Zamperla to build amusement park near Cluj

The international group Zamperla, one of the world’s top producers of equipment for amusement parks, is preparing to start work this year on the construction of an amusement park in Cluj. Investment in the project is put at 15 million euros.

Cluj-Napoca City Hall is making six hectares of land available to the Italian company in the Colina area near Cluj and in the direction of Oradea.

“On January 3, Zamperla officials presented us with a model for an amusement park to be built in several stages. We sent them a digital map of the land we can offer and they came up with a general plan of the park. By March, we will be sealing an ante-project contract, which we will negotiate and submit for approval,” Emil Boc told Ziarul Financiar.

“Financing rests entirely with the Italian entrepreneur, while our contribution is limited to securing the required land,” Boc added.

Works are most likely to begin this summer and are expected to last for a period of at least three years.

The project will aim to create a space exclusively for use as an amusement park and will be equipped like other large amusement parks in Europe, constructed around several themed ideas. It will also include tennis courts and an artificial skating rink.

At the entrance to the park there will be parking facilities and a restaurant for park visitors.

Representatives of the Italian company had intended to begin with the project as early as last summer. Initially, the list of possible locations for the park included Bucharest, Oradea and Cluj-Napoca, with investors finally opting for the latter city. “This will be the Prater (the famous amusement park in Vienna) of Transilvania that we hope will attract not only Romanians, but foreign visitors as well,” a Zamperla representative for Romania, Dario Zantedeschi, said at the time.

To assure Romanian authorities of the seriousness of their intentions, investors produced a letter of reliability from the Italian government.

Zamperla produces and sells internationally various types of equipment for amusement parks. It also owns a plant in Italy and subsidiaries in the United States, Russia, Korea and Asia.

There are over 550 amusement parks worldwide, of which over 150 are in Europe.