{"id":909131,"date":"2026-11-07T13:38:20","date_gmt":"2026-11-07T13:38:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/909131\/"},"modified":"2026-11-07T13:38:20","modified_gmt":"2026-11-07T13:38:20","slug":"californias-great-america-theme-park-to-close-after-2027-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/909131\/","title":{"rendered":"California’s Great America theme park to close after 2027 season"},"content":{"rendered":"

California\u2019s Great America<\/a> will close for good on Labor Day, Sept. 6, 2027, Six Flags Entertainment announced Friday, bringing more than a half century of thrills, twists and turns in Santa Clara to an end<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The park\u2019s future has been uncertain since 2022, when Bay Area real estate firm Prologis<\/a> paid $310 million for the land beneath it and leased it back to Cedar Fair, which owned Great America at the time. The lease runs through June 2028, with an option to extend it by as many as five years.<\/p>\n

Six Flags said last year that 2027 could be Great America\u2019s final season. On Friday, the company confirmed it would let the lease expire. Earlier this year, it extended the park\u2019s 2026 season<\/a>, adding fall dates through Nov. 1.<\/p>\n

The park will reopen in March for what Six Flags is calling its \u201cFarewell Season.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

The company said school groups can still book outings and employers can hold company picnics during the park\u2019s final year.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe wanted to create a farewell season that gives our guests, our team members, and the community a chance to celebrate and make a few more memories before saying goodbye,\u201d said Kristin Fitzgerald, Six Flags Entertainment\u2019s director of public relations.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Celebration Swing whips riders around during opening day at California’s Great America in Santa Clara Calif. in 2016. The 100-acre amusement park will be shutting down after the 2027 season. (Gary Reyes\/Bay Area News Group)\u00a0<\/p>\n

Cedar Fair and rival amusement park owner Six Flags merged in 2024 to form Six Flags Entertainment. In May 2025, Six Flags CEO Brian Witherow told investors the Santa Clara park ranked near the bottom of the company\u2019s parks on profit margins.<\/p>\n

The 112.6-acre site near Levi\u2019s Stadium has access to Highway 101, Highway 237, light rail and an ACE train station behind the stadium. When Prologis bought the property in 2022, commercial real estate brokers told this news organization<\/a> the site could accommodate a mix of homes, offices and shops.<\/p>\n

Great America\u00a0celebrated its 50th anniversary this year<\/a>. It opened on March 20, 1976, as one of two theme parks developed by Marriott Corp. Both parks, the one in Santa Clara and one in Illinois, were initially known as Marriott\u2019s Great America.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor more than five decades, this Santa Clara theme park has brought people together, created family traditions and served as the backdrop for unforgettable memories,\u201d said Dave Vosejpka, park manager.<\/p>\n

Carousel Columbia, the 100-foot-tall double-decker carousel at the park entrance, has greeted visitors since opening day in 1976. Six Flags\u2019 closure announcement did not say what will become of it or the other rides after Labor Day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"California\u2019s Great America will close for good on Labor Day, Sept. 6, 2027, Six Flags Entertainment announced Friday,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":909132,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[3805,28,2356,4887,2444,4779,101,3802,88,134,3803,2558,3,5413,3804,1170,71080,10840,248945,10842,10843,52675,2628,27233],"class_list":["post-909131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-bay-area","tag-business","tag-california","tag-california-news","tag-commercial-real-estate","tag-development","tag-economy","tag-editors-picks","tag-entertainment","tag-jobs","tag-keywee","tag-latest-headlines","tag-news","tag-north-bay","tag-pm-report","tag-real-estate","tag-santa-clara","tag-santa-clara-county","tag-social-alert","tag-solano-county","tag-south-bay","tag-theme-parks","tag-things-to-do","tag-vallejo"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/909131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=909131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/909131\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/909132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=909131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=909131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=909131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}