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2019: General Discussion

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If you buy your park ticket online via one of the many employee discount/student discount portals, the park + dungeon combo is available which is an additional £2.50 for the dungeon.

I did not opt for this as I’d really rather not bore myself, but £2.50 is either just pretty decent or a bit desperate.




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I know a 17:30 ride closed looks bad but if the Smiler and the Wickerman are posted at 90 mins queue then the last rides wouldn’t close much before 7 then you got to walk to the entrance then decide do u get the monorail or walk to your car could be nearly 8 by the time u leave the car park. Then the drive home. I bet some staff mainly in Towers street shop don’t get home much before 10.
 
Themeparksandy1981 said:
I know a 17:30 ride closed looks bad but if the Smiler and the Wickerman are posted at 90 mins queue then the last rides wouldn’t close much before 7 then you got to walk to the entrance then decide do u get the monorail or walk to your car could be nearly 8 by the time u leave the car park. Then the drive home. I bet some staff mainly in Towers street shop don’t get home much before 10.
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But the 90 minute queue time will magically reduce to a forty five minute one as the staff crack on to get home and the fasttrack queue closes.
Amazing how throughput increases as the queue entrance closes.
 
Alton Towers' budget is inadequate.

They can't afford to extend ride close much and as a consequence, you've a park with multiple half hour waits shutting at 4.30pm.

Terrible guest experience. Only a Merlin owned park would smack guests in the face that way.

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I think closing times is a controversy that probably beats the state of the rapids, Duel, CCL and the lack of family dark rides in my mind (although they're all massive bones of contention for me).

Even the family run parks manage to keep the gates open past 4pm. I can forgive reduced throughput on quiet days, baggage hold closures and staggered openings IF the parks open in hours where better. Even if some of those tactics need to be employed on quiet days to save costs, a park like AT should never shut before 18:00 in my opinion.

Last week the park should have been open until at least 19:00. DLP was open in February half term to that time with similar queue lengths that Towers had had this week and it felt about right. Also, the restaurants and food and bev outlets were rammed at tea time as a result.

It seems like Merlin are trying to cut and discount their way to prosperity with Towers. I'm not suggesting they need to reach to Disney levels of operation, but AT should at least be open for longer than the likes of Paultons or BPPB, especially when you consider the size of the park.
 
Tibble said:
What's ATs latest allowed closing time?
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No idea - but they seem to stick to 9pm ride closes for events like Fireworks, so it could be 9pm. Of course, this is the time the ride queues close, not the ride, so rides [that really generate the noise] will be running until about 10pm on a busy day.
 
I wonder. The roads are poorly lit and Alton village may have some kind of curfew on it. One that allows to the park to operate untiil 9 or 10 on select days perhaps.
 
Rob said:
I do not believe that there is a stipulated latest closing time.
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Indeed I don’t think there is anything formally agreed but the precedence set is 9pm. That way rides are down by the latest 10.30pm.
 
I don't think anyone would object to Towers closing at 7 or 8 pm on busy summer nights. The 9pm precedent is perfectly adequate. There certainly won't be a 'curfew' on the roads in Alton. They are public roads and as such are public rights of way providing you are driving, walking or riding on them legally. The only way any such restrictions could be put in place would be noise complaints. I think that would be far more likely to be around the park operation itself rather than the use of public roads. The use of roads and other infrastructure is only usually considered by a local authority when assessing planning or lisencing applications. None of these are relevant in the parks case.
 
Matt.GC said:
I don't think anyone would object to Towers closing at 7 or 8 pm on busy summer nights. The 9pm precedent is perfectly adequate. There certainly won't be a 'curfew' on the roads in Alton. They are public roads and as such are public rights of way providing you are driving, walking or riding on them legally. The only way any such restrictions could be put in place would be noise complaints. I think that would be far more likely to be around the park operation itself rather than the use of public roads. The use of roads and other infrastructure is only usually considered by a local authority when assessing planning or lisencing applications. None of these are relevant in the parks case.
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I could be wrong but isn't it to do with public transport links? Lots of people who both work there and some who visit too rely on public transport to get there.

Towers will never have long opening hours in the summer. It's simply not feasible sadly because of the above. Blackpool and Thorpe Park are far more accessible and thus can run later in certain periods.
 
Benjsh said:
I could be wrong but isn't it to do with public transport links? Lots of people who both work there and some who visit too rely on public transport to get there.

Towers will never have long opening hours in the summer. It's simply not feasible sadly because of the above. Blackpool and Thorpe Park are far more accessible and thus can run later in certain periods.
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It used to manage 8pm closes in the summer. Fairly sure it still could.
 
Dave said:
It used to manage 8pm closes in the summer. Fairly sure it still could.
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The latest Summer closing time I can remember was 7pm. This was close on 20yrs ago when they had the Royal Marines "Team Extreme" display on the lake in front of the main lawns at 7pm. It was very much an event lead by the marketing team at Towers. The ride staff used to hate it as from 6pm onwards all the rides were literally walk-on, with just the same few people going round and round for more.

Whilst I am never going to defend 4pm or 5pm closures, the fact does remain that due to Alton Towers location, later openings are only viable when there is a big event to keep the customers on-park, i.e. Scarefest or Fireworks. Even in the upcoming school trips weeks, the park can be getting very quiet after 4pm as the coaches start to leave.

In some ways I wish Merlin would spend the budget on longer hours at Thorpe Park - where they have the market for it & optimise ride availability at Alton for a full - albeit shorter - day. By this I mean Enterprise open, Toadstool back, replacement for Ripsaw, replacement for Submission etc. The days of Alton Towers being able to claim "over 50 rides and attractions" are long gone.
 
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