Alton Towers is a theme park and resort located in the grounds of a former stately home in Staffordshire, England. It attracts around 2.8 million visitors per year. Alton Towers is the 11th most visited theme park in Europe. It is based north of the village of Alton in Staffordshire (approximately 16 miles (26 km) east of Stoke-on-Trent), in the grounds of a semi-ruined gothic revival country house of the same name, the former seat of the Earls of Shrewsbury. Also on site are two hotels; The Alton Towers Hotel and Splash Landings Hotel , The Alton Towers Waterpark (Cariba Creek) , Extraordinary Golf , Conference Centre and The Alton Towers Spa (Located in the Alton Towers Hotel) . Alton Towers is the flagship attraction of Merlin Entertainments. As the resort is so popular, eleven car parks are located around it.
Some of the major attractions at Alton Towers include:
- Nemesis , Europe's first inverted roller coaster.
- Oblivion , the world's first vertical drop roller coaster.
- Air , the world's first B&M flying roller coaster.
- Rita - Queen of Speed , a launched roller coaster which accelerates to 100 km/h (60 mph) in approximately 2.2 seconds.
The park's promotional music is In the Hall of the Mountain King, written by Edvard Grieg which has been used in TV promotions and around the park since the early 1990s.
History
Early history of the grounds
The estate dates back to before 1000 BC, when an iron age fort was built in the area, known as Bunbury Hill. In circa 700, the estate became the site of a fortress, for the Saxon king Ceolred of Mercia. A castle was built soon after the Norman Conquest, but the date of its erection is unknown. In the 1100s, the estate passed to Bertram de Verdun, as a reward for his work in the Crusades. In 1318, the estate passed by marriage to Thomas de Furnival, when he married Joan de Verdun. It passed again in 1406, to Sir John Talbot, when he married Maud, the eldest daughter of Lord Furnival. He became the Earl of Shrewsbury in 1442, a title that had been resurrected after being forfeited by the third earl in 1102. The old castle was destroyed during the English Civil War.
The early Alton Towers was a hunting lodge, known as Alveton Lodge (or Alverton ), which is the ancient name for Alton . It had three floors, and one of the towers was from an earlier building, which is part of the building today. It was split into two properties, one which was rented by a tenant, and one which was used by the Talbots as a summer residence, their main residence being at Heythrop in Oxfordshire.
Charles Talbot, the 15th Earl, began improvements on the house, and initiated the creation of the Gardens, at the turn of the 19th century. Through the early 1800s, 13,000 trees were planted in the grounds. In 1811, major work began on the house. Over the next ten years, several new rooms were built: a drawing room, dining room, chapel, library, long gallery, banqueting hall, conservatory and entrance hall were all added. As a result of the work done, the house doubled in size. The entire building was renovated in a Gothic style, and the foundations of the Flag Tower were also laid. The house was renamed to Alton Abbey , despite there not being any particular religious connection. Some of the architects that worked on the house were Thomas Allason, William Hollins and Thomas Hopper.
In 1814 Charles and his wife moved into Alton permanently, and began the creation of extensive gardens. Prior to his work on the gardens, the land around Alton was farmland. Charles transformed the land into one of the largest gardens in Britain. Set in a valley that leads down to the River Churnet, a variety of features were created. A Pagoda fountain was built as an exact copy of the To Ho Pagoda in Canton, which used water from a spring at Ramshorn that passed through various lakes and pools. The Garden Conservatories, designed by Robert Abrahams were built of cast iron, and today are filled with various plants. A building known as the Swiss Cottage housed a Welsh harpist, and is now a restaurant. A building known as Stonehenge was constructed, and a copy of Lysicrates' Choragic Monument from Athens was built. Several gardens were planted, including a Dutch garden, located to the left of the conservatories, and a rock garden.
Following the earl's death in 1827, his nephew John succeeded him, who completed the gardens and house. In 1831, the earl's principal residence in Heythrop burned down. Everything that was saved was moved to Alton, and the earl came to live there permanently. Augustus Pugin designed a new entrance hall, banqueting hall and various other rooms, extending the house further, and it was renamed to Alton Towers. The grounds were opened to the public at various times of the year from 1839.
