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[2026] Bluey Coaster in CBeebies Land

IanB said:
I dont understand this train design at all? Its almost like it’s being designed by someone who does not go to theme parks.

Sitting at the front of the train and being the driver is the most fun for kids (and adults), so why take that away. Why not have Bluey and Gran at the back if you must have them in the ride car?

Why reduce capacity by two for what is already going to be a low capacity ride?

I get that you always have a slightly blocked view from people in front, but this is just, I don’t get it.
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are you new to themeparks?

this isn't uncommon to have the lead car a big theming element

having a lead car be theming, etc is very common and depending on the configuration of the ride, it probably will be a trailered design where apart from the first car (this one with the theming) the rest only have 2 sets of wheels and are attached to the car in front by a ball joint similar to a trailer, this means the first car usually has to be larger which would look odd without anything up front and difficult to fit some seats in the spot (it also can have an impact on the forces of the rides, as the front car is a solid car it can affect how it takes corners, often they will have only rotation axis (in roll), this can be seen on wickerman which shares the same design, but they can have seats such as the smiler or nemesis).

given the design of this ride, the train will probably be quite long meaning only a few people would actually be impacted, and the theming has been designed to come alongside the ride over being in front of the riders meaning it probably wouldn't have much impact on the visibility of the theming, thrill rides you would want to see forward more, or rides such as DK at universal but this isn't too critical.
 
I am not saying that it does not look impressive, and that the front carriage should not have any themeing, it does look good, they have done a good job, and its going to be fun for kids to go on and as others have said, Kids are going to love it no matter what.

The point I am trying to make is that I belive the guest experience should come first and I am not sure that is the case here. Maybe, as others have said, the team who has designed it thinks this element improves the experience for the guest, I dont see it that way.

The people I care most about agree with me, it was quite funny when I was showing Daisy it, she was like, it looks great, but I wish I could drive it and then asked if it had any inversions (She did her first inverting coaster in December, and I have tried to teach her the names of the elements correctly, so she calls them inversions instead of loops).

Maybe the angle of the photo makes it look worse than it is, but for young children sat on the front row, they are not going to be able to see anything out the front or get that sense of speed from the air blowing in your face. We both agree it would be more fun, if you could sit at the front, see where you were going, and pretend to be driving. Why bother with a rollercoaster if your not going to let people expereince what makes a rollercoaster great?

This requires a little bit more engineering, and cost (But for a company that is second only to Disney, this should not be an issue), but why not be more creative, think outside the box and have Bluey and Gran holding on the back, and an animatronic lifts them up, so it looks like they are flying when they go down the first drop. The kids get to come away having this magical memory of driving Bluey and Gran around, and everyone watching has something impressive to watch with them hanging on at the back.

Maybe I am just getting to the old and grumpy stage of life.
 
IanB said:
I am not saying that it does not look impressive, and that the front carriage should not have any themeing, it does look good, they have done a good job, and its going to be fun for kids to go on and as others have said, Kids are going to love it no matter what.

The point I am trying to make is that I belive the guest experience should come first and I am not sure that is the case here. Maybe, as others have said, the team who has designed it thinks this element improves the experience for the guest, I dont see it that way.

The people I care most about agree with me, it was quite funny when I was showing Daisy it, she was like, it looks great, but I wish I could drive it and then asked if it had any inversions (She did her first inverting coaster in December, and I have tried to teach her the names of the elements correctly, so she calls them inversions instead of loops).

Maybe the angle of the photo makes it look worse than it is, but for young children sat on the front row, they are not going to be able to see anything out the front or get that sense of speed from the air blowing in your face. We both agree it would be more fun, if you could sit at the front, see where you were going, and pretend to be driving. Why bother with a rollercoaster if your not going to let people expereince what makes a rollercoaster great?

This requires a little bit more engineering, and cost (But for a company that is second only to Disney, this should not be an issue), but why not be more creative, think outside the box and have Bluey and Gran holding on the back, and an animatronic lifts them up, so it looks like they are flying when they go down the first drop. The kids get to come away having this magical memory of driving Bluey and Gran around, and everyone watching has something impressive to watch with them hanging on at the back.

Maybe I am just getting to the old and grumpy stage of life.
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Although I understand what you're saying, as others have said it's not unusual and I don't think it's detrimental to the ride. Just responding to your Disney comment, on what is probably one of Disney's most famous coasters, the engine zero cars on Big Thunder Mountain are probably the biggest ones out there with them taking up the whole front carriage without any seating and no one has ever complained / mentioned it to my knowledge on here before and it definitely doesn't take it away from the ride experience.

