Do you like Ferris wheels? You sit in the gondola, hopefully with someone you like, and you’re off and climbing backward looking at the structure holding you up and propelling you higher as alarms start going off in your nervous system (EEEEeeee!!). As you reach the top you start getting lighter; going down you become very light as you lose sight of everything but the tiny people below (OOOOooooo!!). Your stomach can never really catch up, but after several revolutions you get used to it.
There is a new BIG WHEEL on the scene and a high stakes competition to go along with it; welcome to the ultra-mega-uber-wheel, or “observation wheel”. Where the Ferris wheel took you around several times, the observation wheel takes you around one time, and takes most of half an hour to do it.
Most folks are familiar with the London Eye which was the world’s tallest (at 135 meters) for a few years; it’s still Europe’s tallest. It was surpassed by The Star of Nanchang in China (at 160 meters) which held the title for about two years. The new, and current, world’s tallest wheel is the Singapore Flyer (at 165 meters). Other notable mega-wheels are the Suzhou Wheel, the Tianjin Eye (which spans a river), the Changsha Wheel, and the Zhengzhou Wheel in China, the 360 in Pensacola, the Great Wheel in Seattle, the Diamonds & Flowers Wheel, the Big “O” (world’s tallest hubless wheel), and the Sky Dream Fukuoka in Japan; let’s not forget the Texas Star in Dallas (tallest in North America).
There are still plenty more I could have mentioned, but the really exciting story is on the drawing boards; there is a “Big Wheel” battle for bragging rights in the making that will make everything done so far cower in shame…. But that’s another story; see “World’s Biggest High Rollers 2, “COMING SOON”.

Think Big
Margaret Braunling