2023: General Discussion

[Kraken27]

Doesn’t bode well for the season at all then

Totally agree - a ride that rain causes issues serious problems with is, is not good for the UK. Not having a pop at Towers - the same could easily be said for rides in Florida where the afternoon thunderstorms (often at 4pm almost to the dot) is the same. This is a big reason why both Disney & Universal seem to replace outdoor rides with indoor ones where possible. The afternoon thunderstorms in Florida can last for 10mins, or right through until the next morning.

 

[RIPCorky]

They need to remove and replace this ride with something that works in the rain. As it stands it's not even a better ride than what it replaced.

 

[rob666]

It used to work fine in the rain, didn't it?
I'm sure I have got wet on it more than once.

 

[AT86]

It used to work fine in the rain, didn't it?
I'm sure I have got wet on it more than once.

(yes, it worked fine in the rain for 10yrs, until ‘the incident’).

 

[jon81uk]

Totally agree - a ride that rain causes issues serious problems with is, is not good for the UK. Not having a pop at Towers - the same could easily be said for rides in Florida where the afternoon thunderstorms (often at 4pm almost to the dot) is the same. This is a big reason why both Disney & Universal seem to replace outdoor rides with indoor ones where possible. The afternoon thunderstorms in Florida can last for 10mins, or right through until the next morning.

But in Florida the issue is nothing to do with the mechanics of the ride, it’s the threat of a lightning strike. The only real solution is to build everything indoors.
Whereas with Thirteen it’s nothing to do with lightning it’s the mechanics of the lift hill and should be able to fix it more easily as it used to run in the rain just fine.

 

[Skyscraper]

This is from the MAP disability Facebook group... Apparently the Skyride could be down until July!



Could be an issue for a fair few guests if that's the case.

 

[Burbs]

This is from the MAP disability Facebook group... Apparently the Skyride could be down until July!



Could be an issue for a fair few guests if that's the case.

Someone in a facebook group is reporting something they were told? I’d take with a pinch of salt.

It never runs in high temperatures so this could be a reason why it might go down for a long period of time though. The gondolas are greenhouses.

Edit: sorry misread your post (read it as they will be closed in July), but my first point still stands.

 

[Poisson]

The gondolas are currently dumped behind Towers Street, Magic HQ and near Nemesis access road.

 

[GaryH]

My thoughts from today:

Not the best of opening days. Monorail not working on arrival. Sky ride not working. Lots of rides down throughout the day. Curse didn’t open until 11.

It felt like the park wasn’t ready for opening day, or at least the rides weren’t. With Nemesis closed there will be some big queues this summer.

Today was moderately busy with most rides being 50 minutes.

On a side note popped into splash landings for a drink before going home and there were a lot of travellers in there. Can’t say I spotted them in the park today so they may be in there tomorrow. Liked the grave stone in the curse queue line which specially referred to them!

Still had Good day though.

 

[BigShadowtinytree]

I’d give my day about a 7.5/10. Overall it was good, the ride count was wickerman x2, thirteen, the kids had a go on driving school and went into the aquarium whilst I went off to do oblivion (was going to do smiler but the srq was an hour wait) and Alton Manor which I thought was superb, need to get on it a few more times as there’s a lot to see. Place was busy as expected.

We did have a couple of issues though. First it was the hour wait for average food at woodcutters after being seated and ordering. Then it was thirteen having to close whilst a minor shower passed over. Nothing that ruined the day but just areas where I wish the park would do a bit better. Hopefully things improve as the season progresses…

My youngest child passed the 1.2 height check (by a hair!) and got to experience wickerman and thirteen for the first time, which really helped make the day special for us. That and the atmosphere was great. Staff we came across were all friendly and seemed happy to be there.

Wickerman was running great today. We had two rides one of which was on one of the last trains of the day, back two rows. It was also dark and it absolutely hauled round the track. It did break down briefly at around or just before closing time, two people got sent round in a train on their own which was funny to see then they added a third train. Overall one of the more interesting waits we’ve had for wickerman. They must have removed a train earlier in the day as I’m sure it was running 3 the first time we rode today.

 

[George W]

This is from the MAP disability Facebook group... Apparently the Skyride could be down until July!



Could be an issue for a fair few guests if that's the case.

I was told by a ride host that the word was Nemesis was planned to be closed for the retrack before last scarefest in mid/late September so rumors do just circulate between staff as not all of them are told all that much.

To the staff it's simply just work gossip anyway and if they are working in the higher up and are in the know of the ins and outs they're less likely to be telling guests things the bosses tell them to keep on the low, because towers is quite a secretive park in general.

Would be good to see towers get a planned maintenance page like Thorpe park have though.

 

[Rick]

With regards to the closed rides, Thorpe and Chessington got a mixed reaction to their comprehensive lists of closures.

At Alton, they obviously had zero intention of running Sky Ride or Spinball (perhaps Battle Galleons, too?) - but they chose not to communicate that ahead of time.

Hard to know which policy is better.

 

[Skyscraper]

Someone in a facebook group is reporting something they were told? I’d take with a pinch of salt.

It never runs in high temperatures so this could be a reason why it might go down for a long period of time though. The gondolas are greenhouses.

Edit: sorry misread your post (read it as they will be closed in July), but my first point still stands.

Of course, that's why I said "could" and "if that's the case". Time will tell.

 

[GaryH]

Forgot to add…. RAP queues were huge again today, not sure what they have changed but I can see this being a major problem on very busy days.

 

[jmc]

Forgot to add…. RAP queues were huge again today, not sure what they have changed but I can see this being a major problem on very busy days.

Echo this, there were regular tannoy announcements in The Smiler queue advising guests that the RAP queue length exceeded that of the main queue (70 minutes). A lot of other queues felt like there was very infrequent movement.

Whatever your opinions are on RAP, the above is not a good experience for anyone involved.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

 

[BarryZola]

Just randomly throwing this in. I went down past the scaffolding/Sub Terra/raised queue yesterday morning to where the barriers are near Nemesis. There were a bunch of Towers managers/higher-ups down there and I asked what the raised platform was all about (explaining that I expect that they probably were not at liberty to say). As expected, they were very hush hush about why it was there and I happily left understanding that they probably weren't going to give anything away.

 

[Max]

Forgot to add…. RAP queues were huge again today, not sure what they have changed but I can see this being a major problem on very busy days.

Seen a lot of this on Twitter. The system needs a complete overhaul, needs to be turned into a proper virtual queuing system. How it’s working at the moment simply doesn’t cut it any more.

 

[Timbrown]

IMO RAP really needs sorting , the majority are taking advantage of the system and ruining it for the minority. When the RAP line is longer than single rider for the smiler there is something wrong. I can not remember in the early 2000’s /2010’s the access line via the exit’s ever being this long.

 

[AT86]

Whilst there is clearly a wider issue with RAP and I don’t want to derail this topic it is not unusual that on opening days and new attraction openings that there may be a higher than usual proportion of RAP guests at the park.

Yesterday’s experience isn’t likely to be representative of an average day.

 

[Ethan]

When the RAP line is longer than single rider for the smiler there is something wrong

Single rider is always the shortest queue out of the 4. From what I've recently seen the queue order tends to be main, Rap, fastrack and then single. Basically single is a free fastrack and feels like an absolute cheat code