With significant economic development hopes riding on the frontier veneer of Wild West World, owner Thomas Etheredge excitedly announced this week he's 95 percent done with construction.

In fact, the $30 million, 130-acre theme park in Park City has stayed about 30 days ahead of schedule for months now, and Etheredge says his May 5 grand opening is on track.

He also plans to gross $16 million this year at Kansas' first theme park by drawing at least 500,000 visitors from May through September, a number Etheredge said is conservative considering there are more than 2 million people within a 200-mile radius of Wichita.