The 16th Earl died in 1852. He was succeeded briefly by his cousin, Bertram, who died at the age of 24. The house was finished by 1856, with no further alterations being made to the house again.
Because there was no direct heir to the estate, Bertram left the earldom and the estate to a younger son of the Duke of Norfolk. Henry Chetwynd-Talbot, a distant cousin of the late earl, contested the will and a lawsuit was initiated to determine who would get ownership. After some time it was granted to Henry Chetwynd Talbot of Ingestre Hall, Staffordshire. The ownership of the contents of the house was never contested, and so everything in Alton Towers was auctioned, with 4000 lots being sold over a period of 29 days. The new earl gained his title in 1858, and the estate in 1860. To celebrate, the earl held a procession on 13 April 1860 . Beginning in Uttoxeter, it stretched over a mile and in the end over 40,000 people were said to be in the grounds. The earl continued to open the grounds to the public throughout the year at certain times, to help raise money to refurbish parts of the house.
During the 1890s, the 20th earl, Charles Talbot started the tradition of summer fetes at Alton. As well as the Gardens, people were attracted with fireworks displays, balloon festivals, clowns, and exhibitions of instruments of torture. In 1896, the earl and countess separated. The earl went to live at Ingestre, where he founded the Talbot Car Company in the 1900s, and the countess stayed at Alton. However, the house was left to decay because the earl did not pay much for the up keep, and the estate was neglected.
In November 1918, the earl decided to sell the majority of the estate by auction, due to his absence. After the earl died in 1921, the countess continued to live in the estate for another two years. In 1924 the rest of the estate was sold to a group of local businessmen, who formed Alton Towers Limited. While the contents of the house was sold off, the grounds were restored and remained open to the public. Some of the rooms of the house were converted into cafés and toilets for public use. The house was requisitioned during World War II as an officer training unit and the gardens were closed until 1951, by which time the neglected house had begun to deteriorate. It was in such a bad state, the entire building had to have its interior stripped out and sold, so it was just an empty shell. In the 1970s, concrete floors were added so that it could be opened to the public, and the building was listed as Grade II.
As a theme park/resort
Alton Towers was opened as a theme park in 1980 with the instalation of The Corkscrew rollercoaster (closed 9/11/2008), Pirate Ship (rethemed to 'The Blade') and the Alpine Bob sled ride (closed 1986). A year later the Log Flume opened and in 1984 the park's second roller-coaster, The Black Hole opened. The themepark continued to be heavily invested in, year-on-year.
The park was purchased by The Tussauds Group in 1990. In 2005, Alton Towers was bought by the investment group Dubai International Capital (DIC) when it purchased Tussauds for £800million. The Tussauds Group was bought by Merlin Entertainments in March 2007 for over £1billion from DIC, placing Alton Towers under their control. In July 2007, the resort and park was sold to Nick Leslau and his investment firm Prestbury who now lease the park back to Merlin Entertainments to operate on a renewable 35-year lease.
Monorail
The Von Roll monorail transports visitors from the further away car parks to the main entrance and ticket booths. The monorail system was acquired from Expo 86 which was held in Vancouver, British Columbia. It was installed in 1987, a year after Towers Street.
In 2008, Sarner, a UK based theme park design company, was commissioned to revamp the nine monorail trains. This included exterior decoration and new bench seating. Each train has a personalised soundtrack to fit with its own theme, such as 'pirates'.
Skyride
The Skyride is a cable car system which visitors can use to travel between Towers Street, Forbidden Valley, and Cloud Cuckoo Land.
The Skyride has operated since 1987 and replaced an earlier chairlift, which had opened in 1963. The central station in Forbidden Valley was burned on the evening of 28 October 2007, due to a faulty halogen lamp. The incident caused a power cut, which led to some guests being stranded on the park's monorail. Luckily, this incident was reported quickly by a Towers employee as to not cause as much massive damage, and the park says that the damage caused to the station was mainly cosmetic. The Skyride re-opened 19 April 2008 after major work had been carried out o
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