 
IanB said:
I am not saying that it does not look impressive, and that the front carriage should not have any themeing, it does look good, they have done a good job, and its going to be fun for kids to go on and as others have said, Kids are going to love it no matter what.

The point I am trying to make is that I belive the guest experience should come first and I am not sure that is the case here. Maybe, as others have said, the team who has designed it thinks this element improves the experience for the guest, I dont see it that way.

The people I care most about agree with me, it was quite funny when I was showing Daisy it, she was like, it looks great, but I wish I could drive it and then asked if it had any inversions (She did her first inverting coaster in December, and I have tried to teach her the names of the elements correctly, so she calls them inversions instead of loops).

Maybe the angle of the photo makes it look worse than it is, but for young children sat on the front row, they are not going to be able to see anything out the front or get that sense of speed from the air blowing in your face. We both agree it would be more fun, if you could sit at the front, see where you were going, and pretend to be driving. Why bother with a rollercoaster if your not going to let people expereince what makes a rollercoaster great?

This requires a little bit more engineering, and cost (But for a company that is second only to Disney, this should not be an issue), but why not be more creative, think outside the box and have Bluey and Gran holding on the back, and an animatronic lifts them up, so it looks like they are flying when they go down the first drop. The kids get to come away having this magical memory of driving Bluey and Gran around, and everyone watching has something impressive to watch with them hanging on at the back.

Maybe I am just getting to the old and grumpy stage of life.
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I guess for younger or more timid children the idea of riding in a train being driven by Bluey might be more appealing. It sounds like your Daisy might have outgrown this sort of ride and be looking for bigger thrills. For a thrillseeker, a front row ride is the golden ticket, but if this ride is targeting preschoolers who might only have ridden Octonauts before, I wonder if it might be a bit too scary?
 
NuttySquirrel said:
I guess for younger or more timid children the idea of riding in a train being driven by Bluey might be more appealing. It sounds like your Daisy might have outgrown this sort of ride and be looking for bigger thrills. For a thrillseeker, a front row ride is the golden ticket, but if this ride is targeting preschoolers who might only have ridden Octonauts before, I wonder if it might be a bit too scary?
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I agree; they've probably added the large character models at the front to help the young ones feel more comfortable riding.
 
IanB said:
This requires a little bit more engineering, and cost (But for a company that is second only to Disney, this should not be an issue),
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They have never once claimed they are second only to Disney in terms of quality. Context is key here.

Merlin are (or were, I haven't checked recently) second only to Disney in terms of visitor numbers across the group only. This is all they have ever claimed to be second in when comparing themselves to Disney, that they are second only in the amount of people going through their turnstiles, across various attractions across the globe. Nothing more.

I wonder what the queues for this are going to be like on opening day? I am guessing it will only have a single train going off the tiny layout.
 
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Problem with claiming yourself as "second to Disney" with a teeny caveat underneath is that it alters expectations accordingly.


Queues will probably be 2 hours at opening. Doubt they'll have Fastrack on it immediately (mostly because they've done similar beforehand), but they might be worth implementing a "1 shot" RAP like Hyperia to allow the queue to actually move.
 
DistortAMG said:
They have never once claimed they are second only to Disney in terms of quality. Context is key here.

Merlin are (or were, I haven't checked recently) second only to Disney in terms of visitor numbers across the group only, this is all they have ever claimed to be second in when comparing themselves to Disney. That they are second only in the amount of people going through their turnstiles, across various attractions across the globe. Nothing more.
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Totally agree with this, I get really tired of seeing that quote across social media being mis-used to justify someone's argument that Merlin are **** or not doing enough.

Sorry to go off topic, but I asked Chat CPT to summarise what Nick Varney meant by that comment when he said it. And this is what it came back with - I have put it in a spoiler in case people don't want to read it as it is a bit off-topic:
Nick Varney’s line about Merlin being “second only to Disney” wasn’t a boast about creative style or storytelling—it was a scale and market‑position statement. Here’s what he meant, grounded in the available information:

What “second only to Disney” refers to:

According to industry reporting, Merlin Entertainments is the second‑largest operator of visitor attractions worldwide, with only the Walt Disney Company ahead of it in size and global reach. This ranking is based on:
  • Number of attractions (Merlin operates over 140 globally)
  • Geographic footprint (Europe, Asia, North America, and more)
  • Annual visitor numbers
  • Overall scale of operations in the themed‑entertainment sector
What it doesn’t mean:

It does not imply that Merlin’s parks are second to Disney in terms of:
  • storytelling
  • brand power
  • per‑park attendance
  • revenue per guest
  • IP‑driven entertainment
Disney dominates those areas. Varney’s point was strictly about global operational scale—the breadth of Merlin’s portfolio (LEGOLAND, Alton Towers, Madame Tussauds, SEA LIFE, etc.) makes it the only company whose total attraction count and visitor volume place it directly behind Disney.

