Once again I appreciate y’all’s patience for how long it took to make this video 😅 the new editing took a while to understand but I made it work. (Pardon for the weird audio btw I’m getting the hang of this new software) Anyways what ride do you miss most from astroworld?
20 years later I'm still pissed Six Flags killed this park. Torn down and they didn't even get half the money they expected from it and still went bankrupt. I remember it being a pretty cool park too, but needed some TLC due to the typical Six Flags neglect. If it was sold off like it should have been it could have been cleaned up and been great.
There is still nothing there to this day I always joke that it would be so cool if the Houston Livestock Show had a permanent midway just on the other side of the parking lot….you know where the big field is…..
Six Flags didn't kill it, Houston did. Let's face it, AstroWorld was in a trashy neighborhood and they could only hire employees that couldn't give a crap. AstroWorld was a dismal place to go in its final years. Good riddance to bad rubbish.
@@theoriginaldashriprock Six Flags quit investing into AstroWorld, it became the corporate dumping ground for their “ride share” program. Only one ride in the 1990s that was at AstroWorld did not come from another park. If that area is so trashy why did they build NRG Stadium there? Six Flags killed it, they were able to get some cash out of it but they didn’t care about the park at all. What they are did to AstroWorld they have been trying to do to Over Texas.
I worked at Astroworld the summers of 1976, 77, & 78. For high school and college students, it was the best summer job in the city. I worked an average of 60 hours a week or more and was paid more than minimum wage. If you worked through the Labor Day weekend, Astroworld would pay a bonus for every hour you worked from Memorial Day to Labor Day. They provided our work clothes and gave us freshly washed clothes every day. Couple of times a month after the park closed, a section would be opened for the employees with free food and rides. Again, high school and college students, it was a party. I have many many happy stories from my time there and a few tragic ones. The city really lost something special when the park closed.
As a native Houstonian and someone who used to visit Astroworld almost every year. I will never forgive the management for what they did to Astroworld. I even hate driving by the site where Astroworld once stood. It’s nothing but a vacant lot now. Don’t even get me started on what they did to the Astrodome. Such an enormous waste. 🤬
I remember being like 13 and just being dropped off with my friends to spend the day at the park. It was like the first time I ever got to be out in public unsupervised for that amount of time... such a different time it was....RIP AstroWorld
Twice a year for 15 years my family made the trip from New Orleans to Houston, we’d do 2 days at Astroworld 1 day at water world and take in an astros game on the water world day… it was paradise for a week for a kid… RIP Astroworld
Astroworld sold season tickets,it was a full day baby sitting park. It brought in gangs and riff raft. It no longer was a place for adults with children. That's what destroyed the park.
In the end Astroworld was ghetto and run down. People were constantly fighting and you couldn’t walk through without smelling the aroma of pot. The contrast of 1985 versus 2005 Astroworld was vastly different. Still miss it though.
The only way Astroworld could’ve been saved, would’ve been to clear the leadership (at that time), be more exclusive in hiring staff, and increase ticket prices a bit. But there would’ve been some kind of campaign by some kind of bitchy organization(s) trying to “cancel” Astroworld anyway.
That's most places with bad management! Atleast they would have had an opportunity to make changes if it hadn't been for the greedy fool that tore it down and didn't even make any money with the cost of the demolition! I mean, new .management, some upgrades & better security would have fixed those problems! Six Flags updates all their parks now! They even take away old rides and build new ones. It was a terrible waste!
@@fallonnugent7951 why would they cancel Astroworld? Unless you are discriminating against a particular group of people, I don’t see why anyone would “cancel” Astroworld. I need you to be more specific.
No one wants to say the real reason it closed out loud. It got sketchy and ghetto at the end. I knew lots of kids whose parents bought season passes so they could drop their bad children off there and use it as a daycare of sorts during the summer. Most of the employees were teenagers too so what were they going to do to clean it up? I had a lot of good times there.
Lots of cheap apartments built up right around it over the late 80's that housed all the single moms. By the 90's, those children grew up and turned into those ghetto hood rats. The only winning move was to close it. I'm sure their liability insurance shot up near the end, making it unprofitable since the shootings. I think there was someone that was killed by a ride, too.
Yup, black kids ruined it for everyone, as usual. Cussing, fighting, stealing people's hats, cutting in line, etc. It really started to suck from the 90s forward.
EXACTLY!! I did security there from 1988-1991. And let me tell you that you'd have gangs of AA teens who would prowl the park and just start punching on guests just for the fun of it. We called these AA teens "wolfpacks". Nobody in upper management didn't want to find a way to deal with them. Instead they wanted their season pass money and their business. That was more important to them than guests safety. And the final straw was a big brawl between 2 groups of AA girls back in 2004 or 2005. It even made the news. From there, park attendance declined greatly. Talk about a self inflicted wound.
I'd be down with Six Flags rebuilding Astroworld from the ground up, complete with new versions of all the old rides along with completely new ride concepts. IMO, closing the park was a mistake and it's high time Houston got a new theme park.
@@ChuckE.CheesesIllinois Building it in the same location would be the worst possible mistake that they could make. Location is what killed the park to begin with. It would need to be built at least 20-30 miles outside of Houston. No theme park is going to survive within an urban area today without massive amounts of security and insanely high ticket prices.
@StillLivinginthewoods Hmmm I do agree about the last part, however Six Flags also got greedy with its location and didn't enforce enough security. Idk how the area is now but I assume it's better than back in the day
I am a Houston resident and some of my fondest memories of my youth came at Astroworld. It was as good as many of the theme parks I have been to and better than many. I will never forget the wild party during grad night, 1974. It was a shame that Astroworld died because of extremely bad upper management. Now all that's left is an empty field. Sad!
Astroworld was awestome. Working there as a teenager was a rite of passage and it kept a lot of kids "off the street". Made lifelong friends there as well.
I am from Houston born and raised. I had been going to Astroworld since I was 6 months old. Had a season pass ever since they were first introduced in the 70's. Me and my best friend got the last public ride on the Texas Cyclone October 30, 2005 the park closed at 6 we did not get to ride till 9:30 that night that is how long the lines got towards the end of the day. Now we have Diamond Elite membership s and drive to Arlington or San Antonio.
Me and my friend also got to be on the last public ride of the Cyclone. As ACE members, we got to be on one of the last rides after it was closed to the general public. The very last riders were AstroWorld employees and rightfully so.
Thanks for the video. I was there on the last day of operation. I will never forget it as it was August 29, 2025. My family evacuated from New Orleans for hurricane Katrina. I had a season pass as we visited SFOG every year. Since the season pass gave us access to all parks we decided to go that Sunday to take our minds off the hurricane. The sad thing was that the park announced that everyone with a Louisiana I.D. Would gain free admission to the park on the Labor Day weekend. Sounds great…. But that Wednesday they transported all the people stuck at the Superdome ito the Astrodome. Over 10,000 people with Louisiana I.D.’s right across the street. The park made a quick announcement that the park would never open again. That was the day 2 parks died as SF New Orleans would never open again as well.
