Surfing is one of the greatest sports mankind has ever devised, and I assume that if you had grown up in sunny Southern California along the coast you'd agree as well. However, you don't have to live next to an ocean to enjoy surfing, as there are now man-made devices which can create perpetual waves. Yes, it costs quite a bit of money to build a mechanism which can create perpetual waves, but it is entirely possible.
Not long ago, I was doing some consulting for an individual that owns a couple of water parks, those are amusement parks with giant slides, and water rides. In his amusement parks he had the endless wave, and folks could body surf and boogie board on these waves all day long. Think of it as a giant endless wave Jacuzzi or swimming pool, or the water flow system where you can swim in place, as if you were going forward but you would not move as you swim. These are great for getting a workout and many smaller community centers have these, and many luxurious homes also have installed these now.
Anyway we got to talking about some way to bring cars off the freeway into the water park. One of his water parks is along a major US interstate that runs nearly coast-to-coast. Although the idea proved to be too costly for his particular amusement park, it is still viable, and I think it's a great idea. I call this innovation and concept;
"Billboard Surfing - For Pay, Practice, and Performance"
- and it would basically be a giant box set up above the freeway on billboard stands, with transparent glass similar to the glass for that attraction which allows you to walk over the Grand Canyon and it looks like you're walking on air because it is transparent below your feet. As the cars drive by they can watch people surfing inside the billboard on this endless wave.
Obviously everyone would have to look, and it would be really easy to hire surfers to come and surf in the sky, and instead of a billboard you'd be watching surfers in real life. In considering this we decided that we would have to beef up the stanchions and add two more columns. Although this would easily double the price of a regular billboard, just for that extra infrastructure, we figured we'd be into the project for about $280,000 total.
Imagine surfing in the sky above the freeway on an endless wave where you could practice, advertise for the amusement park, and get paid for it. Indeed, I thought you'd like that.