But back to this coaster though, and like others have said, it looks great and should 100% appeal to the target audience. Obviously I am not that audience nor do I have kids young enough to be part of that audience either. Let's just hope that the area theming around the coaster is just a high quality, no reason to think otherwise. I think Towers are onto a winner here.
 
IanB said:
This requires a little bit more engineering, and cost (But for a company that is second only to Disney, this should not be an issue), but why not be more creative, think outside the box and have Bluey and Gran holding on the back, and an animatronic lifts them up, so it looks like they are flying when they go down the first drop. The kids get to come away having this magical memory of driving Bluey and Gran around, and everyone watching has something impressive to watch with them hanging on at the back.
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from an engineering perspective that is so immensely complex I don't even know where to start, it isn't a "little" bit more engineering, you are talking about probably doubling the cost of the ride if not significantly more, Disney haven't done anything like that for a reason:

it would require a significant train redesign to move the non trailered car to the back of the train, as I said earlier the train is (now we have more pictures) a trailered design, this is where the first car is similar to a road car with 4 sets of wheel's and the rest are attached with ball joints and only have 2 sets of wheels similar to how a trailer is hauled on a road car, this is one of the reasons why the first car has the theming as those 4 sets of wheels means the car is longer but perhaps not long enough to add more seats, or the forces due on the front would be too high to meet its restraint classification requirements.
in addition to that the trains would have to be modified to add secure attachment points, and the animatronics would have to be very carefully designed to ensure fatigue isn't an issue, whilst also requiring a ton of maintenance to deal with the vibrations and fatigue that will probably happen.

It would add so much weight, adding just a set of speakers has destroyed rides like space mountain at Disney California due to the weight of the batteries and sound system, this would require a massive battery along with controls and large heavy structures to hold and move the characters this could require massive changes to the structure of the ride.

It would also requires a charging system to charge the new batteries to power the system in the station, this would require a ton of power and be quite expensive, most rollercoasters don't have power once not in the station, there usually power a small section of sensors / actuators to open / close the restraints (Galactica is an exception), it is getting more common to power rides outside the station, but that is usually directly tied to the ride (spinning, etc) and the vehicle has been designed around it.


The design of the ride would be limited due to these animatronics overhanging the back of the train limiting the tightness of the corners and hills the ride can take whilst maintaining clearance.

there are quire a few more problems, but it would probably be extremely expensive to modify a ride to have animatronics on, it may be possible to design a custom ride with animatronics such as king Kong in universal but that would essentially require a new train designed from the ground up, you may say design the train differently, but often rollercoaster trains are "off the shelf" with a new body attached, as it is very expensive to design a train
 
Plenty of time to get theming in place for a Spring opening, I guess we got the zero car reveal yesterday so it didn’t get revealed via a load of cameras over the fence today.

Interesting how there’s the access over the bridge and an exit around the back of the station, guessing one will be the staff access. I guess the bridge will be the guest exit as getting off the other side of the station will allow for smoother operations, and guests being spat out towards Big Fun seems more of a focal point than to the side of Lunchbox.

Will be interesting how this attraction will affect the popularity of Octonauts, especially since that IP can be considered a bit dated now. I wonder whether we could see it relocated elsewhere in the park to make space for next CBeebies expansion.

Anyways, going back to speculation on Bluey, I’d really like Bandit and/or Chilli to be the voiceovers for the ride announcements. Would be such a sweet thing to add and make the experience that bit more immersive in the IP’s world.
 
Bert2theSpark said:
Plenty of time to get theming in place for a Spring opening, I guess we got the zero car reveal yesterday so it didn’t get revealed via a load of cameras over the fence today.

Interesting how there’s the access over the bridge and an exit around the back of the station, guessing one will be the staff access. I guess the bridge will be the guest exit as getting off the other side of the station will allow for smoother operations, and guests being spat out towards Big Fun seems more of a focal point than to the side of Lunchbox.
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I assume the sloped exit on the airgates' side will be the wheelchair/non-ambulant exit. If so, then it kind of makes the wheelchair lift at the main queue/RAP merge point a bit pointless.

Here's a construction update from TPWW. There is so much more work to do that I'm not convinced it'll be finished in time for the season opening on March 14th. Could explain why they haven't announced an opening date yet.


From: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fk-byZUJKiQ
 
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