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The communities became finalists for the mega-attraction, now known as Earthpark, after Regency Land Services withdrew its proposal to include the project at a Tiffin development.

Developers in Pella and Riverside have financial packages which meet or exceed $25 million, a local funding goal the project established in March, as well as viable sites for the project, Earthpark officials said.

Regency had come up with about half of the funding, but determined additional funding would have required additional time.

A 3 p.m. teleconference is scheduled for this afternoon to address the selection process.

Earthpark executive director David Oman said in a release the selection process, initiated after talks about locating the project in Coralville broke off after five years, worked extremely well.

"After hundreds of hours of work by our team, in league with dozens of people in communities across Iowa, we now have two viable locations under consideration as Earthpark's future home," Oman said.

While 16 communities or developers expressed interest in the project earlier this year when the project began looking for a new site, the field of four new finalists was named in March. Grinnell, the fourth finalist, withdrew earlier this month after a group there was unable to raise local funds for the project quickly enough.