1/ Six Flags New Orleans is one of the youngest of the abandoned places I've visited, and at 140 acres, certainly one of the larger ones. Open for only 5 years, it's been a ruin for longer than it was in use. What happens after you abandon an entire amusement park?

2/ Some backstory: Six Flags New Orleans was originally built as a park called Jazzland in 2000 with music-themed rides like the MegaZeph roller coaster, pictured below. It was unprofitable and the next year the park was leased to Six Flags.

3/ Six Flags added a bunch of DC and Looney Tunes themed rides, my favorite of which was the Joker's Jukebox, below. In 2005 they were planning a water park expansion that would be announced in August, but that month instead brought a catastrophe that would doom the property.

4/ Hurricane Katrina slammed into New Orleans that month, and in addition to the other destruction it wreaked, Six Flags NO - located in a basin - was submerged in 4 to 7 feet of water for over a month.
(Photo credit: Bob McMillan/FEMA Photo Library)

5/ Six Flags declared the park a total loss, stating that the damage done to the rides and structures left almost all of them beyond salvage or repair. Legal battles between the city and Six Flags and Six Flags and its insurers ensued.

6/ Less than five rides were removed, and the rest, including the Main Street Square designed as a replica of the French Quarter, were left to the elements and vandalism. They remain, 14 years later, in a state of increasing disrepair.

7/ Since then SFNO has been used for a set for a number of movies including Jurassic World, Deepwater Horizon, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, and Percy Jackson: The Sequel No One Asked For.

8/ Currently patrolled by both security and the police, trespassers are arrested on sight, but that may be the least of their worries. The park is also home to wild boars, alligators, and snakes. It is insanely unsafe and I do not recommend attempting to visit it.

9/ I was lucky enough to gain legit access a few years ago (no, not telling trade secrets), and it was a pretty haunting experience, in part because of the wildlife. Alligators are fast and launch themselves out of vegetation/water, something you find everywhere at SFNO.

10/ Despite my fear of heights, I climbed all of the roller coasters, because I am an objectively stupid person. At the top of the last (very steep) one, my lens cap popped off and fell what seemed like forever into the trees below. Not fun. I did find it later, believe it or not

11/ I was also stalked by an alligator (not pictured) who hung out in the lagoon behind the Ferris Wheel. They are much scarier when you're by yourself in their home turf than they are on the nature channel, even though people who live near them treat them like wasps

12/ There were a load of horrible thorn bushes wrapped around many of the places I wanted to go, so I got to know them pretty well. I also met NOPD, who thought I was lying about being there with permission until I gave them my security contact's info

13/ In 2016 a plan to reopen the park was introduced, but it fell through in 2018. This year New Orleans' mayor spoke of plans to demolish the site, which would cost $1.3 million. No progress has been made so far.

14/ If you enjoy the thread and would like to see more of Six Flags New Orleans, hop on over to my Abandoned America website gallery - you'll find more photos and hundreds of other abandoned places to boot. Thanks for taking a moment to read about it! https://www.abandonedamerica.us/six-flags-new-orleans