@@Honald-yt5dy I think you must be referring to the date of Katrina, I thought you were talking about the last day the park was open. I actually missed the 2025 until you pointed it out!
@@codytraweek4407 that was the last day the park actually was open for guest. It never opened Labor Day weekend. I was evacuated there for 3 weeks and it never opened at all while I was there.
I know no one will talk about this but one reason a lot of Houston stopped going to astroworld after a while was because they would always have low price days where large groups of black people would run around the park like hooligans .
I loved sux flags. I actually rode the ride that took a few people lives a few days before it happened. The bar didn't stay down and I almost flew out thank God I didn't. This was some of the best days until that happened and closed down. Astroworld was on the opposite side of the freeway of the dome
Coca Cola all night parties were cool. Rode the cyclone 12 straight times and never had to get off. Astroworld season pass was the way to go if you lived close.
I wouldn’t say Astroworld failed. It operated perfectly fine for nearly 40 years. I personally think Six Flags, and not the whole company, but their at-the-time CEO failed Astroworld.
Astroworld was removed before I was born but my dad is a huge roller coaster nerd and grew up in Houston so I know a decent amount about the park. Now the land is used as overflow parking for large events, there is a trolly that runs across the bridge to take you to the stadium. every time my family goes, my dad points out the location of where certain rides used to be.
And yet they built the Metro train line there and built Reliant stadium, which hosts the HLSR, Super Bowls, World Cup matches, bowl games, graduations, etc. And with the TMC being down the block, it's rapidly becoming gentrified. It was greed that did it in and they used fear mongering to justify it.
@cleopatrajones2024. And how would you know? I worked in security there and we had gangs of AA teens who would jump and assault anyone who wasn't black just for the fun of it. Back then, we called them "wolf packs". 🐺 And don't get me started on the D rope Off Zone and the McDonald's on the other side of the Freeway. In fact, we called the Drop Off Zone ( DOZ) the DMZ.
This park is a prime example of what happens when you know what’s take over an area. It becomes a dump. No one wants to say it, but it’s the truth about what happened to it
I still mourn Astroworld. Born in 67, live less than 2 hours away, I grew up going there. Went my whole life and took my son born in 1990. What a huge loss.
Fun trivia fact! the bridge going over 610 was the first privately owned, publicly accessible bridge to go over a federal highway. Thanks to Hofheinz friendship with LBJ.
Well. did you know that? There was one year before the Rodeo owned it that they didn't allow access across the bridge which you can imagine really "put a spur in their boots" as they would say. I've been a committee member for years but I don't know the legal wranglings of who owns what but I do park in that space when I work out there, Answer me back if you want to hear my funny LBJ story, PS, I wasn't born here
Great video, appreciate the work!! Astroworld was our home park when I was a kid in the 80’s and 90’s. Really sparked my love for parks and rides. My wife and I are rekindling now thanks to parks like Fiesta Texas and creators like you. 🙏 Seeing XLR8 really took me back!
Six Flags ruined Astroworld! From making the employees pay for previously free meals, to tearing out popular rides and putting in roller coaster after roller coaster after roller coaster (and jacking up the price every year to pay for them), to blocking the "Alpine Sleigh Ride" in "Looney Tunes Land" (can't ride it any more unless you have a kid with you). The problems with the "ghetto" crowd was the final nail in the coffin.
Astroworld started a program where you could get a season pass for like $99.00 or something. What this did was Astroworld became a babysitter for the inner city youth in the summer as kids would be dropped off and spend the day there with no supervision. These kids were hoodlums and drove off the good paying customers and this is what caused Astroworld to be shut down.
I miss Astroworld more and more every year. Twice as much during Rodeo where we literally park on the graveyard of Astroworld and then walk across the, formerly happiest, now saddest, bridge in Houston
Astroworld was my home park. The park started going downhill after 9/11/2001 as did a bunch of other companies started losing money post 9/11. The last time I was able to visit was September 2004. The place was becoming a dump for the hood. I wasn't surprised when it shutdown.
Yup. It cost nothing for a season pass and it was basically daycare for the ghetto that was within walking distance... I remember my last visit the rows of metal detectors.
I worked at Astroworld for five years. In 1991 Goodyear shut down it's blimp base on the north side of Houston. At the same time, the Astroworld CEO asked employees for ideas to improve the park. I wrote a well researched, three page precis on how it would behoove the park to move to the former blimp base. I received a condescending "We're happy where we're at" letter in return. We see how well that worked out.
@far22186 The blimp base was available AND there was empty land adjacent to the base and where the trailer park is (soon to be vacated) could have been had and don't forget the water park right across the freeway (set up a pedestrian bridge). Another selling point was that this was a good area compared to the old AW site, which was in a bad neighborhood (section 8 housing, adult entertainment, etc.).
@luddite In 1991, there was section 8 housing (filled with not so nice law breaking people) on the east and west sides of the park and just beyond the section 8 housing, establishments where women without clothing danced.
As someone who grew up going to Astroworld frequently as a kid in the 90's, it was sad to see it close it's doors. I'll never forget going to Fright Fest during Halloween time. So many memories of that place and even Waterworld to some extent. The Dungeon Drop I have 2 vivid memories of. 1 being the first time I rode it- my dad was counting while waiting in line. Counting so he could prepare for the drop. The person working there must've heard him. When we were at the top he started his countdown and when it came time all you heard was " three, two, oooooooooooooooone!!!" Dude let it rip a second early haha. The second one was not such a good memory but its one that's hars to forget. One of the kids i went to school with was somewhat large- so when he got seated and locked in, the bars and its locks were stressed to say the least. On it's ascent, the lock popped open and he fell out of the seat, luckily he was only about 20 feet off the ground. Could've been worse... ended up breaking his leg and his arms in the process but he survived. That was towards the end of the parks existence, like late '03, early '04. The park needed some TLC for sure but it didn't deserve it's fate. Definitely could do with another theme park for sure. It's sad that ALL the things I have fond memories of from when I was a kid are all gone now. AstroWorld, WaterWorld, each of the schools I went to, my childhood home, my little league ballpark, ALL just gone. Hell even the Astrodome isn't the same. Im only 34. Would've been nice to have one bastion of memories that remained the same, or didn't completely get torn down.
@@Emotionalsavage281 do you happen to remember what the name of the log ride was? I remember standing on that bridge eating some dip-n-dots fully unaware that when the log comes down it hosed the bridge. Needed a new ice cream treat after that lmao. That's cool about Mic! I think XLR8 was my favorite. Partly because it had you swinging, partly because the whole time I was checking my pockets to make sure I wasn't losing anything. I remember my dad telling me that he knew someone who lost a prosthetic leg on that ride. I also enjoyed the Mayan mind bender. Loved the brief ride in the AC and darkness on those hot summer days! I remember always wanting to ride the cycle but not being tall enough, and by the time I was, it scaring the crap out of me because of the creaking. Never did get to ride it. Was only tall enough once before the park shutdown and I had second thoughts on that visit.
