Runaway Mine Train

The Runaway Mine Train opened on July 4, 1974, just days after Great Adventure itself debuted, making it the park's first major roller coaster and the oldest coaster still operating in New Jersey. Arrow Dynamics — the same manufacturer behind the Matterhorn Bobsleds' pioneering tubular steel track — custom-designed the layout to wind through what was then densely wooded terrain along the park's lake shore, using a single lift hill rather than the multiple lifts found on many of Arrow's other mine-train installations elsewhere.

Arrow's mine-train coasters were an early proof point for tubular steel track's ability to follow natural terrain rather than the rigid, geometric layouts wooden coasters required, and this installation was one of the first to reinforce that track with a central steel spine — a construction technique Arrow would refine a year later on Corkscrew at Knott's Berry Farm. The result is a gentle but scenic ride: a 60-foot climb, a sweeping helix, and a series of small airtime hills that wind past the park's Skyride and lake before a dramatic final turn back to the station.

Now over five decades old, the Runaway Mine Train is the last operating New Jersey coaster built by Arrow Development, having outlasted the company's own transition to Arrow Dynamics and eventual closure in 2001. For generations of visitors, it has served as many riders' introduction to real roller coasters, a role it continues to play even as Great Adventure has grown around it with far larger, faster attractions.