• 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.

  • ⚠️ Online Safety Act Changes

    We've made some changes to the forum as a result of the Online Safety Act. Please check the post in guest services for further information.

Ride Availability/Operations 2022-25

Hid said:
Disney do have essential maintenance closures all the time every month there's at least one ride under going maintenance.
Click to expand...

Despite being an off peak month and a 365 park there are currently no ride closures at Disney Studio Park nor any scheduled for the remainder of the month :D

Admittedly there aren't that many rides to begin with.
 
I have seen complaints that disney have rides go into essential maitanence unexpectedly (for instance areosmith dose it often).

Universal I also understand also have rides going down for a few days.

Part of the problem is the types of rides AT have, it has what 4 prototype/first of its type rides and a notoriously unreliable type of launch coaster, in addition AT are much smaller than disney or universal and likely have a much smaller tech crew.

There are also additional factors, for instance the scale of disney, universal and sea world with the amount they run their rides means they can buy more spair parts with out it wasting as much money (as parts are run more they wear quicker meaning the spair parts may be required more often meaning disney may go through multiple lift motors in 10 years for instance but ATs rides may only go through one in its life time) meaning they have more spair parts and don't have to wait for parts to be made.

In addition disney and sea world opperate a lot of rides from one company (vekoma and b&m) likely adding a lot of part commonality
 
There always seems to be an excuse.

"This park is bigger so they have more money"
"Merlin has lots of money"
"But it's hard to get engineers here"
"Well what about this smaller park that's open longer?"
"They don't have prototypes"
"How about this park that has similar attractions..."
"From similar manufacturers so they can share parts"
"How about this comparable European park?"
"Something something Brexit"

Poor Merlin, the plucky underdogs who are simply victims of their circumstances.
 
Bowser said:
There always seems to be an excuse.

"This park is bigger so they have more money"
"Merlin has lots of money"
"But it's hard to get engineers here"
"Well what about this smaller park that's open longer?"
"They don't have prototypes"
"How about this park that has similar attractions..."
"From similar manufacturers so they can share parts"
"How about this comparable European park?"
"Something something Brexit"

Poor Merlin, the plucky underdogs who are simply victims of their circumstances.
Click to expand...
I was more arguing they aren't really comparable to disney / universal / sea world interms of maitanence and logistics, probably similar to six flags / cedar who have prototype rides and do have rides go down for unexpected maitanence frequently (although unlike six flags AT dosnt leave them closed)

Disney, universal and sea world have massive numbers of rides and large throughput meaning they go through a lot of parts, meaning it makes more sence to store spares for parts which don't break too often as they wear quicker, and they have a lot of similar rides (vekomas, b&m, intamin, etc) reducing the number of differnt rides.
 
Bowser said:
There always seems to be an excuse.

"This park is bigger so they have more money"
"Merlin has lots of money"
"But it's hard to get engineers here"
"Well what about this smaller park that's open longer?"
"They don't have prototypes"
"How about this park that has similar attractions..."
"From similar manufacturers so they can share parts"
"How about this comparable European park?"
"Something something Brexit"

Poor Merlin, the plucky underdogs who are simply victims of their circumstances.
Click to expand...

Brexit was an excuse as it slowed down part delivery but we are 5 years in now so they have had time to sort out their parts storage.

They don’t really have any excuses for the poor uptime, yes they have old ride stock and much of it was prototype but so what? People are paying to get in so they should have a plan.

The crux of their problem is they don’t pay their tech staff well enough to recruit and retain them. They constantly have adverts out for techies, so there is clearly an issue.

Towers has always been a bit of a naff employer except for tech services, they had electricians and riggers who worked their for decades but something changed about 10 years ago and they don’t seem to have that loyalty anymore.
 
Surely better staff transport from bigger population centres like Stoke, Derby or Nottingham would also help?

Or if the park aren’t going to do that, perhaps they at least need to consider a more compelling salary and benefits package for their engineering staff? When JCB are nearby, offering year-round employment that remains indoors, probably pays better, and is somewhat less rural, Alton will have to work a little harder to attract talent.

In the era we live in, I think the novelty of simply working in a theme park alone isn’t really enough to counteract the numerous negatives of working for Alton over, say, JCB, and the park has to find a way to address this if it wants to recruit and retain engineering staff.
 
Merlin being a business that is very staff-heavy is deliberately a pay-lagger, if they want to fix this someone needs to make the direct economic case for how improving engineer pay and improved ride availability will lead to more profit for the company.

Considering both the Vice President and Director of Operations have both recently left the Resort, there’s a bit of a vacuum in someone making the case for it. Whoever replaces them in their roles will need to take their time to learn the dynamics of the Resort. That combined with the on-going restructuring of Merlin means that other staff are still figuring out job roles, and what needs to be done.
 
I haven’t seen the opinion parroted recently that Thirteen can’t run in the rain, however surely days like today can finally but that one to bed. It ran pretty reliably all day long through varying assortments of light rain to heavy rain and everything in between.

