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Park Closing Time

delta79 said:
Just having a look around AT on google street view.

There are vehicle access gates
near the goal striker.
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You seriously don't want to use that access road around from security and all the way round to the back of Hex, especially near Spinball on the corner, that road is terrible it really needs resurfacing!
 
AirFAN said:
Out of interest how do the Towers ensure everyone has left the park?
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Security do 24 hour patrols, but it would be possible to hide from them all night in theory.
 
If you were so inclined, technically you could camp out In a very obscure part of the gardens, out of the way of the red/yellow routes! I highly doubt security will patrol EVERY square metre of park...
 
Ben said:
Alastair said:
Ben said:
Perhaps close off X-Sector and have a shuttle bus going to the car parks from the X-Sector gate, a member of guest services could be present to help guests and also organise the bus etc.
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Has this ever happened before (a bus driving into the park)? Where would it enter and exit?
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It happens during winter when its too cold to run the monorail, a bus services operates between the hotels and main entrance
. X-Sector has a large gate and the staff road behind oblivion.
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There's hidden gates everywhere over Towers. Between Sonic and X-Sector is a large gate which leads to one of the perimeter roads, the bus could go through there, then back up to Farley and in the main entrance. There's a hidden gate near Air (you can actually see it from the monorail) which leads straight into the car-parks.
 
As I've said that perimeter road around the Sonic area is terrible and desperately needs resurfacing before you would want to take a bus of guests on it.
 
Went about a week and a half ago.

Queued 3 1/4 hours for The Smiler, Rita was busy, Nemmy almost up to the gate, and park pretty packed - clearly lots of trips, which I imagine are prearranged.

Queue close? 5pm.

I found that quite extraordinary.
 
Yesterday they park had hour long queues across the board for all big rides and it closed at 5:30pm ON A SATURDAY. I know they are being thrifty at the mo because of the Smiler delays and Merlins accountants saving every bean for the flotation but that is just ridiculous
 
Dave said:
Yesterday they park had hour long queues across the board for all big rides and it closed at 5:30pm ON A SATURDAY. I know they are being thrifty at the mo because of the Smiler delays and Merlins accountants saving every bean for the flotation but that is just ridiculous
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They miss so many obvious opportunities by doing this as well, and you know what for once I'm not going to put them in here.

A few members had mentioned ideas being pinched off the forums and it irritating them, now I have witnessed a few of the less favorable ones miraculously appearing on park whilst they furiously bean count and miss the point completely, I'm just not going to do it. I used to think it was a bit sour, greater good and all that - but to solely increase their bottom line? No.

Penny wise, pound foolish (guest satisfaction oblivious) Towers.

Your enthusiastic park staff are your saving grace at present.

I wont be holding out much hope of them emailing me for my ideas.
 
I managed only 8 rides yesterday due to long queues and early close.

It simply isn't good enough but they don't seem to care. The park, since The Smiler opened, is substantially busier yet they're only adding half hour to closing time when through the day 4+ rides have queues of 1 hour or more!

Legoland closed at 7pm, on the flipside...

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2
 
AstroDan said:
I managed only 8 rides yesterday due to long queues and early close.

It simply isn't good enough but they don't seem to care. The park, since The Smiler opened, is substantially busier yet they're only adding half hour to closing time when through the day 4+ rides have queues of 1 hour or more!

Legoland closed at 7pm, on the flipside...

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2
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Though I did arrive late in the morning thanks to traffic jams and stuff, this was on a Wednesday, I managed 4, if you don't count the fact I joined The Smiler queue at the end of the day, it was 3.

THREE.

On a Wednesday.
 
Weekdays have also been busy since The Smiler opened - so it's no surprise last Wednesday was busy too.

Yesterday, I was with non-regular visitors - and our day panned out like this.

