Knott’s Parent Firm to Buy Hotel Next to Theme Park

Intensifying the battle for tourists in Orange County, the Ohio company that owns Knott’s Berry Farm said Friday it has agreed to buy the 320-room Buena Park Hotel and Convention Center next to the Buena Park theme park.

Terms were not announced, but Atlas Hospitality Group broker Alan X. Reay said the hotel at Crescent and Grand avenues would sell for an estimated $30,000 to $35,000 a room. That would indicate a price of $9.6 million to $11.2 million for the 23-year-old hotel.

The purchase by Cedar Fair LLP follows its tentative decision to add a water-themed park at Knott’s, a proposal expected to be approved by its board in March. It has a similar cluster of theme park, water park and hotels at its flagship Cedar Point complex on Lake Erie in Sandusky, Ohio.

The expansion positions Knott’s to compete more effectively with Disneyland, where a major expansion will include opening a second theme park and a third Disney hotel in 2001. With its vast Florida complex as the model, Disney hopes its Anaheim operations can become a “destination resort” where tourists stay three days or more.

In buying the Buena Park Hotel, Disney’s Orange County rival expressed similar if more modest aspirations.

“The idea is for the person to come in, check into the hotel and not have to use a car again until they leave the property,” said Richard L. Kinzel, Cedar Fair’s chief executive. “Sort of like what Disney has in Florida, though to a much lesser extent.”

Kinzel said a renovation begun by current Buena Park Hotel owner Montgomery Fisher will be completed and the swimming pool area will be upgraded.

“We’ll probably put in a couple of spas, and the pool will be enlarged to appeal to the total family,” he said.

In the coming year, Cedar Fair will spend a modest $2.5 million on additional improvements to Knott’s, most notably on Coasters, a 1950s-themed hamburger restaurant, Kinzel said.