History
The ride was named and originally themed after the 1958 movie, Thunder Road. NASCAR celebrities, Bobby Allison and David Pearson, along with major newspapers from around the country were at Carowinds for the grand opening..
Thunder Road was originally painted red, white, and blue. Two moonshine stills were originally placed at the entrance but have since been removed.
The ride originally featured trains from the Jetstream, a roller coaster at Chicago's defunct Riverview Park. Upon arriving at Carowinds the trains were themed to resemble a Sheriff's car and an Outlaw's car, in accordance with the coaster's original theme. The Riverview trains were retired in 1980 and replaced with new, higher capacity Philadelphia Toboggan Coasters trains.
Thunder Road's trains all faced forward until one side was reversed in 1995 to run backwards. This was mainly due to the fact that at one time in the mid-1990s it was said that Thunder Road would be no longer. During the 1995-96 off season, the air conditioners in the waiting area were removed, the decorative memorabilia from years ago was removed, and over time the coaster would become a ghost of its former self as it diminished in grandeur. At the time Paramounts Carowinds was moving forward with bigger, better built roller-coasters and during that time Thunder Road started to look like a liability of sorts with its aging wood frame that required constant maintenance. Ride attendance plummeted as the new roller coasters in the park took attention away from Thunder Road. At one point in the late 1990s a rider could easily stay on the ride in the same seat as no one would be waiting in line to occupy the car. The current ownership has taken steps to renovate the coaster to its previous fame. In 2008, all trains were turned to face forward once again.
In 2008, Thunder Road faced about two months of downtime during the summer, due to track maintenance and testing. During testing in late June-early July, it was run with test dummies in the seats. It is now open and running much more smoothly.
In 2009 Carowinds rebuilt more sections of Thunder Road with the majority of the work spent rebuilding the two large turn-arounds at back end of the ride and a portion of the return track half way back. Now they have completely removed the old track in between the rebuilt sections which will make a nice long new smooth section.
Read more about this topic: Thunder Road (roller Coaster)
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