What will happen to the Gold Coast’s themeparks?

Gold Coast themeparks are still working out what it might mean to re-open post coronavirus with strict limits on visitor numbers.

GOLD Coast theme parks are still trying to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Under the State Government’s three step plan, amusements and attractions including indoor movie theatres, concert venues, stadiums, galleries, museums and zoos will be allowed to have up to 20 patrons – and only during stage two, which will rollout in mid June.

But the Gold Coast’s two major theme park operators say there is a huge difference between being allowed to open in theory and opening in practice.

Village Roadshow themeparks and resorts COO Bikash Randhawa said while he appreciated the work that had gone into the road map by state and federal governments, limits of 20 to 100 people were unviable.

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Drone footage of Gold Coast landmarks now empty due to coronavirus (COVID-19). Dreamworld and Whitewater World. Picture: Jerad Williams

“We are working to get an outcome where we open themeparks as soon as possible, given how important they are in the Gold Coast’s economic supply chain,” Mr Randhawa said.

“This plan lacks basic business fundamentals from a commercial point of view, it doesn’t take theme parks into consideration.”

“Given the enormous impact open theme parks could have on accelerating the Gold Coast economy again, we would hope for engagement with the Government to come up with a way we can strike a balance.

“We have a number of suppliers reaching out to use us for work, laundries, auto mechanics caterers, so if we are up and running again so are they.”

“So themeparks should be front and centre of discussions.”

Mr Randhawa said given the mass amounts of infrastructure it could take anything from four to five weeks to reopen any of the parks, with the need for around 2000 staff on site.

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: Movie World entry on March 17, 2020 in Gold Coast, Australia just before the federal government ban on mass gatherings. (Photo by Chris Hyde/Getty Images)

“Once you look at the infrastructure required it is easy to see that opening for 100 customers isn’t viable.

“There is a financial impact and investment we would need to make to open, so we need transparency and a clear runway telling us to ‘go ahead do what you need to do’.

“Until then we have suppliers reaching out to us and I am not sure what I can say to them, I feel for small business at the moment.

“I have a big fear that if we allow people to open under such hurdles and restrictions we may see a lot of small business go bust.

“The numbers may not stack up.”

A spokesman for Dreamworld said they were also looking into the detail of the restrictions, to see how viable any reopening may be.

“Like everyone else, we are encouraged by some of the restrictions being lifted as a result of the good work undertaken by all Australians over the past few months,” the spokesman said.

“We note that theme parks have been included in Stage 2 of the Queensland road map and are looking to understand the details more to ensure it is economically viable for our Parks and Attractions to reopen at this time”.