Nostalgia. Purely Nostalgia. We rode those baloons when we were kids and wish that our kids could ride em too
Exactly! The balloons weren't really in-theme anyway, but the nostalgia of that particular ride is what I'm attracted to.
Heh, sometimes I think we are too rigid on what constitutes "in-theme" at SDC. There's a certain amount of kitsch involved. SDC came close at times to being a true frontier town, but there's always been an edge to it, and the balloons fit within that to some degree. I mean, hot air balloons have been around since 1800 at least. Obviously they wouldn't be flying around a little Ozark town, but that's where the kitsch aspect comes in.
As for History Buff's comments, I think at this point it has to be conceded that there will be an increasing number of off-the-shelf flat rides installed around the park. At one point, even the balloon ride was kind of a sore thumb for the park's ambiance, but if it were still there now I don't think it would clash nearly as much. We talk every other week about how the park is changing in that aspect, but I still say that there's a right way to do it that keeps the SDC spirit more or less in tact while giving the current market what it wants. Look at TGS for example - a revolutionary (at the time) level of theming for a simple S&S screamin' swing, with a whole area full of interesting little perks around it. It's all about putting these rides into a 'place' instead of just a bunch of rides.