A lot of people that don't live in Houston aren't aware that it's actually the fourth largest city in the country behind LA, Chicago and New York and has over 4 million people in it's metro. The fact that such a large customer base doesn't have a major theme park less than 3 hours away is just mind blowing. I get that people don't go to Houston for tourism but the population base alone should be enough to sustain a theme park. And plenty of people pass through on there way to vacation in Galveston as well. It's pretty surprising that one of the big companies haven't tried to build a new park in the city especially when you consider that it would basically be able to operate year round because of the warm winters (winter temps in Houston mirror those in Central Florida). To this day something like 90% of the area that Astroworld was built on remains vacant and unused. The Astrodome remains standing but unused as well, decades after it was last used. I'm not real estate mogul but that sure does look like piss poor land management to me.
Astroworld dominates my childhood memories in the late 70s and early 80s. For me the beginning of the end was when they closed the alpine sleigh ride and put looney tunes themed attractions there.
My friends and I used to get dropped off and stay the whole day into the night as many days per week as we could in the summer. They sold season passes for 29.95 and most of the time you could get a discount on a season pass or daily park entry with a coke can. They had "Magic 'till midnight" and..... let's not forget "The Boogie Fog Disco" Think about - no phones - no tracking. You might call your parents from a pay phone to stay later or leave early otherwsie you left the park and walked over the bridge and they had a pickup area for parents to pick you up. It was a hard requirement that you must have your hands and arms straight up and not hold on on Texas Cyclone and Greased Lightning. "Allllll clear - boom :)" For me the peak years would be 78-82. I got a car and license in 83. We still went but many other things to do after that. :)
Lived in Houston from ‘75-‘80. Seasons pass, parents dropped us off. Used to love riding the Texas Cyclone and many others. Had my first kiss at Boogie Fog Disco (embarrassing, I know).😂
This video was so depressing I can't begin to tell you all the memories and fun I had here , it was more than just fun it was the best times of my life
Only moved to Houston a few years ago but as someone who loves coasters/parks it’s such a bummer that this doesn’t exist anymore, having a big park within a 30 minute drive would’ve been a dream come true for me, plus getting to ride classics like the Texas Cyclone. RIP Astroworld
I worked there in '69, '70, and '71. Best job I have ever had. I had a lot of fun working there and met loads of other people my age from different schools from all over the Houston area. Lots of very fond memories.
Who remembers the gang shooting that happened in either 93 or 94 at Houston’s Astroworld? Before that happened there were no metal detectors at the entrance.
I hate that Astroworld closed. Would go there every year when I Would visit grandma. Had my favorite roller-coaster ever. The Texas Cyclone......will always be missed.
I lived in Houston at the time of the park closure, the media said that the reason the park was closed and ripped down was to make way for condos in the area and that the land was worth more than the park was. Oddly after the Park closed and it was torn down the condo thing never happened. Years went by and it was just a vacant lot and after a while they did use it for overflow parking during the Houston livestock show and rodeo. The sad thing is that even though Houston is 3rd or 4th largest city in the country can't support an amusement park.
The area around 6 Flags turned into bad neighborhoods. Moving it would of been great. Spring would of been perfect. But as Disney has found out, you just can't keep all the bad people out.
I don't know if you're a native Texan or not but you got to remember if you are that the gang violence at that Park was so bad that is the main reason besides parking they closed it down
@JBThrills I remember when they closed down and auctioned off a lot of the stuff my dad had actually kept one of the roller coaster ride cars he still has it in his shop
Thanks for the video! I remember when I was 6 years old, back in 1993, was the first time I went to Astroworld. Mom had my siblings and me get on the Astroneedle (it’s the white observation tower in the footage) and I was scared, because I had no idea what it did. Once it was back on the ground, I was like ‘that wasn’t so bad.’ lol. My first ever roller coaster was the Viper, the green roller coaster with the serpent on the tunnel. It was a big thing to me back then, but now it’s child’s play. lol I had so many good memories with this park. I definitely get nostalgic feeling when looking at footage from the days it was here. Again thanks for the video.
I miss Astroworld. Great memories from my childhood. My last memory was with my brother in 2003 while he was dealing with ALS. He couldn't ride the rides, but he smiled the whole time. He passed in 2004.
My mom would get us season passes most summers. A lot of my teenage years were spent there. Man i miss that place. Astroworld was a casualty of allowing mediocre dudes to have positions of power.
Six Flags AstroWorld always interested me and i wish it was still around, it would've made all those trips I've taken to houston more fun. I fully blame Six Flags' 2000s management for the park going defunct because it would still have been around had Six Flags not been financially unstable and got too greedy selling the land
I’ve been in Houston since 1978. Astroworld was my home park until it closed. We had season passes for a very long time. It really started to fall apart in the final years, but we still went! I miss it so much! I really wish they’d do something in Houston again! If not six flags, some kind of coaster therapy is needed close to home.
I appreciate this a lot. I grew up going to this park. My first ACE event sadly was saying goodbye to Astroworld although it was after the park had closed to the public, we still got some ERT. I wonder if we were some of the very last people to ride? I loved Ultra Twister and Taz’s Tornado the most. Great memories, this park turned me into an enthusiast.
You opened up old wounds.... Man, I used to spend most of my summers there. Loved Grease Lightning and Xcelerate. And I liked how you could get those $10 or $20 off deals on cans of coke.
As a kid from south Texas we had a season pass for the summers. Got to ride all the coaster from Excalibur, XLR, Texas Cyclone, Ultra Twister, Viper, Greased Lightning, even the Mayan Mind Bender, but my absolute favorite was Batman the Escape. The Batcave was cool.
Hey, thanks for the great video!. I haven't seen anything out on AstroWorld in a long time. It was nice. Unfortunately it also made me tear up a little. I was pretty close to the park lived 5 minutes away and still have a room full of cool memorabilia. I used to go to the park at least one night a week. Great job on your video. Thank you!.
I was 12 when they shut the park down but man did I have a bunch of memories. More good than bad but my favorite things to do and eat there was the Bamboo Shoot, Texas Cyclone, the buggy rides, they had the best Frito Pie and for some reason the Corn dogs were better than any other theme park I went to. I remember one of the last times going in 2004 wasn’t the best time I’ve had. Someone tried to fight porky pig, another fight happened because a kid was taking too long on the sword in stone, the rides were delayed all day, the day started sunny and hot and turned into a stormy muggy afternoon. The last thing I ever did before leaving was watching my dad get roped into buying time Warner cable because he’d get free season passes for 2005 and we never used them because eventually the park closed lol
I think that once Six Flags accquired Feista Texas and the Oilers left Houston, Astroworld was doomed. Astroworld became the middle child of Six Flags' Texas parks: It wasn't the older child that Over Texas was and thus received a lot of attention, or the younger child that Feista Texas was and thus was the shiny new toy for Six Flags to pour money into. So they just left Astroworld to fall into decay.
The last time I was at Astroworld in the 2000s, Grease Lightning, my favorite ride at the time, malfunctioned and went too fast. Scared the crap out of me, and I don't think I've ridden a roller coaster since then. Lots of fun memories from the 80s and 90s, though.
