Minor Updates, Rumors, and Happenings

[Guy_With_A_Stick]

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[batmanfan80]

We went on the 3rd and 4th. Things are going much better. Most of the coasters have announcements about how they need to launch in 30 seconds. The crowds were worse, but the lines were not. Batman was even a walk up around 7:30 or so on the 4th. Roaring Rapids advertised a 60 min wait with a line almost back to the house thing and it took us about 10 minutes to clear. Justice League single rider line on the 3rd took about 10 min. Joker single rider line on the 4th around 7 took the wife about 20-30 min w/a break down. X-Flight back at the keyhole took significantly less time than the usual 30-40 min. Flash passers did not clog anything, maybe 10 per ride wait time as opposed to the 300 some we'd see 3 years ago starting on the 3rd July weekend. Demon was 10-15 on the 3rd around 4 maybe. Giant Drop had the longest line we'd seen in a while on the 3rd. About 15 min. Batman's queue was completely full on the 3rd most of the time we walked by it. Not sure on Pretzelman or Raging Trimbrake. Raging had the usual first few rows of the queue full plus a little more. Viper on the 3rd had a line back to the 2nd flash pass worker and took maybe 15-20 min. Before it would take 40-60 most of the time. Whizzer had a pretty full queue on the 3rd, but not the 4th.

The new light show was fun but nothing someone would absolutely have to see. I noticed they were putting on a lot more small shows and things on throughout the park, that was badly needed. The wrestling wasn't up to par with what they usually do on 4th fest. The 7pm show on the 3rd didn't even feature much of anything resembling an actual match despite having name talent. So we didn't bother watching the matches on the 4th. We can drive to Joliet or that baseball field by Midlothian and watch Blitz whenever. In a couple weeks the rides may all have unfathomably long lines.

Did not ride Eagle. Was going to but they closed it early for fireworks. Hoping maybe it's not as Mean Streaky as it was last year. Demon in the yellow car was about the best ride we ever had on it in 6 years. Very smooth and didn't give me any sorta minor whiplash in the loops. We were in the last row. Last row Viper was very bumpy and the airtime isn't as good because you just sorta fly over the hills. Batman is running good as ever, but it makes me miss Montu and the bigger elements and longer ride. If only they could just build a batwing on the end of the ride...X-Flight on the left side is still the same. Bumpy in the final helix. Would be about perfect if it had a couple final big elements.

Those Bavarian pretzels are awesome if you get em fresh. They harden up pretty rapidly if left out. Fresh funnel cake was also a lot better than what we usually get. Ice cream is top notch. Capone's has extremely slow lines and a real lack of tables if you're thinking about going there. Spaghetti was much better this weekend. The meal pass is often more enticing than a lot of the rides nowadays. Hot or even warm water wasn't working anywhere as usual. Roaring Rapids gave us probably the fastest ride we ever got on it.

They got Cedar Point bins on Batman now too. Never noticed a separate railing to separate the front row rides on Batman like X-Flight has. Susan Rosen had a student named Serena do her show. Not a bad show but there is a marked difference. Glad there's something in the Pictorum. Anything they can do to make it more of an experience as opposed to just a few coasters is a good move. Lines to get into the park seem to move faster with the new system.

I can give them credit for the improvements. But this is with half the back lot at least 30% empty. It's already pushing it. We may go again a couple more times this month and see how it pans out.

[Ilovthevu']

^The park tells lies to the non-enthusiasts when they say 30 seconds to dispatch. Could you imagine them sending outdoor Batman in 30 seconds? The thing would stop on the lifthill every single cycle. For V2, they wait 2 minutes to send it, and than the girl goes we only have 30 seconds to dispatch. lol

Spacely's, Little Dipper, and the Batman indoors are probably the only rides that can safely be sent within 30 seconds.

[Goku1910]

They make the goal of 30 seconds unrealistic on purpose to make people move faster.

It doesn't work since people tune out spiels anyway.

[Ilovthevu']

^I think they tune out recorded spiels over live spiels way more.

[batmanfan80]

I wonder if they're misreporting the wait times to keep people out of the lines. The times they post and the times on the queue sites were way off. Usually they aren't. Doesn't Raging have a countdown? Whatever they're doing, they're moving the lines along way more efficiently and without many empty seats. It wasn't that long ago that they were taking 5 min to dispatch Viper trains.

[Ilovthevu']

^I think the Zipper (joker) is helping keep the lines for the other rides all down. Almost everytime I go on that ride, it's almost 1 hour, and that's not even those HUGE switchbacks to the right. 1 hour is maybe 400 people. Their might be 500 people that are stuck their for 1 hr 1/2 everyday this year.

