First off, you are not intentionally screwing your guests by selling them FastLane tickets when, in your opinion, they aren't necessary. If guests want to buy them, let them. Just don't tell me they couldn't figure out for themselves that the lines were only 10 minutes long and bought a FastLane just because they saw them on sale. If that's the case, he or she is a complete moron and does not deserve to be at the park. Period.
Secondly, for some rides, not all, the FastLane is a required position to host, whether or not FastLane tickets are actually being sold that day (you need extra people there in case something goes wrong). Visit the park on a Friday night during Fright Fest and you'll notice that rides that have a grouper/ticket taker in the station still have their grouper. Like rct2wizard360 said, the park knows how to run the rides better than you do Bob O.
EDIT: Your comment about cutting off admission early is one of the stupidest things I have ever heard! Do you have no idea how an amusement park is run?! They want attendance to be up. More spending on admission, food, games, and merchandise. The park is not there to satisfy only you Bob O. Good grief.
Anyways, here's how I see it. What Bob O is really upset over is that there are long waits for the rides and they're not being run at full capacity. So he's complaining about it here. Sorry to break it to you Bob O, but if you want to do something about it, you'll have to contact the park directly. These forums are unofficial and aren't moderated by the park.
Bob O....here is a detailed reason why all trains aren't running right away in the morning, even when they suspect the crowd will be heavy....STAFFING STAFFING STAFFING.
When the morning shift employees arrive at 9 in the morning, there is usually only enough people to run 2 trains on a 3 train coaster, 1 train on a 2 train coaster, and an extra person to clean and take a position when it is time for 15 min breaks. The mid-shift employees come in at 11, usually around this time is when the remaining trains needed are added to the track. At this time there are plenty of employees at the ride to run at full capacity, have a few people cleaning, and still have enough employees to hand out lunch breaks to the morning shift. Around 3:30-4:00 the night shift employees come in and the morning shift goes home, the mid-shifters are still there so that lunch breaks can be given. At 7:00 the mid-shifters go home, and the ride is usually back down to 2 trains, or 1 train as it's case may be. If the park is crowded and the line still long, they will move other certified employees from an overstaffed ride that has a shorter line and can drop trains/rafts/boats, or ask some mid-shifters to stay later.
So that is why all trains aren't on right away in the morning, and why coasters that don't have big lines drop down again at night.
Welcome to ShockWave please pull your harness down as far as it will go. While riding ShockWave please keep your hands and feet inside the car, and your head against the headrest, please hold on to all loose articles, especially hats and glasses. Enjoy your ride!
On this post i DIDNT complain at all about the amount of time i have waited in lines, i dont go too the park when it is going to be very busy and have strategies to avoid long lines so lines being long is rarely a problem, so i dont worry about it. When in line you often hear people complain about the time they have waited for a ride, how they are nickled and dimed to death on prices, be it from parking/food/fastlane etc/admissioin prices etc. When i talk to people are arent enthusiats like many of us here are they rarely have good things to say about the SFGAM and when they dont have good experiences they wont return. Now seasonpassholders may not care about the things that the GP care about but the park/company are going to make alot more money off of people coming once or twice a year paying full or almost full admission then they are on passholders coming to the park dozens of times in a year.
I have no complaints about the ride-ops, they do a very good job and are just following directions given to them from managment.
If the company knew how to run there parks better they wouldnt be 2 billion in debt, or is that caused by great park mangement??? Doesnt it make one wonder how other parks can get by without selling fastlane tickets???When you have visited parks all over the country which i have done you can see how different companies run there parks and you can see which ones are successful, and in this category SF is a company that is run terribly and there debt level is a big measure of how bad it is run. And not staffing your rides properly or having enough staff hired is another example of mismangement.
Maybe park mangement should visit other parks and see how they can get by without selling fastlane tickets(which few parks do other than SF chain)or open earlier and stay open longer during busy periods with all or most rides properly staffed.
And yes, some parks do close there doors when it is too busy, the best example would be disney parks at x-mas time or easter when they have reached capacity, ,so they forgo a little money by not letting people in tilll the attendance is down so the people currently in the park can have a more enjoable expereince. Im sure other parks have done like wise when they have reached a capacity level.
Bob O wrote:...If the company knew how to run there parks better they wouldnt be 2 billion in debt...
Most of that debt level was taken on thanks to Premier Parks purchasing Six Flags from Time Warner. The parks themselves have turned a profit.
And yes, some parks do close there doors when it is too busy, the best example would be disney parks at x-mas time or easter when they have reached capacity, ,so they forgo a little money by not letting people in tilll the attendance is down so the people currently in the park can have a more enjoable expereince. Im sure other parks have done like wise when they have reached a capacity level.
You are correct. Six Flags Great America would have to close their gates if they reached capacity too. In fact, I've seen days where this has happened within the last five years. It used to happen a lot before that, so the park kept adding things that would be able to handle larger and larger crowds.
In a smaller sense, you probably saw this year how Hurricane Harbor has a capacity limit, and if there are that many people in it, people can't go in. It's a limit imposed by the state, not by the parks (any of them) for quality control.
I've also been to some of the Disney parks around the Christmas times when they have reached capacity. Do you have any idea how much larger their daily capacity is thanks to the fact that they are designed as year-round parks? The day I was there I got to ride less than 10 rides all day, including FastLane, and the park was open for 18 hours.
I'm not even going to get into your crazy Fastlane arguments.
When SFGAM was created by Marriott it used wdw/dl as a model for the way it was run/organized. And while it is apples and oranges to some degree SF needs to hire someone with that type of mindset to get them out of the financial ruin they are curently in.
PKI has turned its focus to being family friendly and has out done Cedar Point which is now having to reduce admission /cotton candy prices to compete as it had its second subpar year in a row.
For those who love fastlane please explain why disney/cedar fair/paramount/busch parks havent jumped on the pay to skip band wagon???(not to metion many smaller run parks like kennywood/holiday world). If it is such a great idea wouldnt all the other chains jump on this bandwagon as they tend to copy each other. Or do the other chains which are far more succesful see the folly in this and havent jumped on a idea they know is bad.
Bob O wrote:When SFGAM was created by Marriott it used wdw/dl as a model for the way it was run/organized. And while it is apples and oranges to some degree SF needs to hire someone with that type of mindset to get them out of the financial ruin they are curently in. .