I was on the last ride with my cousins. They let us stay on the coaster for two or three consecutive go arounds. I was recently moved to Houston and it was a fun 10 minutes to an otherwise sad day. I always thought another one would be built, but it only makes me angrier every year seeing the dirt lot that used to be the happiest place in Houston and nothing going on with the Dome.
I grew up closer to Dallas and went to Six Flags in Arlington more as a kid but they ran commercials for Astroworld and I remember wishing we could go down there one time. We never did make it, not I live closer to Houston and its weird that there is no big theme park in one of the country's largest cities. Seeing that empty field and the shell of the Astrodome is sad even though I don't have childhood memories of going to either.
I never lived in Houston, but I drive through from time to time. I had been to astroworld when I was 10, and other than that, would see it driving by on 610. It was very weird, going down 610 one day and it was just completely gone.
I have a theory that they might open another Houston Park so there is empty plot land near Hurricane Harbor Splashtown so I can see a smaller theme park similar to Discover kingdom open but anyways, this video was amazing 🤠
One fact to remember regarding the decision to close Astroworld: Six Flags estimated the property value based upon pretty rosy economic forecasts. Unfortunately, between the announced closure in 2005 and the property going on the market in 2007 was the year 2006, not a good year for the economics of Houston. Oil companies were taking hits that year, and a lot of Houston development was stalled or cancelled. This included the Astroworld site. If the site had been sold in 2005, Six Flags would have make a fortune. But the economic downturn meant that by 2007 the site was worth about half what it had been. To make matters worse, the area around Astroworld had been in decline for a while. The opening of the football stadium was supposed to be the beginning of a rebuilding of the area. The whole redevelopment never happened, and to this day that part of Houston is run down and depressed. The Six Flags management looked at the value of operating the park compared to the value of selling just the land and made a choice. Unfortunately, their economic forecasts turned out to be wrong, and Houston got a giant parking lot and storage area in place of what had been a decent amusement park.
Astroland was the most magical place in Houston very much a world of it’s own in a concrete slab of a city. Lots of greenery and innovative ideas too keep park visitors cool while waiting in line each section had a completely different vibe. It’s hard to believe so much fit in the space that was left behind.
I blame Greezed lightning for my love of speed and coasters! I still love launch coasters. I could literally go to Astroworld and ride Greezed lightning all day and never get sick of it. Excalibur was my very first coaster as a kid. I still remember Cyclone and how big and fast it seemed as a kid. When I got older, that ride just hurt! I rode it so many times, the layout was embedded in my brain! Remember Taz Tornado? The triple loop that was in the park for what seemed like a year or two? It was ok. I was the person who needed speed and adrenaline (still am into my 50s now), but when XLR-8 came out, I thought it was dumb! It was neat when they turned the cars for fright fest though. Mayan Mindbender the indoor dark coaster, it was lame but neat because we didn’t have a dark indoor coaster. Viper was fun. Ultra twister broke my collar bone, (literally) the restraints were horrid. Looping starship was a vomit comet. Ohhhhhh dungeon drop and skyscreamer are to blame for my love of drop towers. I remember putting Pennie’s on my knees on skyscreamer and when you dropped the Pennie’s floated in front of your face! So many memories were just dug up on this vlog! Wow, I miss it!
In the last years of astroworld, it was a very dismal place to be. The park was dirty, trashy, employees that didn't seem to care about their job. The last year too it was open, we went to Six Flags in arlington, and got back home to Houston and decided to go to astroworld.... unbelievable difference between the two night and day! The one in Arlington was very well-kept, very clean, very good employees working there. You wouldn't know that the two parks were owned by the same company.
Once again I appreciate y’all’s patience for how long it took to make this video 😅 the new editing took a while to understand but I made it work. (Pardon for the weird audio btw I’m getting the hang of this new software) Anyways what ride do you miss most from astroworld?
I miss the Alpine Sleigh Ride. 😥
Greezed Lightnin'
Mayan mindbender
Texas Cyclone
XLR8 was my favorite... Sky Screamer was a close second, though.
20 years later I'm still pissed Six Flags killed this park. Torn down and they didn't even get half the money they expected from it and still went bankrupt. I remember it being a pretty cool park too, but needed some TLC due to the typical Six Flags neglect. If it was sold off like it should have been it could have been cleaned up and been great.
There is still nothing there to this day
I always joke that it would be so cool if the Houston Livestock Show had a permanent midway just on the other side of the parking lot….you know where the big field is…..
Six Flags didn't kill it, Houston did. Let's face it, AstroWorld was in a trashy neighborhood and they could only hire employees that couldn't give a crap. AstroWorld was a dismal place to go in its final years. Good riddance to bad rubbish.
@@theoriginaldashriprock
Six Flags quit investing into AstroWorld, it became the corporate dumping ground for their “ride share” program. Only one ride in the 1990s that was at AstroWorld did not come from another park.
If that area is so trashy why did they build NRG Stadium there?
Six Flags killed it, they were able to get some cash out of it but they didn’t care about the park at all. What they are did to AstroWorld they have been trying to do to Over Texas.
The Viper, Xcellerate and Excalibur were gems. I’ll never forget all the swamp lands under the rides!
@@SnicesqworkLooping starship, ultra twister, and greased lightning as well.
I worked at Astroworld the summers of 1976, 77, & 78. For high school and college students, it was the best summer job in the city. I worked an average of 60 hours a week or more and was paid more than minimum wage. If you worked through the Labor Day weekend, Astroworld would pay a bonus for every hour you worked from Memorial Day to Labor Day. They provided our work clothes and gave us freshly washed clothes every day. Couple of times a month after the park closed, a section would be opened for the employees with free food and rides. Again, high school and college students, it was a party. I have many many happy stories from my time there and a few tragic ones. The city really lost something special when the park closed.
That’s so amazing seriously such a special experience 🔥
AstroWorld stop being special many, many years before it closed. The place was a dump in a bad neighborhood.
As a native Houstonian and someone who used to visit Astroworld almost every year. I will never forgive the management for what they did to Astroworld. I even hate driving by the site where Astroworld once stood. It’s nothing but a vacant lot now. Don’t even get me started on what they did to the Astrodome. Such an enormous waste. 🤬
I remember being like 13 and just being dropped off with my friends to spend the day at the park. It was like the first time I ever got to be out in public unsupervised for that amount of time... such a different time it was....RIP AstroWorld
Twice a year for 15 years my family made the trip from New Orleans to Houston, we’d do 2 days at Astroworld 1 day at water world and take in an astros game on the water world day… it was paradise for a week for a kid… RIP Astroworld
Astroworld sold season tickets,it was a full day baby sitting park. It brought in gangs and riff raft. It no longer was a place for adults with children. That's what destroyed the park.
In the end Astroworld was ghetto and run down.
People were constantly fighting and you couldn’t walk through without smelling the aroma of pot.
The contrast of 1985 versus 2005 Astroworld was vastly different.
Still miss it though.
The only way Astroworld could’ve been saved, would’ve been to clear the leadership (at that time), be more exclusive in hiring staff, and increase ticket prices a bit. But there would’ve been some kind of campaign by some kind of bitchy organization(s) trying to “cancel” Astroworld anyway.
