing:
As stated above, the team is planning a suspended coaster for the revived Jazzland.
According to its website, the Jazzland team wants to reopen the park as a “true celebration of Louisiana by connecting the dots of community, history, identity, and artistry in a living testimonial to our spirit and pride.”
In recent years, the Six Flags New Orleans/Jazzland site has functioned mostly as a movie set and studio for films such as Jurassic World and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes.
Learn more about the “Bring Back Jazzland” effort here. And stay tuned, as 2017 will likely be an interesting year for this park if Pope’s offer is accepted next month.
What do you think of the plan to reopen Six Flags New Orleans as Jazzland Park? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.
After what happened to Big Dipper I genuinely feel that Six Flag New Orleans doesn’t deserve to be brought back and just be leveled, if 91 years of history couldn’t be even attempted to be saved SFNO doesn’t deserve to be saved either.
These are some of the lighter feelings that the destruction of the Geauga Lake Big Dipper brought out, I have MUCH darker thoughts for the people actually involved.
What does SFNO have to do with Geauga Lake? Nothing.
I know SFNO was closed and destroyed beyond repair from the hurricane. But the park was only there for a decade. Now that it has flooded, they have realized it can happen again. The site would take more to repair then to just level it. It’s a waste of time and money on sentimentality. If this company wants a park, go save Geauga Lake.
If you think about it, Kentucky Kingdom reopened in 2014, which Six Flags closed in late 2009, and Ed Hart managed to reopen it 4 years later. Hopefully Tonya Pope can manage to reopen Jazzland… MegaZeph and Jester coasters undergoing restoration, along with other rides and attractions that can be saved. Hopefully Grand Texas is on schedule to open soon, and hasn’t stalled… in hopes of filling the void the 2005 closure of Six Flags Astroworld left behind. With the Louisville, Houston, and New Orleans metropolitan areas, Six Flags most likely won’t be coming back.
I personally would be very happy if they re-opened the park! I have kids and moved here from near Houston where there’s so much for families to. That being said I would be thrilled to have this park opened so that I could enjoy it with my family.
Openning the park would be an intresting but gr8 idea due to the fact that it can still be functional, even after the devastating Hurricane Katrina. This park would add additional amusement and entertainment to the breathtakingly fabulous and cultural New Orleans, Louisiana (NOLA). In addition, I can finally enjoy yet another amusement park other than Six Flags Fiesta Texas and/or Six Flags Over Texas. Plus, re-openning Jazzland/SFNO would upscale the value and entertainment of NOLA rather than just leaving it to rot. I’m sure movie directors can find another location to film their movies, BUT there will be no other JAZZLAND to come back to entertain guests if we don’t re-open the park.
I think they should really open the water park because it has been closed for 11 years and New Orleans do not have nun to show for…. the make a long story short New Orleans ( Slidell ) uptown gentility and more would have people lining up jazz land this is a great opportunity to have us all come together and be HAPPY again ?
I think they need to open Six Flags New Orleans Six Flags Houston for these children to have something to do and get off the streets study selling drugs and using drugs I think this would be a good time to open up Six Flags New Orleans Six Flags Houston and I think the crime rate we go down these children don’t have nothing to do no game roms no theme parks and government needs to crack down and try to open these pops up as soon as possible for these children to have fun and get them off the streets and I think that would bring down the crime rate for Jefferson Parish New Orleans and maybe Texas that’s what’s wrong with the economy today they don’t care what these kids do today they don’t care if they don’t have fun and I say that’s wrong
I hope the plan goes through because they plan to build new versions of the Haunted House and Laff in the Dark from Pontchartrain Beach in the Beach section where Megazeph is. The log flume will come back and be called Sugar Flume, and a new rapids ride will be built, and a shoot the chutes ride. A new dark ride by the entrance with wax figures from the closed wax museum in New Orleans. So, it would almost be like bringing back Pontchartrain Beach which closed Sept 1983.
I Would like for six flags to reopen