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[2024] Nemesis Reborn: Construction and Speculation

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Blackhole_Sun said:
I would be more than confident it would poll top of the list. Wickerman is extremely popular but enthusiasts also make up a decent percentage of the public and don’t rate it highly.

The park isn’t the same without it, whereas I would quite happily miss out any other of the coasters (perhaps not Oblivion) when I visit.
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Whilst I agree that Nemesis is very likely to be rated highly by guests, which would be one of the compelling reasons to retrack it as opposed to remove it, I would disagree that enthusiasts make up a decent percentage of overall numbers.

In comparison to the 2.5million or so people through the gates each year enthusiasts are a tiny fraction. Take the entire membership of this site (4,200) as an example - it equals 0.1% of yearly visitation.
 
AT86 said:
Whilst I agree that Nemesis is very likely to be rated highly by guests, which would be one of the compelling reasons to retrack it as opposed to remove it, I would disagree that enthusiasts make up a decent percentage of overall numbers.

In comparison to the 2.5million or so people through the gates each year enthusiasts are a tiny fraction. Take the entire membership of this site (4,200) as an example - it equals 0.1% of yearly visitation.
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While I agree, some of this public will be enthusiasts at some point. The amount you see in park merchandise. Before I actually was bothered with rollercoasters I considered Nemesis the best ride at the park by some way (apart from Black Hole of course). This is from when I was a kid.

Wickerman appeals to a younger generation because it’s a ride they can actually get on.
 
We all know that the flagship attraction is actually Battle Galleons, on account of there actually being ships and flags involved. Plus water. Who doesn't love splashing about? 🪿

Nemesis is definitely the signature thrill coaster, but the one in all of the advertising, material and on merch that you see when not in the park is surprisingly Wickerman.
 
The Smiler seems to be the one that people obsess over mostly, especially the under 30s age group (from what I have observed personally). The other two most popular rides seem to clearly be Wicker Man and Nemesis. I think these are the 3 flagship rides, if that is even possible. I don't think that there is any one of the three that blows the other two away in terms of popularity amongst the general public. Nemesis would seem to be more popular with a slightly older demographic compared to the other two, quite possibly, and would probably be the only world class one amongst rollercoaster enthusiasts worldwide.

Edit - But then again, I question myself a little as the popularity of the closure of Nemesis last year and the interest in the rebuild is significant.
 
BarryZola said:
The Smiler seems to be the one that people obsess over mostly, especially the under 30s age group (from what I have observed personally). The other two most popular rides seem to clearly be Wicker Man and Nemesis. I think these are the 3 flagship rides, if that is even possible. I don't think that there is any one of the three that blows the other two away in terms of popularity amongst the general public. Nemesis would seem to be more popular with a slightly older demographic compared to the other two, quite possibly, and would probably be the only world class one amongst rollercoaster enthusiasts worldwide.

Edit - But then again, I question myself a little as the popularity of the closure of Nemesis last year and the interest in the rebuild is significant.
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Flagships change, they're supposed to evolve and it will usually be the newest large investment.

They all however fall into a pattern when we're trying to root for what we as fans think is the park's signature, or definitive ride. It's the big/new coaster that you grew up with and captured the public imagination, during your informative years, the rides that become part of the zeitgeist. Similar to how everyone has a preferred Doctor. It doesn't mean that we think it's the best ride at the park, it's just what defines the park in our collective mind.

Ecclestone by the way. Come at me Tennantites.
 
TomW said:
It seems a bit of a stretch to insinuate that Merlin are willing to spend X-million on rebuilding an entire rollercoaster that the public dislike just to appease some enthusiasts.
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When did I say it was disliked?
I love it, full stop, but what I said was...many members of the public, non thoosies, do not rate it very highly...including many members of my family and friends, and that it isn't considered the parks flagship anymore.
No insinuation that it isn't a good, well rated coaster at all.
Thoosie appeasement doesn't happen often, especially with merlin.
 
I would personally disagree that Nemesis is the signature thrill coaster at Alton Towers, if there even is one. It is clearly popular with the wider guest populace outside of enthusiast circles, or else they wouldn’t be retracking it, but I do think that enthusiasts often have a tendency to overstate Nemesis’ wider popularity versus that of the park’s other rides, from my experience.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s clearly a popular and well-liked ride, but I wouldn’t say it was necessarily any more popular or well-liked than some of the park’s other rides, such as The Smiler or Wicker Man. Whenever you hear people talk about Alton Towers, The Smiler is often the very first ride that comes up, from my experience (and not because of the crash, before anyone says it). As much as it’s not that well liked, or is at very least polarising, in enthusiast circles, the wider guest populace absolutely loves The Smiler, from my personal experience. Wicker Man is similar; as much as it’s not overly revered in enthusiast circles, the wider guest populace absolutely loves it.