That's most places with bad management! Atleast they would have had an opportunity to make changes if it hadn't been for the greedy fool that tore it down and didn't even make any money with the cost of the demolition! I mean, new .management, some upgrades & better security would have fixed those problems! Six Flags updates all their parks now! They even take away old rides and build new ones. It was a terrible waste!
@@fallonnugent7951 why would they cancel Astroworld? Unless you are discriminating against a particular group of people, I don’t see why anyone would “cancel” Astroworld. I need you to be more specific.
@@ScottieDrippenI guess maybe Travis Scott, but like he only made his album because the park went away
We smoked on the cable cars, so we didn't get caught...lol
Astroworld turned into Ghetto World.
It smelled like dank and hood.
No one wants to say the real reason it closed out loud. It got sketchy and ghetto at the end. I knew lots of kids whose parents bought season passes so they could drop their bad children off there and use it as a daycare of sorts during the summer. Most of the employees were teenagers too so what were they going to do to clean it up? I had a lot of good times there.
Lots of cheap apartments built up right around it over the late 80's that housed all the single moms. By the 90's, those children grew up and turned into those ghetto hood rats. The only winning move was to close it. I'm sure their liability insurance shot up near the end, making it unprofitable since the shootings. I think there was someone that was killed by a ride, too.
I literally just typed this lol
Yup, black kids ruined it for everyone, as usual. Cussing, fighting, stealing people's hats, cutting in line, etc. It really started to suck from the 90s forward.
EXACTLY!! I did security there from 1988-1991. And let me tell you that you'd have gangs of AA teens who would prowl the park and just start punching on guests just for the fun of it. We called these AA teens "wolfpacks". Nobody in upper management didn't want to find a way to deal with them. Instead they wanted their season pass money and their business. That was more important to them than guests safety.
And the final straw was a big brawl between 2 groups of AA girls back in 2004 or 2005. It even made the news. From there, park attendance declined greatly. Talk about a self inflicted wound.
@@vxy357I went numerous times during that time span and my family had zero issues. This was the 2nd best theme park I’ve been too Disney being first.
Astroworld was awesome! Closing it down was a huge mistake. I loved the old wooden roller coaster the Texas Cyclone.
I’ve been to Astroworld more times than I can count from when it first opened. They used to have cool rock concerts there back in the 80s.
I'd be down with Six Flags rebuilding Astroworld from the ground up, complete with new versions of all the old rides along with completely new ride concepts. IMO, closing the park was a mistake and it's high time Houston got a new theme park.
Yes!! I’ve been saying for years! if a Texas billionaire was really smart…they’re remake Astroworld with updated rides, somewhere near Houston
@@Caglecardscollectibles21 I mean the old plot still can be used, just gotta get a parking structure
@@ChuckE.CheesesIllinois Building it in the same location would be the worst possible mistake that they could make.
Location is what killed the park to begin with. It would need to be built at least 20-30 miles outside of Houston.
No theme park is going to survive within an urban area today without massive amounts of security and insanely high ticket prices.
@StillLivinginthewoods Hmmm I do agree about the last part, however Six Flags also got greedy with its location and didn't enforce enough security. Idk how the area is now but I assume it's better than back in the day
I always felt like I was going to fly out of Excalibur as a kid lol them lapbars 😂😂😂😂
I loved that helix that you couldn’t see coming at the end
@theheardtheorem mini mine train my ass 😆 🤣 😂 that ride was wild!
I am a Houston resident and some of my fondest memories of my youth came at Astroworld. It was as good as many of the theme parks I have been to and better than many. I will never forget the wild party during grad night, 1974. It was a shame that Astroworld died because of extremely bad upper management. Now all that's left is an empty field. Sad!
Astroworld was awestome. Working there as a teenager was a rite of passage and it kept a lot of kids "off the street". Made lifelong friends there as well.
It’s 2025 and I still miss astroworld and waterworld…. I saw the go-go’s and stray cats in concert there…… memories ❤❤❤❤
I am from Houston born and raised. I had been going to Astroworld since I was 6 months old. Had a season pass ever since they were first introduced in the 70's. Me and my best friend got the last public ride on the Texas Cyclone October 30, 2005 the park closed at 6 we did not get to ride till 9:30 that night that is how long the lines got towards the end of the day. Now we have Diamond Elite membership s and drive to Arlington or San Antonio.
Me and my friend also got to be on the last public ride of the Cyclone. As ACE members, we got to be on one of the last rides after it was closed to the general public. The very last riders were AstroWorld employees and rightfully so.
i miss astroworld so much. I'm just glad I got to experience it as a child and teen.
Thanks for the video. I was there on the last day of operation. I will never forget it as it was August 29, 2025. My family evacuated from New Orleans for hurricane Katrina. I had a season pass as we visited SFOG every year. Since the season pass gave us access to all parks we decided to go that Sunday to take our minds off the hurricane. The sad thing was that the park announced that everyone with a Louisiana I.D. Would gain free admission to the park on the Labor Day weekend. Sounds great…. But that Wednesday they transported all the people stuck at the Superdome ito the Astrodome. Over 10,000 people with Louisiana I.D.’s right across the street. The park made a quick announcement that the park would never open again. That was the day 2 parks died as SF New Orleans would never open again as well.
"I will never forget..." then proceed to type the wrong date.
@ was typo we all know it was 2005. lol
@@Honald-yt5dy I think you must be referring to the date of Katrina, I thought you were talking about the last day the park was open. I actually missed the 2025 until you pointed it out!
@@codytraweek4407 that was the last day the park actually was open for guest. It never opened Labor Day weekend. I was evacuated there for 3 weeks and it never opened at all while I was there.
I’d do almost anything for one last ride on Texas Cyclone and Viper 😢
And the Greased Lightning.
Grease lighting and serial thriller were cool too
I know no one will talk about this but one reason a lot of Houston stopped going to astroworld after a while was because they would always have low price days where large groups of black people would run around the park like hooligans .
Cussing, cutting lines, fighting, stealing, etc. They really did ruin it for everyone.
Truth
ABSOLUTELY CORRECT!
Yes, some of my most positive memories as a child were the day-long trips to Astroworld.
I loved sux flags. I actually rode the ride that took a few people lives a few days before it happened. The bar didn't stay down and I almost flew out thank God I didn't. This was some of the best days until that happened and closed down. Astroworld was on the opposite side of the freeway of the dome
Gone, but never forgotten. We still wish it was still around.
Gone but not forgotten 🙏🏽
Coca Cola all night parties were cool. Rode the cyclone 12 straight times and never had to get off. Astroworld season pass was the way to go if you lived close.
I wouldn’t say Astroworld failed. It operated perfectly fine for nearly 40 years. I personally think Six Flags, and not the whole company, but their at-the-time CEO failed Astroworld.
We all know why Astroworld closed and it wasn't Six Flags management. Thugstroworld became a liability. Full of hood rats.
