Well, it's over a year later and there hasn't been a single bit of a status update. I can't help but wonder what would've happened if SM took the majority of community love and support instead of NL, and where SM would be today if that happened.
Hyper Rails is long dead, but Theme Park Studio is coming up soon as a follow-up. I think the project shows a lot of promise and potential, despite Pantera's sketchy history with this sort of thing, and it certainly fills in the void left from the RCT franchise being run to the ground. However, after SM, NL, and HR all came around, I think things got way too crowded which is why NL won out in the end.
Not sure if SM2 is being worked on slowly in secret, or if the whole thing is completely scrapped. I have to admit, a source release would be nice if the latter happened, although the community doesn't seem to be large enough with sufficient interest to handle an open-source coaster/park sim. (It's been tried once and never got anywhere after a long time.)
That said, I'm happy for both NL2 and TPS. Things have stagnated pretty badly in the world of coaster/park sims, and we're long due for a refresh. Having not one, but two new products upcoming is nice to mix things up.