Massive Water Park Planned About An Hour from St. Cloud

Not only will this be a massive water park, but it will be a year round water park with a retractable roof!

Here is what is happening, years ago, there was a water park near the Mall of America.  It was called "Waterpark of America".  That closed and Wolf Lodge was opened in 2017.  Since then, that has been the destination that many people in Minnesota have gone to.  But that one is really just an indoor park that is great to go to during the winter months.

So now, it looks like the Mall of America is in plans to build another water park.  If this does come to fruition, the rendering looks great.

And has the added bonus of a retractable roof, so if you want to get some sun while you're there, that is possible, and if it's raining, your fun won't be rained out.  Perfect!

This was a park that was a planned project a few years ago, but then COVID, then high interest rates, supply chain issues, etc.  Now plans are back on the table, although the new plans are a bit smaller than the original plan.  More economical.

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The water park would be called "Mystery Cove".  How are they paying for it?  The City of Bloomington has this plan:

• The city would provide an $85 million subsidy for the water park through tax-increment financing (TIF) and another $75 million in TIF for the parking ramp. TIF is an economic development tool in which cities use the additional property tax revenue from a project to pay for development costs.
• Bloomington would collect profits from the water park after mall owner Triple 5's debt payments to a private lender. The city would collect at least $100 million and could use the money for affordable housing and other development in the area.

The idea is also to have half retail and half entertainment attractions at the Mall of America to keep visitors and tourism up.  If everything goes well with financing and the design plans and approvals, the goal would be to open by 2027.