Zombie Theme Park in Detroit | Hacker News Reader

Zombie Theme Park in Detroit

indiegogo.com

42 pointssoleimc24 comments

Aesthetically, the idea of a 'zombie theme park' is pretty weak. I get it; there's a lot of people who think zombies are the bees' knees. But a theme park dedicated entirely to them? You know how one dimensional zombies are? After running away from moaning, stumbling zombies for an hour, this would get boring as hell. And most people don't even commit to the acting (lame).

Practically, what the hell is the matter with people? There are homeless and poverty-stricken families and individuals all around Detroit. At the very least the structures could be used to house people who are at risk of heat stroke in the summer months and of freezing in the winter. More ambitious plans could be proposed which puts small businesses up rent-free, possibly getting the homeless jobs that could help them work their way out of poverty. Communal living spaces could be erected, or shared housing for artists and students. But instead they think it'd be fun for a bunch of middle class white nerds to run around going "Braaaaaaains!!"

This is a great example of a more practical use for the neighborhood: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/13/charismata-homes-of... https://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/14/garden/in-detroit-help-fo...

And there are starving people in Africa, too. All that you suggest is already being done in Detroit. Personally, I think I would be bored after about an hour like you say but it would be really cool if they could pull this off.

The Detroit area (including parts of Detroit proper) isn't a complete wasteland. There are a lot of people in the area that want to have a little fun in their life, like anywhere else in the world. There's nothing wrong with that. If they pull it off, this would attract people from all over the region (and I'm sure far beyond), which can only be a good thing for the economy.

FWIW, I don't think they'll pull this off, especially for $145,000, but I like that someone's trying.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405270230455000457750...

It appears there is already a big demand for this sort of fun.

As a British person, I can't help but worry about how they're going to make a 200 acre expanse of Detroit safe enough to play this game. Making sure that the structures are sound, that there isn't dangerous debris around etc. The job of clearing up alone seems like a massive undertaking.

Cute, but completely unrealistic. Is this a middle-school project?

It's a liability waiting to happen, and I have no idea how $145,000 in capital will get them started; try at least two orders of magnitude more. Theme parks aren't exactly killing it nowadays.

While we like the positive developments we’re seeing in Detroit’s downtown and along the Woodward corridor, we lamented what happened to the neighborhoods.

This would not be a positive. The Mower Gang and urban farmers -- that's a positive. The RoboCop statue kickstarter was at least funny; this is just dumb.

Something similar to this already happens in the UK, except it takes place in the middle of cities rather than in abandoned areas:

http://2.8hourslater.com/

Sounds like a legal liability ready to happen. Ambitious, but one step on a rusty nail and lawsuits ensue. Though I like the creativity of solving the inner city blight.

Meta: For a website discussing startups, this discussion seems quite pessimistic to me. I am not aware of all the technical difficulties, I am not certain it will be the most fun project in the world, but I wouldn't give it the disparaging remarks I see here. I am certain they'll have difficulties with the local government and who knows if it will be successful, but I am in favor of people trying strange new things.

Even if it is a "completely unrealistic ... middle school project" or a "poorly thought out idea", the worst that could happen is that the people trying to put this together will learn a lot, and hopefully use that experience to try something awesome later. Considering what they are trying to put together, they clearly think this is awesome, and in that light I'd say it's worth the risk of doing.

Disclaimer: I'm from near Detroit. Not sure how much that changes my opinion on this, though.

To me 90% of the fun of living out a zombie apocalypse is taking a baseball bat to the side of a zombie's head. I don't really want to run around and hide all night.

This is a poorly thought out idea. If the city took two years (after initial opposition) to agree to a tree farm I can not imagine they'd ever get support for this idea.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405270230489870457747...

What happens when someone running from 'zombies' gets injured inside one of the buildings? Just making the structures safe for the game would run into millions of dollars.

I can understand taking over an abandoned mall to make a "Zombie Theme Park" like was done in the UK

http://www.zedevents.co.uk/the-mall/

but 200 acres is pretty big, and outdoors makes everything more complicated.

And decades of dumping. And slum lords. And wild dogs. And squatters. And massive pollution. And peripheral crime. And dodgy-to-nonexistent infrastructure.

People see cheap building sales in Detroit and they don't realize those almost always come with requirements to pay back-taxes, tear down all the structures, decontaminate the grounds, etc.

There are good (read: expensive) reasons that much of Detroit remains abandoned.

There is already kinda sorta a MVP for this in form of Zombie 5k challenges like 'Run for your Life':

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A4XvnVz9qDQ

The Zombie Theme park would seem like a scaled up version of those as it seems to have similar limitations (no weapons) and rules (if you lose your tags you become a zombie).

Paintball guns could make this more interesting.

Near my city there's an airsoft field where weekend zombie events are organized.

Basically, you assemble a group, pay the entrance, and a group of actors disguised as zombies attack you in the forest.

Being paid actors, they play it real, safe, and "correctly" die when they should.

You mean when they are shot in the head or neck only?

That sounds pretty miserable being a zombie. It would suck getting within 5 feet of someone and getting unloaded on.

My first question would be; Who's gonna be the zombie? Are they gonna hire these people? From what they are trying to do it seems they needs "lots" of zombies...

I don't think this project will be financially viable and a big liability on top of that..

The most interesting aspect of this: What can be done with an area like that, in a way that involves maintaining the current aesthetics?

We've done that before, with old power stations and churches.

Are we at peak zombie yet? This infatuation seems almost unkillable.

Can someone say "liability issues"?

how am I supposed to kill zombies?!

I thought Detroit itself was already supposed to be something like a zombie theme park.

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