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2013: General Discussion

They were all wired in wrongly - if you wobbled a speaker it'd come back into life.

I imagine it'll be fixed over winter, as I know a couple of the staff were reporting it often.
 
The speaker inside the "cave" bit just after the down lift was also broken by the end of the year and was just playing crackling noises. You would imagine all the TVS/Speakers would be under some kind of years guarentee, so shouldnt cost anything to get replaced.
 
According to this, it seems the 2013 Fastrack packages have been announced.

Not that much more expensive than last year, with the only main changes being Oblivion has been added to the Rita/Th13teen deal, with it being replaced on the 'scream' deal by Sub-Terra. Also there is an all new 'silver' package which includes Air, Nemesis, Oblivion, Rita & Th13teen.
 
The change to Scream is quite major IMO - it was the most popular one because it included 3 major coasters, now it's just 2 and a flat. I also wonder whether there'll be a special X-Sector fasttrack including SW7 and Oblivion? Makes sense considering I can't see how it'd fit onto any of those without price increases.
 
Alastair said:
The change to Scream is quite major IMO - it was the most popular one because it included 3 major coasters, now it's just 2 and a flat. I also wonder whether there'll be a special X-Sector fasttrack including SW7 and Oblivion? Makes sense considering I can't see how it'd fit onto any of those without price increases.

Bolt-on Spinball possibly?

These packages were near enough what I expected...
 
It's likely that after SW7 gets through its first couple of months it'll be offered as a bolt-on to other deals, similar to what they did with Sub-Terra.

Also I noticed that there is no Scream+ anymore, so the only package that offers unlimited rides is Platinum.
 
All I can say after see the new options is that there are way too many options for fastrack. I'm not against fastrack, I think it is good and essential offering in many cases. However I do not agree with the way it is offered at Towers. The way BGW do their Quick Queue system is far better. You have the standard option that provides one go on each major ride (minus Nessie due to no room for Quick Queue and Verbolten as it's new), and the Unlimited plus option which provides unlimited entry to the same major rides plus one ride on Verbolten. They are prices appropriately, not stupidly expensive but not really cheap; though I think they provide excellent value for money and made good use of the Unlimited one on my visit.

All the options at Towers are confusing for a start, people won't know what to get. They should scrap Scream and Adrenaline, and keep the new Silver option along with Gold and Platinum. I'd probably reduce the price of Gold and Platinum slightly. Then scrap Young Explorer and Adventure and replace it with a family equivalent of Silver. I feel they would still make a fair amount of money as those that really want fastrack will still buy it. It would also stop the stupid queues we have seen recently for fastrack which impact stupidly on the main queue and cause great dissatisfaction for all guests, with or without fastrack. Sub-Terra should only be on the Gold and Platinum fastracks. SW7 could be added to these options either later in the season, if not for 2014.

That's how I'd do it anyway, of course I have no idea how much they make from fastrack and what the targets are they need to reach. There's every chance that what I've said would mean they don't meet required targets, despite it probably being a better system. The other option is queue bot which does work very well I think.

:)
 
Totally agree with you Rob, the amount of Fastrack deals is just ridiculous, all they need is four tiers of it which will make it simple for everyone to use. Like:

Bronze: Family attractions.
Silver: Thrill attractions.
Gold: All attractions.
Platinum: Unlimited.

Would be so much simpler that way.
 
Pricing I think is spot on.

It's expensive enough to make people think twice about it. With that link suggesting removal of an unlimited backage, makes me think they're making the Fastrack queues vanish and become a premium product once again.
 
The pricing in great, however I don't see any need to change the packages from last year...
I think they should just say
£5 a Thrill Coaster
Add on a flat thrill for £4
All family rides £4
Simples!
 
Josh said:
Totally agree with you Rob, the amount of Fastrack deals is just ridiculous, all they need is four tiers of it which will make it simple for everyone to use. Like:

Bronze: Family attractions.
Silver: Thrill attractions.
Gold: All attractions.
Platinum: Unlimited.

Would be so much simpler that way.
Really like this idea :)
 
Sub Terra on a main package? I trust quotas have been cut accordingly as Sub Terra cannot cope with fastrack!

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2
 
That strikes me as odd too. Assuming they've got the allocation right then I can see them frequently selling out and forcing people to use one-shots for Air and Nemesis. I'd expected the Forbidden Valley package to be £9 with N:ST a £3 bolt on.

