page_title: Europa-Park
section_title: Themed areas and growth (1980s–2012)
hierarchical_section_title: Europa-Park / History / Themed areas and growth (1980s–2012)
caption_attribution_description: English: Europa-Park in Rust, Germany. View from Euro-Tower over Park. You can see 'Greece', a part of the park. Deutsch: Europa-Park in Rust, Deutschland. Aussicht vom Euro-Tower über den Park. Man sieht den Themenbereich Griechenland.
context_page_description: Europa-Park is the largest theme park in Germany, and the second most popular theme park resort in Europe, following Disneyland Paris. Europa-Park is located in Rust, in south-western Germany, between Freiburg im Breisgau and Strasbourg.
  The park is home to 13 roller coasters, the oldest being Alpenexpress Enzian, a powered coaster that speeds through a diamond mine, and the newest coaster being the Ba-a-a Express, a small kiddie roller coaster. Europa-Park has very high capacity roller coasters and attractions meaning the park can accommodate approximately 60,000 guests per day. It counted 5.7 million visitors in 2017. It is also the location of the Euro Dance Festival.
  Since 2014, Europa-Park has been named the world's best amusement park by the Golden Ticket Awards. In November 2019, Europa-Park's Rulantica water park opened, along with a new themed hotel "Krønasår".
context_section_description: The first country-themed section was "Italy", opened 1982. Like most of the original themed areas at Europa-Park, it was designed by Ulrich Damrau. The Alpenexpress "Enzian" and Schweizer Bobbahn rides opened in 1984 and 1985, respectively. The "Europe" theme was pursued further with the opening of "Holland" (1984), "England" (1988), "France" (1990), "Scandinavia" (1992) and "Spain" (1994) sections.
  Visitor count passed the 2 million mark in 1991. The development of the hotel resort began in 1995 with El Andaluz, followed by Castillo Alcazar in 1999.
  By the year 2000, the number of visitors had risen to 3 million, and the hotels had been booked to nearly 98% of their capacity. The park opened during the winter season for the first time in 2001/2. The current logo was registered in 2003.
  In 2011, there were 4.5 million visitors, and by 2012 the park encompassed an area of 90 hectares, featuring eleven roller-coasters, five themed hotels with a turnover of close to EUR 300 million and more than 3,000 employees. In 2012, Roland Mack announced investments in excess of EUR 60 million, the largest yearly investment in the park's history. The total sum invested in the park is estimated at close to EUR 700 million.
caption: Overview of the park, showing themed areas such as Griechenland.
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