History
In the 1970s the Coney Island Cyclone was in a state of disrepair, and was in danger of being demolished to expand a nearby aquarium. Astroworld did not have a wooden roller coaster at the time, and the owners attempted to buy the Cyclone and move it to Houston. After further study, the owners decided that a move would be prohibitively expensive, and so settled on building a replica of the Cyclone in Texas.
Astroworld hired William Cobb to design the replica of the Cyclone. He created a mirror image of the Cyclone, which was also larger and faster than the original. During the construction, which was done by the Frontier Construction Company, the north end turnaround was damaged by a tropical storm, which delayed the opening of the coaster until 1976. When the Texas Cyclone was opened, it was one of the tallest and fastest wooden roller coasters in the world, and was considered by many to be the best roller coaster in the world. In 1979, the first turn was lowered by two feet to prevent stalling, so that it could operate safely in higher winds.
Read more about this topic: Texas Cyclone
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