For the days you went, was the waterpark also really packed because it was really warm out? That matters also. When it's 90 degrees out, everyone is in the waterpark. When it's about 70-79 degrees, everyone is in the regular park.

As of right now, the park is also on it's peak with roller coasters. Some of the times, they were getting new coasters, they would always close another one. Now, they added one, and didn't take away one, yet... Iron Wolf closed, and they added X-Flight. Ragin Cajun closed and they added Goliath. Little Dipper seems to be the only one they added, but didn't take away one. Deja Vu closed, and they added Batman indoors.

[cliffhanger]

^I think they tune out recorded spiels over live spiels way more.

People will tune out anything they hear. When I went on Goliath recently people were STILL pulling down the restraints after probably hearing the announcement 5 times in line and before boarding. They should add a big sign on the stairs telling you to leave the restraint up.

[cliffhanger]

^The park tells lies to the non-enthusiasts when they say 30 seconds to dispatch. Could you imagine them sending outdoor Batman in 30 seconds?
Spacely's, Little Dipper, and the Batman indoors are probably the only rides that can safely be sent within 30 seconds.

While it sounds silly to us, I think it really puts the hustle into people. That is, when the operator says it clearly enough to be understood. I think the real problem is the cubbies and drink holders. X-Flight, Batman and Bull need to get rid of those. The exit area is so cramped on those rides, that it really slows down load and unload. For those, it should be mandatory to store at least bags in lockers. Maybe provide them free for the riders. I know Universal does this for some rides.

[Ilovthevu']

^The park tells lies to the non-enthusiasts when they say 30 seconds to dispatch. Could you imagine them sending outdoor Batman in 30 seconds?
Spacely's, Little Dipper, and the Batman indoors are probably the only rides that can safely be sent within 30 seconds.

I think the real problem is the cubbies and drink holders. X-Flight, Batman and Bull need to get rid of those. The exit area is so cramped on those rides, that it really slows down load and unload. For those, it should be mandatory to store at least bags in lockers. Maybe provide them free for the riders. I know Universal does this for some rides.

I absolutely disagree. The smaller the station exit, the faster they will store those bins, and drink containers compared to something like Superman where the train and exit area is gigantic, and they might have 1 bin near the exit. Yes, the Batman outdoor exit is a little too small, and I think that the Whizzer exit area is the right size with the exit being in the right place (in the middle of the train). It's just a little bigger than Batman outdoor. As with anything, it's the workers speed on certain rides. Some of the workers at the park are just SLOW, and some workers are fast. On the flip side, the Batman station isn't the coolest place in the world. How would you like to run that ride in 90 degree weather? The park doesn't know how to use 3 workers efficiently either. The operator for Batman should check rows 1 & 2 walking across the rows. The 2nd worker should check rows 3-5, and the last worker should check rows 6-8. They are stuck in their ways, and don't realize that less walking by each employee will make operations faster.

X-Flight is a poorly designed exit just like Demon. That's the REAL problem with that ride. The reason is because you have to walk the entire ride almost unless you are towards the front seat avoiding people that are entering. Exits for coasters should be smaller and towards the middle of the ride - not on either ends of the ride - like those 2. Rue Le Dodge is another terrible exit. You have to walk the entire bumper cars floor in order to exit which adds probably at least 1 minute to that ride loading / unloading procedure.

To increase capacity, the ultimate goal to get rid of the people as fast as possible through exiting. The further the exit is, that will only hurt your capacity. Exits should be in the middle of the ride. Station exits should be smaller - like Whizzer. Station loading area should only be a TINY bit bigger than something like Batman outdoors. Maybe fit only 2 more people per row so it's easier to pass. Some sort of gate that would lock, or that is automatic is so much better than a turnstyle. Turnstyles only add more time to the unloading process. Put the turnstyles before the ride instead.

Where is Raging Bull's turnstyle? Is it at the exit? If so, that's part of your problem. They need a large gate instead, if so.

Even if a turnstyle takes 1 second, that's 36 seconds for those people to leave.

[CoasterRiderSC]

One thing that I've noticed is that rides where you have to step DOWN to board (Viper, Eagle, Whizzer for example) seem to load much more slowly than rides where you just walk up and board (Raging Bull, Batman, X-Flight for example).

[Ilovthevu']

^Whizzer is a really fast loading ride. I don't understand where it's taking too long with that ride. For Viper, and Eagle, they don't have enough employees for each side. They are only using 2 employees to check the entire train of 30 people with seatbelts and lapbars. For Eagle, they have a 3rd employee that's in the booth. Viper would need 4, and Eagle would need need 5 employees per each side instead, but oh well. So, those rides are going to take forever. If those rides didn't have seatbelts, it wouldn't take a long time, but they do..

