Six Flags Trying to Become More Family Friendly

We have a bunch of theme parks within 100 miles of my house, such as the Disneyland Resort, Knott's Berry Farm, Universal Studios, Sea World and Six Flags Magic Mountain. Of all of those parks, the one that always made me a little nervous was Six Flags. It was the only one of those parks that required you to pass through a metal detector to get in and the crowd that showed up at Six Flags didn't inspire a lot of confidence in your personal safety.

Six Flags is the closest theme park to both the best and worst neighborhoods of Los Angeles County, and their emphasis on wild thrill rides and roller coasters attracted lots of teenagers. It's also not an easy park to get around because of many steep hills, so it didn't attract many older visitors that you'll see at some of the other parks.

Six Flags parks nationwide have been suffering from low attendance, and there was some talk about selling the Valencia park to housing developers. It looks like the parent company is trying to revive the park by making it more family friendly:

Bad behavior and bad dress are now out at Magic Mountain and the other 29 amusement and water parks operated by Six Flags Inc.

Hoping to attract more visitors to its parks, Six Flags said Wednesday that it had adopted rules requiring shirts, "appropriate footwear" and considerate conduct, among other things.

The new code of conduct is part of Six Flags' effort to draw families to its struggling collection of theme parks, which have a reputation for attracting rowdy teens.

That means no more line-jumping, saving places for pals or other disorderly behavior, said the New York-based company, which recently drew fire from animal-rights activists over a promotion allowing people to jump to the front of lines by eating cockroaches. And leave that rude T-shirt at home.

"We thought it was important to say that this is the type of family-friendly environment we want to provide for our guests," Six Flags spokeswoman Wendy Goldberg said.

Six Flags wanted to standardize varying codes at its parks to create an inoffensive atmosphere, she said.

My kids still like Six Flags and want to go again before the place is shut down. It really has nothing that I'm interested in, so if I go, you'll find me somewhere in the shade reading a book...and watching my back.