He certainly did, but the parking situation, as well as shifting demographics, were two contributing factors that were beyond his control
@@airlar4857Parking is a kinda because Reliant/NRG were ok with sharing parking with the park, but Kieren didn't want that
Being born and raised in 1975 in Houston i got to spend alot of summers there and loved every minute of it .
Astroworld was removed before I was born but my dad is a huge roller coaster nerd and grew up in Houston so I know a decent amount about the park. Now the land is used as overflow parking for large events, there is a trolly that runs across the bridge to take you to the stadium. every time my family goes, my dad points out the location of where certain rides used to be.
Aye recreated the park in planet coaster
@@FishFlags1780 nice. planet coaster 1 or planect coaster 2?
RIP Astroworld. Who else had a season pass in the 90's?
"They paved paradise, and put up a parking lot"
Nothings paved, just dirt lot with rodeo ticket booths sitting on it
Great Joni Mitchell song, big yellow taxi, and she was correct!
Gangs took it over and crime went through the roof.
And yet they built the Metro train line there and built Reliant stadium, which hosts the HLSR, Super Bowls, World Cup matches, bowl games, graduations, etc. And with the TMC being down the block, it's rapidly becoming gentrified. It was greed that did it in and they used fear mongering to justify it.
No it did not. That's a lie. Gangs? Really
@@cleopatrajones2024 don’t kid yourself. The niggas took it over and made it a dump. It’s the truth no one wants to admit
@cleopatrajones2024. And how would you know? I worked in security there and we had gangs of AA teens who would jump and assault anyone who wasn't black just for the fun of it. Back then, we called them "wolf packs". 🐺 And don't get me started on the D rope Off Zone and the McDonald's on the other side of the Freeway. In fact, we called the Drop Off Zone ( DOZ) the DMZ.
It’s pretty sad that the 4th largest city in the US doesn’t have an amusement park.
It's sad that we had a great amusement park that was ruined
Growing up Astroworld was the best place to go. I was a season pass holder for many year!
This park is a prime example of what happens when you know what’s take over an area. It becomes a dump. No one wants to say it, but it’s the truth about what happened to it
I still mourn Astroworld. Born in 67, live less than 2 hours away, I grew up going there. Went my whole life and took my son born in 1990. What a huge loss.
Them Northside vs Southside fights were crazy…😂 once it got ratchet, it was a wrap 🤷🏾♂️
Yeah I remember going in 2001 and it being pretty run down. Six Flags just completely neglected the park.
Worked there in ‘92 and ‘93, amazing memories. Still upset after 20 years that it’s gone.
so excited to see this on my feed, thankyou!!! our patience will persevere! 🎉
You’re welcome! It’s fun to make videos like these for y’all
Fun trivia fact! the bridge going over 610 was the first privately owned, publicly accessible bridge to go over a federal highway. Thanks to Hofheinz friendship with LBJ.
Interesting!
Well. did you know that? There was one year before the Rodeo owned it that they didn't allow access across the bridge which you can imagine really "put a spur in their boots" as they would say. I've been a committee member for years but I don't know the legal wranglings of who owns what but I do park in that space when I work out there, Answer me back if you want to hear my funny LBJ story, PS, I wasn't born here
Great video, appreciate the work!!
Astroworld was our home park when I was a kid in the 80’s and 90’s. Really sparked my love for parks and rides. My wife and I are rekindling now thanks to parks like Fiesta Texas and creators like you. 🙏
Seeing XLR8 really took me back!
Thank you for watching! I’m so happy to be able to talk Texas parks and roller coasters with y’all 🙏🏽 astroworld needs more content online
Miss this place! 😢
Everyone knows what killed Astroworld. Basketball Americans.
Six Flags ruined Astroworld! From making the employees pay for previously free meals, to tearing out popular rides and putting in roller coaster after roller coaster after roller coaster (and jacking up the price every year to pay for them), to blocking the "Alpine Sleigh Ride" in "Looney Tunes Land" (can't ride it any more unless you have a kid with you). The problems with the "ghetto" crowd was the final nail in the coffin.
I remember a brawl between 2 groups of AA girls ended up on the news in 2004 or 2005.
@@vxy357 Yeah, I seem to recall that also.
I wish it didn’t go… Houston will never have a Theme park like that again.
Astroworld started a program where you could get a season pass for like $99.00 or something. What this did was Astroworld became a babysitter for the inner city youth in the summer as kids would be dropped off and spend the day there with no supervision. These kids were hoodlums and drove off the good paying customers and this is what caused Astroworld to be shut down.
I miss Astroworld more and more every year. Twice as much during Rodeo where we literally park on the graveyard of Astroworld and then walk across the, formerly happiest, now saddest, bridge in Houston
Astroworld was my home park. The park started going downhill after 9/11/2001 as did a bunch of other companies started losing money post 9/11. The last time I was able to visit was September 2004. The place was becoming a dump for the hood. I wasn't surprised when it shutdown.
Yup. It cost nothing for a season pass and it was basically daycare for the ghetto that was within walking distance... I remember my last visit the rows of metal detectors.
We might have been there at the same time cause that's when I last went lol
@@loboneiner1034I’m 24 now and last time I went was for my birthday 4/16/05. So many good memories 😢
I worked at Astroworld for five years. In 1991 Goodyear shut down it's blimp base on the north side of Houston. At the same time, the Astroworld CEO asked employees for ideas to improve the park. I wrote a well researched, three page precis on how it would behoove the park to move to the former blimp base. I received a condescending "We're happy where we're at" letter in return. We see how well that worked out.
Lol. The land where home depot and lowes is not as big as astroworld
@far22186 The blimp base was available AND there was empty land adjacent to the base and where the trailer park is (soon to be vacated) could have been had and don't forget the water park right across the freeway (set up a pedestrian bridge). Another selling point was that this was a good area compared to the old AW site, which was in a bad neighborhood (section 8 housing, adult entertainment, etc.).
That was a good idea
@@The_Dudester When the park was built, there was no neighborhood south of 610!!
@luddite In 1991, there was section 8 housing (filled with not so nice law breaking people) on the east and west sides of the park and just beyond the section 8 housing, establishments where women without clothing danced.
As someone who grew up going to Astroworld frequently as a kid in the 90's, it was sad to see it close it's doors. I'll never forget going to Fright Fest during Halloween time. So many memories of that place and even Waterworld to some extent. The Dungeon Drop I have 2 vivid memories of. 1 being the first time I rode it- my dad was counting while waiting in line. Counting so he could prepare for the drop. The person working there must've heard him. When we were at the top he started his countdown and when it came time all you heard was " three, two, oooooooooooooooone!!!" Dude let it rip a second early haha.
The second one was not such a good memory but its one that's hars to forget. One of the kids i went to school with was somewhat large- so when he got seated and locked in, the bars and its locks were stressed to say the least. On it's ascent, the lock popped open and he fell out of the seat, luckily he was only about 20 feet off the ground. Could've been worse... ended up breaking his leg and his arms in the process but he survived. That was towards the end of the parks existence, like late '03, early '04.