[cliffhanger]

I absolutely disagree. The smaller the station exit, the faster they will store those bins, and drink containers compared to something like Superman where the train and exit area is gigantic, and they might have 1 bin near the exit.

I disagree with your disagreement. In most cases, the ride designers are limited to where they can put the exits. The only place for X-Flight to exit is through the front. In this case, the drink holders don't make a difference. I never saw any problem with demon, the "storage" area is open enough that people can get in and out of the bins at the same time. Batman on the other hand is super cramped and the bins totally make it slow to get in and out of compared to if they weren't there. Bull's turnstyle is at the beginning of the exit and flanked by bins. Traffic slows to a halt during unload because of this and because the exit ramp is only really wide enough for a single file line. Either way, these rides would benefit from removing bins in my opinion.

[Ilovthevu']

^That's why the Arrow X at Magic Mountain had a station unload, and a station load. You don't have people loading, and unloading on the same side which is such a bad idea. I think with X^2, they changed that because they are CHEAP, and they don't want to run 2 trains all the time plus unload requires more workers. That's probably why Six Flags didn't buy another Wing Coaster, other than the fact that the ride is bumpy in some parts.

Even Cedar Fair (which is buying B&Ms) only bought 1 wing coaster that I know of.

[Ilovthevu']

^They still bought Full Throttle though (a year after X-Flight) which I have yet to find a real price for. $6 million is a JOKE. Backlot Stunt Coaster I have for $13 million in 2005 which was 1,960 ft, and Full Throttle which is taller is 2200 ft opened in 2013. Backlot Stunt coaster tallest height is 45 ft tall, and Full Throttle's loop is 160 ft tall. For $6 million, every Six Flags park would buy a Full Throttle. Instead for that price, you only get 863 ft, and a shuttle coaster like the one at Discovery Kingdom.

The point is, is that they spent some good money on a coaster after X-Flight. They could have bought 2 B&M X-Flight coasters back to back at different parks.

When I went to Magic Mountain so much of that park was 1 train because they don't have enough maintenance trains for nothing. They need to spend more money on every coaster they can in regards to trains. Not buy more coasters, but buy more trains for coasters. I don't know if they since changed this, but why in the world did they give a Riddler train to Great Adventure? Great Adventure should have just bought another train for Chang / Green Lantern. Magic Mountain is not a 1/2 year park like Great America. It's a year round park, and should be run like 1 with EXTRA maintenance trains.

Over Texas and Over Georgia are also 2 parks that are becoming more year round like parks, and should buy more maintenance trains for rides. Yes, they might be $1 million for a train, but that's the price you pay when you want to be open all year round.

Great America doesn't have to buy 3 trains for Batman the Ride or Superman Ultimate Flight because they have a longer time the park is not open. And yes, I absolutely know that 3 trains on either ride is not possible. I'm only talking about maintenance trains.

I waited like 45 minutes for Riddler at Magic Mountain because of the stupid 1 train, and the park was only open till like 6 pm. So many rides at that park were long because of the 1 train operation.

That park gave me a bad taste in my mouth, and it's not worth going back to because of the horrible 1 train operations. Who cares if that park has 19 coasters if so many of them are only running 1 train on a shortened day. They should get their act together, and start worrying about maintenance trains. They should even take out 5 coasters at the park in order for them to get their act together. An amusement park isn't just about what type of coasters you have, but the experience you have during the day. They have yet to figure this out.

[JaminOut]

Spacely's, Little Dipper, and the Batman indoors are probably the only rides that can safely be sent within 30 seconds.

Raging Bull, American Eagle, Whizzer, Joker, and Demon all have blocks less than 30 seconds apart after the lift hill. I believe The Dark Knight (not Batman indoors) has 20 second dispatches, but correct me if I'm wrong). So that makes six coasters that can handle 30 second dispatches (time being after the air gates open, not when the previous train has left the station).


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[Ilovthevu']

They also don't say we have 30 seconds to send this train after the train leaves the lifthill either.

Whizzer is 1:24 until they send another train if they do have 3 running. If they only have 2, they wait until the other train completes the entire course.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqqvsnHQn0E

Demon is 1:08.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKC8R351mXs

^I love some of the comments in the video:
"this hurt" / "I hate this ride. Last time I went on my head bounced back and I literally heard a crack and got a headache. Worst ride ever." / "Don't go on it I got a concussion on the corkscrews" / "i hit mu head against the handles" / "ikr I almost broke my neck on the loop parts" / "One word: ow" / "ikr I got whiplash in the corkscrew" / "I hit my head so much on this one!" - respond to that "Me too", "I hate this ride because of that reason alone...aside from it being slow halfway through" & "true" / "I rode this when I was little, and I liked it. But years later, I have grown and hit my head a bunch of times. Now I don't like it" / "This has to be the worst ride in the park" / "Too Be Honest I Don't Really Like This Coaster Because It Is A Headbanger" / "I fainted on this ride" / "This ride sucks" / "That ride gives you head injuries"/ "I got on that my head was everywhere"


