The other week I wrote about how theme parks like Disneyland can bring a child’s dreams to life with their cartoon mascots and their appeals to imagination. Today I’d like to introduce you to the other side of the spectrum: an amusement park that is well past its use-by date but still manages to draw a modest crowd despite its inherent creepiness:
Welcome, my friends, to Melbourne’s Luna Park.
If you ignore the intimidating entrance of the park (and let’s be honest, how could you?) it sounds rather quaint and charming on the surface. You are free to enter and walk around inside and are only required to pay should you go on any of the antiquated rides. Established in 1912 and located in the now trendy seaside suburb of St. Kilda, the park is considered a classic landmark of Melbourne. It also houses the oldest continually-operating roller coaster in the world: the ‘Scenic Railway’. The question is: would you want to ride on the oldest continually-operating roller coaster in the world?!
For whatever reason, going to Luna Park at least once is a staple of many Melbournians’ childhoods. I too have memories of attending this park as part of an evening excursion with my Year 7 class.I recall several kids throwing up, and personally refusing to go on the ghost train in the face of overwhelming peer pressure (and really, if the train entrance looked like this, would you?!)
The last ghost train you will ever ride.
Due to its status as a cultural asset the interior of the park has changed very little, save the usual rotation of rides. I’m sure this is a good thing for the nostalgia factor, but I’m sure there are plenty of little kids who would very much prefer that some of it not enter their long-term memory… or their nightmares:
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- Well.
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- Um.
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- I say.
This may have contributed to why it is now only one of two Luna Parks left in Australia, out of
five original parks. I have come to the park recently on several occasions to show visiters to the country what Melbourne has to offer, and each time the crowd (if you can even call it a crowd) is meagre. The park’s attendants wait stone-faced between the small pockets of children and young adults often only filling up a third of the space on the rides, chewing absently on a hot dog or chewing the fat with one of the other uniformed staff. One is left wondering whether the park’s patrons are there because they specifically planned for it, or if they just wanted something to do and figured they may as well go while they were in the area. Or maybe I’m just projecting my own fears of the park’s decor onto others. Seriously though, did Luna Park even need a ghost train?! Look at those glow-in-the-dark teeth!
I do think that Luna Park is worth going to at least for the experience of seeing a living fossil of a classic amusement park for free. I’m a big fan of abandoned amusement parks (I may write an article or two about some of them at some point), so for me it’s a pleasure to immerse myself in the atmosphere that gave kids joy and thrills back in the day. For the life of me I still have no idea how an audience that would have soiled themselves watching the first Frankenstein film would have children who got their jollies in a park with decor that makes adults soil themselves now.
If Melbourne’s Luna Park is not quite your cup of tea, maybe you’d prefer St. Kilda’s mini cake district on Acland Street instead:
Om nom nom.