The park needed some TLC for sure but it didn't deserve it's fate. Definitely could do with another theme park for sure. It's sad that ALL the things I have fond memories of from when I was a kid are all gone now. AstroWorld, WaterWorld, each of the schools I went to, my childhood home, my little league ballpark, ALL just gone. Hell even the Astrodome isn't the same. Im only 34. Would've been nice to have one bastion of memories that remained the same, or didn't completely get torn down.
I rode the dungeon drop with mic Foley aka man kind the wrestler
Serial thriller and grease lighting where probably my favorite
@@Emotionalsavage281 do you happen to remember what the name of the log ride was? I remember standing on that bridge eating some dip-n-dots fully unaware that when the log comes down it hosed the bridge. Needed a new ice cream treat after that lmao.
That's cool about Mic! I think XLR8 was my favorite. Partly because it had you swinging, partly because the whole time I was checking my pockets to make sure I wasn't losing anything. I remember my dad telling me that he knew someone who lost a prosthetic leg on that ride.
I also enjoyed the Mayan mind bender. Loved the brief ride in the AC and darkness on those hot summer days!
I remember always wanting to ride the cycle but not being tall enough, and by the time I was, it scaring the crap out of me because of the creaking. Never did get to ride it. Was only tall enough once before the park shutdown and I had second thoughts on that visit.
A lot of people that don't live in Houston aren't aware that it's actually the fourth largest city in the country behind LA, Chicago and New York and has over 4 million people in it's metro. The fact that such a large customer base doesn't have a major theme park less than 3 hours away is just mind blowing. I get that people don't go to Houston for tourism but the population base alone should be enough to sustain a theme park. And plenty of people pass through on there way to vacation in Galveston as well. It's pretty surprising that one of the big companies haven't tried to build a new park in the city especially when you consider that it would basically be able to operate year round because of the warm winters (winter temps in Houston mirror those in Central Florida). To this day something like 90% of the area that Astroworld was built on remains vacant and unused. The Astrodome remains standing but unused as well, decades after it was last used. I'm not real estate mogul but that sure does look like piss poor land management to me.
The park didn't fail, Six Flags failed the park.
Astroworld dominates my childhood memories in the late 70s and early 80s. For me the beginning of the end was when they closed the alpine sleigh ride and put looney tunes themed attractions there.
Huge fail by Six Flags, considering the 4th largest city in the US has been without a Theme park for the last 20 years!
My friends and I used to get dropped off and stay the whole day into the night as many days per week as we could in the summer. They sold season passes for 29.95 and most of the time you could get a discount on a season pass or daily park entry with a coke can. They had "Magic 'till midnight" and..... let's not forget "The Boogie Fog Disco" Think about - no phones - no tracking. You might call your parents from a pay phone to stay later or leave early otherwsie you left the park and walked over the bridge and they had a pickup area for parents to pick you up. It was a hard requirement that you must have your hands and arms straight up and not hold on on Texas Cyclone and Greased Lightning. "Allllll clear - boom :)" For me the peak years would be 78-82. I got a car and license in 83. We still went but many other things to do after that. :)
Lived in Houston from ‘75-‘80. Seasons pass, parents dropped us off. Used to love riding the Texas Cyclone and many others. Had my first kiss at Boogie Fog Disco (embarrassing, I know).😂
This video was so depressing I can't begin to tell you all the memories and fun I had here , it was more than just fun it was the best times of my life
Sorry 😭 as someone who’s never gotten the chance to go to astroworld I still wished it worked out
Only moved to Houston a few years ago but as someone who loves coasters/parks it’s such a bummer that this doesn’t exist anymore, having a big park within a 30 minute drive would’ve been a dream come true for me, plus getting to ride classics like the Texas Cyclone. RIP Astroworld
Great vid amazing editing. I love your vids you’re an amazing producer. Do you wish the park was still here
Absolutely. Six flags made a big mistake
Broke my heart to see the empty field 💔
I worked there in '69, '70, and '71. Best job I have ever had. I had a lot of fun working there and met loads of other people my age from different schools from all over the Houston area. Lots of very fond memories.
Who remembers the gang shooting that happened in either 93 or 94 at Houston’s Astroworld? Before that happened there were no metal detectors at the entrance.
And who remembers the big brawl between 2 groups of AA girls in 2004 or 2005. It even made the news.
Great video man! I wish they would bring back AstroWorld or something similar to Houston. Give us another theme park here in Texas. 13:56
It got ghetto and people used the season pass like a day care.
Ruined such a dope spot for Houston
I miss astroworld
I hate that Astroworld closed. Would go there every year when I Would visit grandma. Had my favorite roller-coaster ever. The Texas Cyclone......will always be missed.
It's still around. They moved it to another park somewhere
I lived in Houston at the time of the park closure, the media said that the reason the park was closed and ripped down was to make way for condos in the area and that the land was worth more than the park was. Oddly after the Park closed and it was torn down the condo thing never happened. Years went by and it was just a vacant lot and after a while they did use it for overflow parking during the Houston livestock show and rodeo. The sad thing is that even though Houston is 3rd or 4th largest city in the country can't support an amusement park.
I remember hearing that too, housing that never happened.
The area around 6 Flags turned into bad neighborhoods. Moving it would of been great. Spring would of been perfect. But as Disney has found out, you just can't keep all the bad people out.
It can't support a park with the current demographics. So far can still have water parks
I don't know if you're a native Texan or not but you got to remember if you are that the gang violence at that Park was so bad that is the main reason besides parking they closed it down
@@Spartin57 that’s what I referred to in “drop in quality attracting the wrong crowds” premier caused the park to be in a bad position 🫤
@JBThrills I remember when they closed down and auctioned off a lot of the stuff my dad had actually kept one of the roller coaster ride cars he still has it in his shop
@@Spartin57which one ?
I miss this place. Visited family in Houston in 1992. Headed out to Six Flags Astroworld for a day of fun. Had a freaking blast.
We quit going because of all the gang activity
I had the opportunity to visit Astroworld, once, back in the 70's. I don't recall too much except the Yeti ride.
Wow that’s amazing 🙌
Thanks for the video! I remember when I was 6 years old, back in 1993, was the first time I went to Astroworld. Mom had my siblings and me get on the Astroneedle (it’s the white observation tower in the footage) and I was scared, because I had no idea what it did. Once it was back on the ground, I was like ‘that wasn’t so bad.’ lol. My first ever roller coaster was the Viper, the green roller coaster with the serpent on the tunnel. It was a big thing to me back then, but now it’s child’s play. lol I had so many good memories with this park. I definitely get nostalgic feeling when looking at footage from the days it was here. Again thanks for the video.
I miss Astroworld. Great memories from my childhood. My last memory was with my brother in 2003 while he was dealing with ALS. He couldn't ride the rides, but he smiled the whole time. He passed in 2004.
My mom would get us season passes most summers. A lot of my teenage years were spent there.
Man i miss that place. Astroworld was a casualty of allowing mediocre dudes to have positions of power.
Six Flags AstroWorld always interested me and i wish it was still around, it would've made all those trips I've taken to houston more fun.
