Growing up in mid-Michigan, a popular destination for short family vacations was Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio. With tons of huge roller coasters, it is an amazing place to visit.
Because of the size of roller coasters found at any theme park, they make for a great subject to check out in Google Earth. Alex Turnbull of Google Sightseeing recently dug in and found some of the best.
Beyond just looking good from above, many of the coasters have impressive 3D models in Google Earth, such as the Kingda Ka at Six Flags Great Adventure in New Jersey:
Taking it even further, some of the parks have been captured by Google Street View, giving you a unique look at the coasters. Here is a shot from inside of Cedar Point:
Alex has done a great job tracking down some of the best views of roller coasters in Google Earth, and I encourage you to check out his full post to learn more. You can also grab a copy of their KML file
to view all of the locations from Alex’s post in Google Earth.
About Mickey Mellen
Mickey has been using Google Earth since it was released in 2005, and has created a variety of geo-related sites including Google Earth Hacks. He runs a web design firm in Marietta, GA, where he lives with his wife and two kids.
These are really cool 3D models. As soon as i saw that as one of your links i just had to go to it and jeck it out. please keep posting pics of 3D models becasue i am excited to see more!!
Unfortunately the above Roller Coaster kml file contains only 16 roller coasters. I you want to see 225 of them check out The Roller Coasters of Google Map at:
http://myreadingmapped.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-roller-coasters-of-google-map.html
And, it breaks down the difference between wood, steal and record holders. And, the associated Google Earth KML file within the map can display any rendered in 3D if the building layer is turned on.