Watch as final Steel Curtain track piece is installed at Kennywood

Finally!

If you are an avid coaster enthusiast, it surely seems like a lifetime ago when plans for Kennywood’s newest ride — The Steel Curtain — was announced. And now, the structure is complete.

On Friday, the park marked a major step in the process by placing the final piece of track atop the coaster.

Now, all nine inversions — a North American record — are complete, including the 197-foot-high one — a world record. That’s 4,000 feet of track if you are keeping score.

“There’s still some final work to be done from a construction standpoint,” Kennywood spokesman Nick Paradise said. “A lot of it depends on the weather.”

Bolts need to be tightened and everything needs to be checked before the first test runs can begin, Paradise said.

“We’re going to focus on safety,” he said.

The Steel Curtain, which rises 220 feet above the ground (which makes it the tallest coaster in Pennsylvania), will take 24 riders on a two-minute trip, traveling at 76 mph.

Next up: The testing phase. We cannot wait to see cars rolling on the track.

It’ll just seem like an eternity before that happens.

“We’re getting closer every single day. The window is definitely shrinking. We’re not quite there yet,” Paradise said. “People are very excited. The goal is when it opens that it’s a fantastic experience that people can’t wait to do again.”

It remains on track, pun intended, to open at some point in the summer.

“Not just yet,” though, Paradise said.