The new adrenaline package is effectively a price cut of the Dark Forest + Oblivion bolt on package from last year, which was £13. I'm not hugely surprised as the basic Dark Forest package was the worst value out of all the options last year, with no saving compared to single ride fastrack prices. It'll be interesting to see if the improved value for money is enough to offset the price increase for guests.

Glad to see the back of scream plus - I always felt that allowing people unlimited entry to just 3 rides could really upset the balance. I also like the idea of the new Silver package, and they seem to have got the pricing about right (a £1 increase compared to Dark Forest + Scream from 2012). I get the feeling it'll become £25 when SW7 is added part way through the season. They've also taken the opportunity to fix the confusing names of the old packages - the hierarchy is now much clearer.

Finally, with the increase in package prices, could this be the year that single ride tickets break the £5 barrier for certain rides? As I'm always willing to see queue jumpers fleeced for as much money as possible, the sort of pricing structure I'd like to see goes something like:
Air, Rita, SW7: = £6
Nemesis, Oblivion, Thirteen, Spinball = £5
Flume, Sub Terra, RMT = £4
Rapids, Charlie, Hex = £3
 
Josh said:
Totally agree with you Rob, the amount of Fastrack deals is just ridiculous, all they need is four tiers of it which will make it simple for everyone to use. Like:

Bronze: Family attractions.
Silver: Thrill attractions.
Gold: All attractions.
Platinum: Unlimited.

Would be so much simpler that way.

Really like this idea, would completely simplify the fastrack offering with a clear hierarchy of packages. Cutting the scream/adrenaline (lower priced) packages would make it much more of a premium product, but still have a decent offering for those who really demand it.

Sub-Terra on the Scream package though? Considering Scream is the most popular, this could really hammer terra during peak times if allocation isn't stricter.
 
AstroDan said:
Sub Terra on a main package? I trust quotas have been cut accordingly as Sub Terra cannot cope with fastrack!

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2

That's a good point. Fasttrack was bad enough on it last year, and it was on the family ticket that no one bought then. If it's on a main one then every man and his dog that buys fasttrack will be using it on Sub-Terra.
 
Josh said:
According to this, it seems the 2013 Fastrack packages have been announced.

Not that much more expensive than last year, with the only main changes being Oblivion has been added to the Rita/Th13teen deal, with it being replaced on the 'scream' deal by Sub-Terra. Also there is an all new 'silver' package which includes Air, Nemesis, Oblivion, Rita & Th13teen.

Good spot Josh, thanks.

I'm sure it is generally known by people here, but the gate price is going up by £1 to £46 - but based on last season I think we can expect two more increases within the season, wouldn't you say?
 
I've been completely out of touch with gate prices for the past few years because I've had my AP but I do hope (naively maybe) that this is the only increase for the season,
with BOGOF I probably wouldn't think twice about paying up to maybe £25 to get in but I know its unlikely my non-enthusiast friends would, and I know none of them would even consider visiting without the BOGOF these days :(
 
The park have been raising ticket prices by way above inflation rates for some time, now. They tend to go up between 8 and 10% per year. I think they'll continue doing this until they find the sweet spot, and gate figures start to drop significantly. Until then, it will continue to rise.

As for Fastrack, as I briefly stated, I have some concerns over the new packages.

Air, Nemesis, Nemesis Sub-Terra.
Both Air and Nemesis have throughputs of around 1,100 to 1,300 per hour. Sub Terra is literally, half those. I worry that the effect of fastrack on Sub Terra. The ride already has one of the slowest moving queues in the whole park... it should only be on the gold and platinum options, if you ask me.

Rita, Th13teen, Oblivion
Again - throughput on Th13teen and Oblivion is 1,200+. Rita barely scrapes 900 to 1,000. I worry for the effect of this on Rita's queue, when it, like Sub Terra, moves very slowly.

Family Package
I hope this is extremely limited in sales. Sonic Spinball does NOT need fastrack and I know for a fact that the ride staff on it detest the bunged up entrance with people for disabled and fastrack...
 
Any above-inflation price rise on Fastrack is good news as far as I'm concerned. As John said, I always love seeing queue-jumpers getting fleeced.

Maybe they've realised that Fastrack was reducing throughput to the point where it was seriously reducing guest satisfaction. It's got to reach a point where the bad experience of enough guests offsets the profits made by ever-increasing Fastrack sales. Hopefully we'll see a shift back towards Fastrack as a premium product - a voluntary tax on well-off idiots rather than just idiots in general. :)
 
The problem is, Alton Towers are making out that Fastrack is essential to a day out.

When you try and book tickets online, it comes up with a box 'don't forget to add fastrack tickets'.

::)
 
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