Hauntings at Navy Pier
For the fourth year in a row Chicago Scenic was called on to produce the scariest haunted house yet at Navy Pier. This year visitors got even more for their money. Working with Navy Pier Creative Director Denise McGowan and Entertainment Operations Director Tony Camarillo, CSSI Project Manager Rick Boultinghouse and Set Designer Tom Ryan increased the haunted house's overall capacity by 25 visitors per cycle and created two additional haunted rooms. These changes benefited both the visitors, who were given the opportunity to experience two more hair-raising rooms for the same price as last year, and the Pier, which was able to increase the number of guests that go through the attraction. Along with the room additions, even more breath-taking pop-out and automated scares were added.

This year's show, entitled Captain Nightmare's Manor, was written by Michael Fosberg. It takes guests on a tour of a manor through the courtyard, library, kitchen, laboratory, and bedroom, along with the two new spaces: the attic and a maze. Visitors screamed as they were greeted in the courtyard by a two-stage pop-out ghoul, whose head extends after his body pops out of a window. In the library, guests first laughed at the librarian reading a ghost story and then jumped as they witnessed a chair slide across the room by itself. After surviving falling bookcases, rattling cupboards, shaking chandeliers, growing tree branches, and flying ghosts, visitors were "accidentally" shown the wrong way out of the manor and into the pathway of an awaiting monster.

After escaping the haunted manor just in the nick of time, visitors enjoyed more Halloween scares throughout the Pier. Along with producing the haunted house, CSSI themes Navy Pier with Halloween decorations every year. CSSI Job Lead Wayne Adams managed the installation of this year's décor, which included large nets and giant spiders on the front of the Pier and cut-out pumpkins, cats, and ghosts that continued down the Pier's South Dock.

CSSI also creates a special place for kids called Scarecrow Hollow. Job Leads Andy Lemerand and Joe Strange supervised this area that is decorated with hay bales, cornstalks, and scarecrows. Scarecrow Hollow offers kids a variety of activities to celebrate Halloween, including a maze, cute and colorful monster photo-ops, and a storytelling stage. Joy Holden was the Assistant Project Manager and Amy Holsman was the paint lead on the project.

Planning for the haunted house and Halloween décor takes many months. However, in the wake of the recent tragedy, last minute changes were requested by Navy Pier. CSSI quickly responded and replaced some of the effects in the haunted house and Pier-wide Halloween décor with more appropriate decorations. Senior Project Manager Ross Hamilton helped supervise the changes and made sure the installation process went smoothly and was completed on time.

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