(Arnolds Park)– The Arnolds Park Amusement Park and the related Historic Arnolds Park Incorporated properties posted some strong attendance numbers this past season, even with the flooding that occurred in June. Jon Pausley, President and CEO tells KUOO news they were pleasantly surprised…
“We were really surprised when we looked at the different data. We ended up having about 585,000 unique visitors to Arnolds Park for our cell phone data that we track which ended up being about 275,000 people that came through, which is really exciting. We were actually the second largest tourism destination in the state of Iowa this summer besides the Iowa State Fair. And a fun note, we had more people come to Historic Arnolds Park’s property this summer than the Statue of Liberty did at Ellis Island.”
Pausley says there’s still a lot of hustle and bustle at the park with various renovation and maintenance projects taking place in the off-season…
“So we have the front entry tipsy house and the front entry remodel that is well underway so a lot of renovations. The tipsy house is getting completely re-done and the new entry will look totally different next year over the coaster so that’s an exciting process going on. We are also finishing up all of the final small pieces of the restoration of the Queen II and then inside of the park we have some things that we’re excited to be able to announce soon about what’s happening inside the park. The big announcement we just made is Foreigner is coming to play at Arnolds Park for two shows: an acoustic show in The Roof Garden and also an outdoor show in Preservation Plaza at the end of June, so that’s a very exciting announcement. Tickets actually go on sale in December.”
And when it comes to improvements at Arnolds Park, Pausley says they’re looking into some technology to help step up security…
“We’ve had a great relationship with the city of Arnolds Park for safety around all of our concerts and the great partnership with them, and we asked the council tonight to help fund a project, a digital twin imaging project that a lot of local school districts also have in place that just allows first responders some great access and information on their way to an emergency. So if an emergency were to happen down at Arnolds Park our first responders have a great way to be able to respond with some great information.”
The Arnolds Park City Council Wednesday evening took the $100,000 request under advisement. The funds would come from hotel-motel tax revenue.