10:15am Entered theme park - went to Forbidden Valley
10:30am Rode Air, with a 5-10 minute waiting time.
10:45am Rode Nemesis, with a 15 minute waiting time. Considered Sub Terra, but it was closed...
11:05am Joined queue for Th13teen, 15 minute queue advertised but actually waited 55 minutes!
12:15pm Didn't bother with Rita due to the queue being 70 minutes. Went to ride Twirling Toadstool, which had a 5 minute waiting time.
12:30pm Spent 1/2 hour in Burger Kitchen, Cloud Cuckoo Land
1:15pm Smiler queue was only 100 minutes, so we joined that. It broke down for 20-25 minutes, so total wait time was 2 hours.
3:30pm Queued 30 minutes for Sonic Spinball.
4:15pm Queued 25 minutes for Congo River Rapids. Group wanted to do Rita, so walked to it.
5:05pm Queued 30 minutes for Rita

Rides were then closed...

The group wanted to do The Flume, Sub Terra, Duel, Hex and Runaway Mine Train but could not yesterday as the park was too busy and closed too early.
 
AstroDan said:
Weekdays have also been busy since The Smiler opened - so it's no surprise last Wednesday was busy too.
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On a couple of occasions this year, I have queued for Nemesis in places I haven't for years, credit to the team that they seem to be running her like clockwork and you never enter the queue worried about times.

If that was not the case, it would be pretty dreadful.

I think they should keep the rest of the park open, but just close the Smiler queue at a sensible time and advertise it clearly! This 5/5:30pm nonsense is just ridiculous now. It's a rip off really!
 
Website had advertised last week just gone as 530 everyday. It was reduced to 5pm randomly on four of those days for no just reason it seems.

The park was still packed at 5pm when I visited. Ridiculous really.
 
I am unaware what time the park closed at today, but according to Ridetimes, four rides had queue times over 1 hour in length (Air, Th13teen, Rita, Smiler).

I fail to understand how Th13teen, with an achievable capacity over 1,400 per hour, could have such a queue...?
 
I certainly wouldn't believe the ride times website one bit, I was on park all day and every time I looked at the website it was no way correct to the real queue times, or even the queue time boards on park, its as if someone updates the website who doesn't have a clue!

For example near the end of the day it said Rita 100 Mins, we joined the queue and was out within 70 minutes, TH13TEEN was no more than an hour, yet the website said 90 minutes. Earlier in the day the site said Nemesis 20 minutes, it was more like 50.

5.30PM ride close is still way too early. We did well today and got on the majority of what we wanted, but failed to get on Air and Sonic due to the large queues and Oblivion because it is still closed. I would say its almost impossible to get on all the coasters, even if you arrive at 9am and leave at the end of the day.
 
Park heaving today - again.

I really feel as though they need to give more. And if it's The Smiler running all night long that worries them, how about:

Today's ride close is 6.00pm
(Smiler 5.30pm)

Today everything was 5.30pm with a solid queue to leave the car parks at 7.45pm!!!!!

It did not used to be like this! In 2010, with today's crowds - car park K in use - it would have been 7.00pm!

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AstroDan said:
Park heaving today - again.

I really feel as though they need to give more. And if it's The Smiler running all night long that worries them, how about:

Today's ride close is 6.00pm
(Smiler 5.30pm)

Today everything was 5.30pm with a solid queue to leave the car parks at 7.45pm!!!!!

It did not used to be like this! In 2010, with today's crowds - car park K in use - it would have been 7.00pm!

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2
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This is disgraceful, the park is heaving - therefore £'s.

The park is bottlenecking due to The Smilers late opening.
 
I really don't understand why it shuts so early, it's the fact people pay £46 each to go on about 6 major rides when the queues are this big it's not value for money
 
After spending Saturday on park, I enjoyed my day, albeit a busy one. However, today was *too* busy, and we left at 2pm, after sitting in the glorious sun on the lawn in front of the Towers. We didn't fancy joining a very long queue for any attraction, and as such, left....

And I am glad we did. 7:45PM queues to exit sounds bad!

Oh, and the Queue Time Boards, and ridetimes.co.uk are absolute rubbish. Don't believe any of it, and just go find out for yourself, as you'll be getting the correct info this way.
 
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