Ian
TS Team
- Favourite Ride
- Dizz, Bobby’s Yarn Land
There are factors such as baggage policy, operating procedures, batching capabilities, exit riders, etc. which all have an impact but are not necessarily the fault of the hardware itself.
When looking at a coaster though hardware and setup considerations may include things like:
When looking at a coaster though hardware and setup considerations may include things like:
- Restraint type and faff - Seatbelts can slow things down, and other restraints like leg flaps or other multi-part restraints increase complexity. Restraints found on the likes of X2 for instance are known for being awkward. Shockwave at Drayton too has a rather unconventional setup that seems to confuse some guests, meaning staff have to then help them or wait for them to figure out what they need to do.
- Ease of access to check restraints - take a B&M Invert or Flyer for instance, you can zig zag back and forth between the rows going left to right on one, then right to left on the next. Sitting coasters may involve more leaning across people or squeezing between riders legs and the front of the vehicle to get to those in the middle. This means you either need multiple staff to reach each side or you make one person spend more time trying to reach over or squeeze in.
- Station layout - Having riders exit the same side as those boarding create bottlenecks, unless you have separate on and offloads. Also where you position your staff. If someone has to walk from either end of the train back to the middle to press their host panel that’s wasting more time.
- Programming - Some rides are badly programmed or have technical limitations. Vampire at Chessington falls foul of this. It wastes so much time trying to park itself far more accurately than is perhaps necessary for a ride of its type. Wicker Man used to have similar issues as well when it came to parking, though some of its problems were born out of trying to be faster and more efficient. Others might have issues whereby a train could be dispatched on paper (its safe to do so, there’s means of safely stopping and restarting the train without hitting the one ahead) but the system won’t allow it. On the flip side, you have some rides which try to be clever and anticipate when they will need to do something, like regulating the speed of a train approaching the station to try and keep it moving ready for when the station clears (Air/Galactica does a rather basic attempt at things like this, including how it allows a train to dispatch and then regulates the lift to space it. Keeps the station flowing and minimises total stoppages)
- Layout and timing - If you can load a train in 40 seconds that’s great, but it’s pointless if your layout means you won’t be able to dispatch for 60 seconds because the train ahead isn’t going to have cleared the block.
- Vehicle movement - When you hit dispatch you ideally want that train out of the station as quickly as possible and the next one in. Th13teen is a great example of this. It’s super efficient at moving trains around between blocks and in and out of the station. Other rides make you wait for this to happen. There’s also things like allowing two trains to follow each other in the station at once. Some rides have multiple sections in the station, allowing two trains to follow closely behind each other. Others demand that you wait for the train to entirely clear the station before the next one will be allowed to pull in.
