When might we see the construction of the UK’s tallest and fastest rollercoaster go vertical?

The Project Exodus construction site has been a hive of activity the past few months. All parts of what was once Old Town have been demolished, the lake has been infilled, and groundwork has been taking place. At the same time, the park has had delivery of both white and gold supports. And we are now close to “vertical construction” ;the time when buildings, supports and track are built. But just how close are we?

What we know

We should first of all stress that nothing is confirmed. As with any major construction project, the park will have plans and a schedule they are working on. However, this can be disrupted due to any number of reasons, and a couple of small disruptions can lead to small delays, which can have knock on effects as a result. Nonetheless, we still can have an idea on the timeline.

Firstly, the park have teased in their Annual Passholder Group on Facebook that September should be an exciting month for construction. This seems like the park have indicated that construction could go vertical in September as a result. With new advertising boards around the site, as well as a model of the ride in the Megastore, we expect that the park are gearing up for the next level of construction!

In the planning application for the roller coaster, the park submitted a draft Scheme of Implementation. This is a Gantt Chart which fully outlines the entire process of building Project Exodus, from removing Old Town to opening the ride. This draft suggests that foundations for the ride should take about 75 days to complete, with the structural installation (ie of supports) starting about 50 days after the foundations started to be built.

When Might Vertical Construction Start?

We believe foundations for Project Exodus started to appear in mid-to-late July. 50 days, which is just short of 2 months, would therefore take us to around mid-September for when vertical construction might start. An exact date is impossible for us to say. Indeed, at this stage, the park themselves might not have an exact date nailed down for definite just yet, but we think sometime between 11th-22nd September is a good bet!

For some context, the last roller coaster to be built at the park (The Swarm) started vertical construction on 2nd October 2011, and finished on the 18th November.

What will be built first? How long will it take?

The first parts of the ride to be installed will be those around the lake. This includes elements such as the finale, and low level parts of the ride between inversions. Then, interestingly, the next part stated to be built is at the front of site, including the the station, turnaround and parts of the lift hill. The third phase will include the bulk part of the ride, with the inversions and lift hill. The finale stage of construction for the ride hardware seems to be at the back of site, which includes the unique outerbanked dive inversion. Again, we stress that this is a draft scheme of implementation, and things may have changed since the park submitted these plans!

The park say this could take about 80 days to complete. If construction starts in mid-September, then it is likely that the track will be completed just before Christmas this year!

When will testing happen? When could the ride open?

Once the track is complete, the next phase of construction is Mechanical and Electrical elements. Like with vertical construction and foundations, this will start whilst the ride is still being constructed, and will take around 3 months in total. This needs to be completed before the ride can start testing. If everything goes to schedule, we could see testing happen in late January. Again, for comparison, The Swarm started testing in early January 2012, and Saw – The Ride started testing just before Christmas 2008.

Following this, we could see the ride ready to open in time for the Easter Holidays in 2024. Of course, this is a very rough estimate, and depends on many factors. But, if absolutely everything goes to schedule, we could be riding Project Exodus in as little as 7 months time!!