By Case Brown • Guest Columnist | The on-and-off again investment deals for the embattled Ghost Town amusement park are familiar to anyone who reads these pages. Multiple meandering deals and their abrupt course corrections feel remarkably like the Black Widow ride that used to jerkily sling mountain ilk around to the soothing sounds of raging death metal picked by the latest pimpled carnie operator.

Attendees of this year’s Hillbilly Winter Jam kicked off the annual fest with a special treat — a private visit to a cherished remnant of Maggie Valley culture. 

There is perhaps no parcel of land in Haywood County that generates as much interest as the one that’s home to long-shuttered mountaintop amusement park Ghost Town in the Sky, but as social media misinformation continues to arise, the property’s developers are now revealing tantalizing details of the incredibly complex plan for the venture and the progress that’s already been made. 

After years of languishing in the shadows of a shuttered amusement park, Maggie Valley’s west end is now seeing substantial commercial development resulting in several major new or renovated businesses. 

Decades after it first opened in 1962, Ghost Town in the Sky still commands a wistful loyalty from thousands of people who remember it during its heyday and are eager to return. 

The strange saga of Maggie Valley’s Ghost Town amusement park has more twists and turns and more highs and lows than a roller coaster, but now that the latest ride up Buck Mountain is over, two investors say CEO Lamar Berry has thrown them for a loop. 

A pair of legal actions filed in Haywood courts during the month of October suggest efforts to redevelop Maggie Valley’s Ghost Town amusement park may be in jeopardy. 

For months, Valerie Oberle has been the public face of the three-person partnership supposedly taking shape at the long-shuttered Ghost Town amusement park in Maggie Valley. Along with husband Spencer, Oberle’s had a frustrating summer marked by unmet promises and modest progress. 

Slow progress and a string of broken promises from new Ghost Town operator and former Disney exec Valeria Oberle haven’t stopped her from talking to people about her plans for the park, but they have stopped her from allowing people to record or broadcast them. 

Amid high hopes for a rejuvenated Ghost Town in the Sky amusement park, it’s looking more and more like the been down this road before crowd may be on the right path.