• ℹ️ Heads up...

    This is a popular topic that is fast moving Guest - before posting, please ensure that you check out the first post in the topic for a quick reminder of guidelines, and importantly a summary of the known facts and information so far. Thanks.

Inexpensive Improvements

AirFAN

AirFAN

TS Member
So you guys probably hear me bang on about how Alton is just a capitalist money making machine a bit too much. Imagine you're on the board of this company (or in a position to make changes) but also have a limited budget. What would you realistically change to make the park better? How do you imagine the park will make a return on any change?
 
Drop the price and drop the vouchers. Instead of charging £50 on the gate, expecting most guests to use a 2-4-1 voucher, drop the price to £30/35 and NO vouchers.
 
@Pepper_Plant painting the tunnel liner has problems due to the material. Although on the first day of the season they had removed the your day lights and stuck some blue LED floodlights in the tunnel. This has changed the feel of the ride, for the better.
 
Free fast-track tickets for hotel guests - early park entry is a good perk, but not much use when half the coasters aren't open anyway. DLP does this for guests staying at the Disneyland hotel (one free pass per person, per room, per day).
 
MichelinMan said:
Free fast-track tickets for hotel guests - early park entry is a good perk, but not much use when half the coasters aren't open anyway. DLP does this for guests staying at the Disneyland hotel (one free pass per person, per room, per day).
Click to expand...
They do something like this at Scarefest when there's no ERT. I think last year it was limited to the first hour from opening, but when the fastracks were valid all day in previous years the impact it had on queues was frankly unacceptable. I still think staying on resort should be a big enough perk by itself at that time of year, and for the rest of the year ERT still seems like the best option.
 
They did used to give you fastrack tickets for a selection of rides, but as we all know, they led to massive queues on rides like TH13TEEB and Charlie.

But last year and I think the year before they gave hotel guests one fastrack on each ride for the first hour of the day, which worked much better because the park isn't that busy.

I know this is something Thorpe do all season now, where hotel guests have a wristband and they can use the fastrack queues as much as they want for the first hour of the day.

It wouldn't surprise me if towers did something like this in the future as it would save a fortune on running costs during ERT. However would be disappointing to see it go for annual pass holders.
 
^ It does feel like a bit of an odd perk when you're presented with a fastrack band on some wet Tuesday in March and the fastrack lines are longer than the regular lines because of said perk.
 
As a hotel guest it doesn't feel like you get any perks for paying such a high price, seeing Fastrack tickets brought back as a perk (all year round) would be a good start. A discounts booklet would also be another good one, they used to give vouchers to hotel guests and if anything it pushes guests to buy more products, food and drink at the resort.
 
James said:
As a hotel guest it doesn't feel like you get any perks for paying such a high price, seeing Fastrack tickets brought back as a perk (all year round) would be a good start. A discounts booklet would also be another good one, they used to give vouchers to hotel guests and if anything it pushes guests to buy more products, food and drink at the resort.
Click to expand...
ERT is a decent perk (and is missing from the Chessington hotels), but I would personally prefer a fast-track ticket. When I am on holiday, I don't want to get up early to make it to ERT (especially because it annoys the hell out of the wife - not a good idea!). I want to lay in, have a pig-out at the great buffet breakfast, and then roll into the park nice and leisurely! I was the same at Disney - stayed at the Polynesian resort 10 nights, but didn't make it into any of the parks for early entry.

An alternative to fast-tracks, though, could be a QBot system like at Legoland. I used it when I was at Legoland, and it worked really well for me. I don't like the idea of paying extra to reduce the wait times, but a virtual queuing system would be good - especially for rides like Rita which must be soul destroying in busy times (never done that queue before, but will be doing it this year with my son who is old enough to ride now, and not looking forward to that queue at all. Especially because of all the wasps that are in the area).

Actually, that could be another improvement - move the location of the drinks vending that is near the Rita queue - I am sure that is what attracts a lot of the wasps (it certainly seemed to be the case when we used it).
 
So, made a list of (mostly) inexpensive improvements.
  • Ripsaw restored to its best. Blood red restraints, saw blades on the end and the blue things on the side.
  • The air music playing loudly in the tunnel.
  • The words "prepare for air" painted on the floor of the air tunnel.
  • More "forest" in dark forest
  • The nemesis queue line videos played
  • For the rides that don't have queue line videos (such as air, thirteen, tips as ect...) play the ride advert on tv screens in the queue.
  • Have built in speakers in the enterprise capsules, that play the oblivion music
  • In the monorail station, have massive pictures of the rides.
  • The original "sit back, it's fright time" played in the nemesis station, or, you know in the nemesis story video, the person shouts "NEMESIS!" That should play.
  • Despite the fact the smiler staff look like disturbed clowns, I like the idea of ride ops wearing ride clothing.
  • ERT includes oblivion, nemesis, air, marauders mayhem and ceebibees.
I know some of these would be expensive, and a bit pointless. But why not.
 
MichelinMan said:
ERT is a decent perk (and is missing from the Chessington hotels), but I would personally prefer a fast-track ticket. When I am on holiday, I don't want to get up early to make it to ERT (especially because it annoys the hell out of the wife - not a good idea!). I want to lay in, have a pig-out at the great buffet breakfast, and then roll into the park nice and leisurely! I was the same at Disney - stayed at the Polynesian resort 10 nights, but didn't make it into any of the parks for early entry.

An alternative to fast-tracks, though, could be a QBot system like at Legoland. I used it when I was at Legoland, and it worked really well for me. I don't like the idea of paying extra to reduce the wait times, but a virtual queuing system would be good - especially for rides like Rita which must be soul destroying in busy times (never done that queue before, but will be doing it this year with my son who is old enough to ride now, and not looking forward to that queue at all. Especially because of all the wasps that are in the area).

Actually, that could be another improvement - move the location of the drinks vending that is near the Rita queue - I am sure that is what attracts a lot of the wasps (it certainly seemed to be the case when we used it).
Click to expand...
Didnt AT try the Qbot system before and it failed miserably?
 
Im prob wrong, Im sure there was a time in Tussauds time where there were ticket machines near ride entrances where you got a ticket with a time to come back.. or was I dreaming o_O

::edit:: or is that not how Qbot works... Ive never been to legoland :p
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top