Eagle is 1:50, but I don't even think they do send a train until the trains comes back to the brake run anyway.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KPkQ2gB2tLE

Raging Bull is 1:45. Raging Bull would be the most fun with a 30 second dispatch. 2 trains on the lifthill. Lifthill takes 1 minute 5 seconds.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWX5IwMaCNE

Joker is 45 seconds - They probably don't say the 30 second thing because it's only 8 people anyway.
https://youtu.be/0PbhV46mDF4?t=42s

And yes, we were both right about Batman indoors. It's 23 seconds:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dw5AqNsKBV0
Though with this ride, they never run 1 car. So, in reality in order to leave the station you probably are waiting for at least 2 cars in front of you. --23 seconds twice. So, that's 46 seconds to dispatch.

So, I'm down to Spacely's, and Little Dipper. If you want to agree with their 30 seconds thing being safe to dispatch, fine. Whatever.. For me, it's a trick to get people to hurry up like it matters. Oh, my goodness. We only have 30 seconds to dispatch. We better hurry up asap. If they do that on Goliath, I think that's why you would have people push their lapbars down when they are not supposed to because it's supposed to leave in 30 seconds - if they even say that for Goliath. People would get in panic mode with their lapbars up in the air. That's the ride they should absolutely not say anything about it, but they probably will.

[Ilovthevu']

^It used to be on rcdb when they were Paramount Parks instead of Cedar Fair parks. They would list all the prices for the rides. Now, they took them off.

[great america fan]

New photo op in yankee harbor using an old coaster train.

[RollingCoasting]

Credit to JiggidyNDG for these updates:






We are seeing some progress at The Lobster site


More bins at RB

[Ilovthevu']

Of course, they don't get it. It's not the bins. It's all those people waiting and waiting and waiting and waiting to exit because they still have a turnstyle at the exit instead of a gate. The exit gate (in replace of the turnstyle) improved Batman (outdoors) so much.

A lot of times, it's just having slow workers for slow operation. They also don't have 4 seat checkers on Batman all the time like they had a lot before. I'm sure other newer rides have 4 seat checkers. How many does X-Flight have? 5 workers for that ride?

I know Superman is also slow because again they don't have 5 workers for Superman a lot - only 3 whenever I ride it. Only 2 seat checkers for 32 people. And people wonder why these lines are slow if they are. That's why.

And sometimes people blame the workers for stacking. It's part of the park's problem for not having 4 seat checkers on Batman (outdoors), and Superman. Even Viper and American Eagle really should have 4 each.

Raging Bull on the other hand doesn't even need 4 seat checkers because it's one of the easiest rides to check. Only a lapbar.. No seatbelts + a harness, or feet thing on Superman or people not fitting on Superman. However, Raging Bull does need a gate, and if the exit wooden platform is too small, you can also make it wider for a small portion. Either way, no turnstyle is so much better than a turnstyle at an exit definitely for that ride because the exit area is so small either if you had bins or not.

[Goku1910]

The amount of attendants have little effect on how fast the dispatch is. It's mostly people and their complications with bags/bins.

In my experience at Demon when bins were reintroduced, the most people we would have was 5. Keep in mind this was very rare. Even with this many people we still could not get the train out any faster than 2 train operation.

According to turnstile counts, we were more efficient with two trains than with 3. Not often, but numbers don't lie....unless some kid plays with the turnstile for a good 20 minutes.

[Ilovthevu']

^That makes sense though that you were more efficient with 2 than 3 because the workers get more of a break. With 3 trains, they get more tired which makes them want to go slower, and it's not like they increase the number of seat checkers if they are running 2 compared to 3 trains with this ride.. Also, the workers also always have to tell people to leave for the exit because the exit is in the boomdox of the ride with that horrible gigantic exit area. If Six Flags cared about increasing capacity, they would move the back fence up so the exit area isn't so gigantic. They won't change a thing though.

[Goku1910]

When I was talking about 2 verses 3 that was with the maximum attendants at the time. Demon's maximum was 5. I'm assuming it's 4 now since Flash Pass has since moved back to its original spot.

And according to screamscape the first Skywarp has been purchased. Most likely Six Flags so here's to praying we're not the ones getting it.

[CoastsToCoasters]

It was supposed to be Six Flags Mexico that got it, not St. Louis this year. Remember that pic inside the S&S office listing the rides & locations for 2017?

Is the Lobster even ready to go yet?!