I fully blame Six Flags' 2000s management for the park going defunct because it would still have been around had Six Flags not been financially unstable and got too greedy selling the land
To really boil the Astroworld closure down to one issue, it was one man trying to save his job with zero regard to anyone else. RIP Astroworld.
I’ve been in Houston since 1978. Astroworld was my home park until it closed. We had season passes for a very long time. It really started to fall apart in the final years, but we still went! I miss it so much! I really wish they’d do something in Houston again! If not six flags, some kind of coaster therapy is needed close to home.
I appreciate this a lot. I grew up going to this park. My first ACE event sadly was saying goodbye to Astroworld although it was after the park had closed to the public, we still got some ERT. I wonder if we were some of the very last people to ride? I loved Ultra Twister and Taz’s Tornado the most. Great memories, this park turned me into an enthusiast.
You opened up old wounds.... Man, I used to spend most of my summers there. Loved Grease Lightning and Xcelerate. And I liked how you could get those $10 or $20 off deals on cans of coke.
As a kid from south Texas we had a season pass for the summers. Got to ride all the coaster from Excalibur, XLR, Texas Cyclone, Ultra Twister, Viper, Greased Lightning, even the Mayan Mind Bender, but my absolute favorite was Batman the Escape. The Batcave was cool.
Hey, thanks for the great video!. I haven't seen anything out on AstroWorld in a long time. It was nice. Unfortunately it also made me tear up a little. I was pretty close to the park lived 5 minutes away and still have a room full of cool memorabilia. I used to go to the park at least one night a week. Great job on your video. Thank you!.
No problem! This park definitely needs to be talked about more and I’m glad I could make this video for y’all
I was 12 when they shut the park down but man did I have a bunch of memories. More good than bad but my favorite things to do and eat there was the Bamboo Shoot, Texas Cyclone, the buggy rides, they had the best Frito Pie and for some reason the Corn dogs were better than any other theme park I went to. I remember one of the last times going in 2004 wasn’t the best time I’ve had. Someone tried to fight porky pig, another fight happened because a kid was taking too long on the sword in stone, the rides were delayed all day, the day started sunny and hot and turned into a stormy muggy afternoon. The last thing I ever did before leaving was watching my dad get roped into buying time Warner cable because he’d get free season passes for 2005 and we never used them because eventually the park closed lol
I think that once Six Flags accquired Feista Texas and the Oilers left Houston, Astroworld was doomed. Astroworld became the middle child of Six Flags' Texas parks: It wasn't the older child that Over Texas was and thus received a lot of attention, or the younger child that Feista Texas was and thus was the shiny new toy for Six Flags to pour money into. So they just left Astroworld to fall into decay.
The last time I was at Astroworld in the 2000s, Grease Lightning, my favorite ride at the time, malfunctioned and went too fast. Scared the crap out of me, and I don't think I've ridden a roller coaster since then. Lots of fun memories from the 80s and 90s, though.
I was on the last ride with my cousins. They let us stay on the coaster for two or three consecutive go arounds. I was recently moved to Houston and it was a fun 10 minutes to an otherwise sad day. I always thought another one would be built, but it only makes me angrier every year seeing the dirt lot that used to be the happiest place in Houston and nothing going on with the Dome.
I grew up closer to Dallas and went to Six Flags in Arlington more as a kid but they ran commercials for Astroworld and I remember wishing we could go down there one time. We never did make it, not I live closer to Houston and its weird that there is no big theme park in one of the country's largest cities. Seeing that empty field and the shell of the Astrodome is sad even though I don't have childhood memories of going to either.
I never lived in Houston, but I drive through from time to time. I had been to astroworld when I was 10, and other than that, would see it driving by on 610. It was very weird, going down 610 one day and it was just completely gone.
Fright night was Awsome!!! Cool fall nights with the thrill of riding at night
It's now a parking lot not grass, and it was ghetto for the last 15 years. Should have been torn down along time ago.
I have a theory that they might open another Houston Park so there is empty plot land near Hurricane Harbor Splashtown so I can see a smaller theme park similar to Discover kingdom open but anyways, this video was amazing 🤠
One fact to remember regarding the decision to close Astroworld: Six Flags estimated the property value based upon pretty rosy economic forecasts. Unfortunately, between the announced closure in 2005 and the property going on the market in 2007 was the year 2006, not a good year for the economics of Houston. Oil companies were taking hits that year, and a lot of Houston development was stalled or cancelled. This included the Astroworld site. If the site had been sold in 2005, Six Flags would have make a fortune. But the economic downturn meant that by 2007 the site was worth about half what it had been. To make matters worse, the area around Astroworld had been in decline for a while. The opening of the football stadium was supposed to be the beginning of a rebuilding of the area. The whole redevelopment never happened, and to this day that part of Houston is run down and depressed. The Six Flags management looked at the value of operating the park compared to the value of selling just the land and made a choice. Unfortunately, their economic forecasts turned out to be wrong, and Houston got a giant parking lot and storage area in place of what had been a decent amusement park.
I remember going to astroworld in the early 2000s. Got to see sugar ray there lol
My first date with who would become my wife was at Astroworld. Not longer after, it was gone.
Astroland was the most magical place in Houston very much a world of it’s own in a concrete slab of a city. Lots of greenery and innovative ideas too keep park visitors cool while waiting in line each section had a completely different vibe. It’s hard to believe so much fit in the space that was left behind.
I blame Greezed lightning for my love of speed and coasters! I still love launch coasters. I could literally go to Astroworld and ride Greezed lightning all day and never get sick of it. Excalibur was my very first coaster as a kid. I still remember Cyclone and how big and fast it seemed as a kid. When I got older, that ride just hurt! I rode it so many times, the layout was embedded in my brain! Remember Taz Tornado? The triple loop that was in the park for what seemed like a year or two? It was ok. I was the person who needed speed and adrenaline (still am into my 50s now), but when XLR-8 came out, I thought it was dumb! It was neat when they turned the cars for fright fest though. Mayan Mindbender the indoor dark coaster, it was lame but neat because we didn’t have a dark indoor coaster. Viper was fun. Ultra twister broke my collar bone, (literally) the restraints were horrid. Looping starship was a vomit comet. Ohhhhhh dungeon drop and skyscreamer are to blame for my love of drop towers. I remember putting Pennie’s on my knees on skyscreamer and when you dropped the Pennie’s floated in front of your face! So many memories were just dug up on this vlog! Wow, I miss it!
I loved that place as a kid in the 70’-80’s. I got a season pass back then for $29.95/year. Paid for it by mowing lawns. Astroworld was awesome!
I have so many memories of this place, so many pictures from the 90s
Fright Fest and July 4th were the most popular times!!!
In the last years of astroworld, it was a very dismal place to be. The park was dirty, trashy, employees that didn't seem to care about their job. The last year too it was open, we went to Six Flags in arlington, and got back home to Houston and decided to go to astroworld.... unbelievable difference between the two night and day! The one in Arlington was very well-kept, very clean, very good employees working there. You wouldn't know that the two parks were owned by the same company.
Interesting sounds like SFOT’s current state these past years. Thankfully to avoid the astroworld fate new leadership is making amazing changes