Why doesn't Scotland have an Alton Towers equivalent?

[JMSA]

I have just taken my 13 year old thrill loving daughter to her favourite place, Alton Towers. We travelled by coach and although a fun weekend was had, it was a brutal amount of travel.
It made me wonder why Scotland doesn't have its own theme park. M&Ds in Glasgow doesn't really compare. Is it our weather? It's just a shame really, as it would bring employment and money to Scotland.
Or is there some glaringly obvious reason that we don't have one?

I would say location and weather have a lot to do with it. The travel.may have been brutal,but surely this is better than the no doubt daily headache faced by the residents in the lovely village of Alton?

Not got a big enough population to provide enough customers.

There will be formulas and algorithms to determine the best locations for these paces.

Meanwhile we've got M&Ds at Strathclyde Country Park and Landmark in Aviemore 😜

Loved Loudon Castle, but I think it must have been running down when we went as there was a serious lack of staff on the gate so actually getting in took ages. Once we were in there it was amazing! Wish I’d known about it a bit sooner.

I did it in a day last year, saw Lewis Capaldi at Lytham Festival in the evening too, a v long day, but doable.

You've got Barry's, what more do you want? :D Or whatever it's called now.

We only took the kids a few times before it closed We had a caravan in Ayr so it was a day out for us .

Always hated M&Ds it had a weird feel to it!

Light water Valley is aimed at under 12s mainly now. It’s actually amazing for my 4 year old.

Alton Towers is a whole other level of theme park, like Thorpe Park. I do think it’s quite sad they are the only ‘proper’ theme park options really.

I also love mountains and beaches and nature but rollercoasters are a different kind of fun. I wouldn’t park one in Scotland though for the reasons outlined above.

just jumping in to say if thinking of staying a night for Alton towers forget a hotel and look up Quarry walk lodges .
so much more affordable/ Fun

Not enough people live in Scotland and the weather is shit

Population, weather, location I guess. Needs to get busy enough to make profits as they will be extremely expensive to run. It's too far for most of the UK to travel to. Most of the parks are fairly central Uk where it is heavily populated but not impossible to get to for the day or weekend for most

Is the Midlands not the wettest place in England? Not exactly amazing weather wise. Scottish weather isnt so bad in the east, I always wonder about those saying the weather !?

It's not that much different in temperature or rain levels but it is often far windier which likely closes rides

Good to know. We've booked a couple of nights there to visit AT.

Tbf the weather isn't Any shittier than the Midlands where AT is. Glorious sunshine where I am today

Here too on the Clyde.

It's definitely a population issue rather than a weather issue. Our climate is not so bad that a theme park couldn't operate from April-October as suggested by some PP. The big, successful theme parks in the UK are all located within easy reach of densely populated areas so that they get enough business to keep themselves going and invest in developing the best rides. Alton Towers for example is within an hour or so of Birmingham, Sheffield, Manchester and Liverpool, each of which is a similar size to Glasgow on its own, plus lots of decent sized towns. The best attempt in Scotland was probably Loudon Castle in Ayrshire which was within easy reach of our Glasgow, which was heavily invested in but which was closed after 15 years because it wasn't economically viable.

As PP have said there is currently a debate about a Flamingo Land at Loch Lomond, which I expect is potentially economically viable because of the large number of visitors that come to that area anyway. However, it's not getting traction with planners who are concerned it would spoil the natural environment that people visit that area for. There are plenty of post-industrial sites across central Scotland that would be more suitable, however there's not enough people living nearby and they're not the areas that tourists tend to visit in large numbers.

Good to know. We've booked a couple of nights there to visit AT.

You wont be disappointed.

I didn't think Loudon Castle lasted as long as 15 years but I can see why it failed.
A theme park in Scotland needs to be able to attract people from Edinburgh and the East as well as Glasgow.

As PP have said there is currently a debate about a Flamingo Land at Loch Lomond, which I expect is potentially economically viable because of the large number of visitors that come to that area anyway. However, it's not getting traction with planners who are concerned it would spoil the natural environment that people visit that area for. There are plenty of post-industrial sites across central Scotland that would be more suitable, however there's not enough people living nearby and they're not the areas that tourists tend to visit in large numbers.

But would tourists coming to Scotland typically want any sort of theme park? Even when dd was a kid/teen, we certainly wouldn't have wasted time in one on a Scottish holiday. We did go to Alton towers a couple of times, it's not that they're not our sort of thing just not what we'd go to Scotland for. The Loch Lomond area sounds like a terrible place for it - why would you do that to a lovely place that already has traffic problems? Surely somewhere between edinburgh and Glasgow near the larger roads would make sense if you were going to plan something like that.

Is there not one at strathclyde park? or is that a bit rubbish?

Neither does Wales

M&Ds is at Strathclyde Park, they call it a theme park but its more like a small version of Blackpool Pleasure Beach or a big fair ground than a theme park like Alton Towers or Disney.

Wales and NI have the same issue as Scotland too small population and too spread out.

We've actually just been to Legoland in Billund, Denmark. 1.5 Hr flight from Edinburgh and it's 10 minutes from Billund Airport on the bus, it was actually easier to get the Denmark than Windsor and my little girl loved it. Maybe not vast amounts for thrill seekers but it was still a great couple of days.

Sounds great! Where did you stay / fly with?