In fact, all rides did well today with the exception Spinball which appears actually physically cannot operate in any amount of rain. Surely a ride of that status in any UK park has to be on the chopping block?
 
Pay I think dose need to be increased, the problem is the benefit is very long term (increased costumer satisfaction of rides not going down as often) and very limited short term if not negative (perhaps reduced fastpass sales as there is more time to do certain rides). I also think it would reduce turnover reducing hireing costs.

another problem is that even if pay is increased today it won't take untill a year or so before the increased staff are noticed as from what I recall it takes like a year to get staff up to competency to work on rides by themselves.

tbh I am surprised they aren't unionised, that small group could take down operations for AT for ages as it takes a while to get competency on rides and is expensive and take a lot of time to rehire.

Mick said:
I haven’t seen the opinion parroted recently that Thirteen can’t run in the rain, however surely days like today can finally but that one to bed. It ran pretty reliably all day long through varying assortments of light rain to heavy rain and everything in between.

In fact, all rides did well today with the exception Spinball which appears actually physically cannot operate in any amount of rain. Surely a ride of that status in any UK park has to be on the chopping block?
Click to expand...
they added brakes at the bottom of the lift hill, it used to not be able to (as the train would start slipping and the computer would panic) but that seems to have been resolved now.

Spinball is due to the brakes, they are too short for the weight of the vehicle, it is fine when dry but when wet it could slip through (which is why it was a limit of 3, and is a limit of 3 at chessington) this closing during the rain was added only recently

Due to this and it being such an annoyance to locals (apparently) I could see them agreeing to remove it for something such as an expansion of cebeebies land
 
flyingguitar said:
Due to this and it being such an annoyance to locals (apparently) I could see them agreeing to remove it for something such as an expansion of cebeebies land
Click to expand...
It’s pretty clear Spinball Whizzer isn’t going anywhere, they’ve only recently invested a lot of money into a new PLC system, bringing up to standard with Reborn and Smiler.

You don’t invest that much into a ride if they thought there was the possibility of scrapping it over the short-to-medium term.

I would like to see more effort being put into Spinball though, maybe a repaint and landscaping to make it a bit more presentable. Also I’d love to see them add some old-school midway attractions by the Hospitality Suite and bring back a small playground for children to blow off some steam.

The midway between Smiler and Spinball is too busy just to be dead space for most of the season.

Sacrifice the Spinball Noodles and On-Ride Photo Booth for a new flat in CBeebies too, having new a new digital ORP booth and a new F&B quick service point where the HB Leisure stall is opposite CHS.
 
Bert2theSpark said:
It’s pretty clear Spinball Whizzer isn’t going anywhere, they’ve only recently invested a lot of money into a new PLC system, bringing up to standard with Reborn and Smiler.

You don’t invest that much into a ride if they thought there was the possibility of scrapping it over the short-to-medium term.

I would like to see more effort being put into Spinball though, maybe a repaint and landscaping to make it a bit more presentable. Also I’d love to see them add some old-school midway attractions by the Hospitality Suite and bring back a small playground for children to blow off some steam.

The midway between Smiler and Spinball is too busy just to be dead space for most of the season.

Sacrifice the Spinball Noodles and On-Ride Photo Booth for a new flat in CBeebies too, having new a new digital ORP booth and a new F&B quick service point where the HB Leisure stall is opposite CHS.
Click to expand...
It has had a new PLC (a few years ago) but it is also built on flat land, and after being sold to AT Mauer actually made it a standard model, merlin could move it to one of their parks else where where the climate is much better with less rain not wasting that money and making better use of the ride (as it can operate more than the like 10 % of the time it isn't raining).

I wasn't suggesting they just add a CBeebies extension, I was more suggesting the add a new big ride using the removal of spinball as a chip to get this new ride through planning permissions and that old land gets turned into CBeebies.

This would also be after and other projects (such as horizon and any new flats, if they still are happening) so would be a couple of years down the line and could allow AT to get something they could have struggled to get through planning permission (as I understand it the locals HATE that ride)
 
BarryZola said:
Why do the locals hate Spinball in particular?
Click to expand...
I don't know, however I have a few guesses:
the view (as explained bellow),
the noise (the brakes are loud, and it is located near the entrance (and thus locals)
it isn't really covered, other rides are quite well covered by the trees or are dug in a valley (lick wickerman) (apart from maybe oblivion) but this ride is quite exposed

Islander said:
Let’s be clear, it’s the same person that’s now posted this twice, so citation needed™ 😉
Click to expand...
I have heard it on this fourm quite a few times, I guess I meant the council not Locals (but is there much of a differnce)

It has been floated many times as a replacment for planning permissions in a similar way
immelmanloop said:
Yeah the council hate spinball, as it technically interferes with the view of the towers from the lawns as I think that view is protected? All it is now planning wise is a pawn for a tricky application.
Click to expand...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top