If I’m remembering correctly, The Smiler won a public poll of the rides that they conducted after its opening, and Alton Towers once confirmed that Wicker Man had the park’s highest guest feedback scores at some point. With this in mind, I disagree that Nemesis is “undeniably the park’s flagship coaster” as some make out, even though it is clearly a popular and well-liked ride. I’m not sure that it’s necessarily uniquely well-liked compared to some of the park’s other coasters.
 
Smiler is tainted by the accident, so isn't the flagship.
Wicker is nearer, but doesn't get a flagship focus like Nemesis used to get...PMBO, Ultimate, Shockwave come to mind as flagships in the UK in my eyes.
 
rob666 said:
Smiler is tainted by the accident, so isn't the flagship.
Wicker is nearer, but doesn't get a flagship focus like Nemesis used to get...PMBO, Ultimate, Shockwave come to mind as flagships in the UK in my eyes.
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See, the accident is an interesting one. I don’t think the accident is really in the public conscious so much anymore, personally, so I disagree that The Smiler is “tainted by the accident” to a degree that stops it from being popular. It was even popular in the initial months after its reopening, from memory.
 
rob666 said:
Smiler is tainted by the accident, so isn't the flagship.
Wicker is nearer, but doesn't get a flagship focus like Nemesis used to get...PMBO, Ultimate, Shockwave come to mind as flagships in the UK in my eyes.
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I would again counter that though with your age. You can very much remember the Year of the Coaster, so that will play a large part in informing what you see as flagships. You still refer to it as Pepsi Max Big One, which is telling too. It's been 12 years since it was officially called that, despite the cans still remaining.

I can remember Year of the Coaster, just, but Oblivion's launch stands out in my mind and for years that was the coaster that defined the park for me and made it the flagship.

As I said earlier, it's really about what you grew up with, or the first big new attraction that caught your imagination.

There'll be a subsection of people who insist that Corkscrew was the flagship coaster for many years, Black Hole too, even after Nemesis's launch.

For my partner's brother, he associates Towers with Rita, even though he's never visited. The marketing around the launch though was the first coaster be paid attention to at the park. Bloody weirdo.
 
Matt N said:
If I’m remembering correctly, The Smiler won a public poll of the rides that they conducted after its opening.
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A rule to live by: do not trust 'public polls' put out by theme parks claiming that their latest ride was voted the 'most popular' and or 'best'. In these circumstances, you can pretty much sway a poll to say what you want it to - there's no particular rigour behind this type of polling.

Case in point - the year it opened, Rita was also voted as the most popular ride in the park - but the way the vote was conducted on the website you could see the mechanics behind it and there that the dial was turned in favour of Rita.

Whenever I think of flagships, it is always worth having in the back of your mind that "this year's flagship" is not necessarily the same as flagship. New rides will always have a flagship air to them during their early years, but it's how long that is maintained the cements them as a proper flagship attraction.

With Wicker Man for example, its real status will only become apparent once Horizon has opened because at the point it won't be the newest coaster, so won’t be included in promotions as such by default. There's a good chance it will continue to be used in that way, but we won't know until Horizon has joined the line-up
 
Squiggs said:
With Wicker Man for example, its real status will only become apparent once Horizon has opened because at the point it won't be the newest coaster, so won’t be included in promotions as such by default. There's a good chance it will continue to be used in that way, but we won't know until Horizon has joined the line-up
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By this token, then, couldn’t Smiler arguably be considered to still have a sort of “flagship” status? It’s not the park’s newest coaster anymore, it’s now 10 years old, and is not included in promotions by default as a new ride, but it still seems very, very popular with the wider guest populace.

The problem with this discussion of “flagships”, though, is that you could go round in circles all day and not really have a right answer, as the whole definition of a “flagship” ride is very subjective, particularly in the case of a park like Alton Towers.
 
I've started something off here by calling it their "flagship coaster" It's common to confuse the meaning of "flagship" it doesn't necessarily mean it's the best ride or most popular, it's more which is the most important to the theme park. It carries the flag in terms of stability and reliability, it's respected amongst the public and trusted. It's had a clean 30 years of good reliable service.
Does help also that it's the best ride in the park ;)
 
I couldn't get a decent shot of it yesterday (as trying to stay upright on the rock everyone stands on for their vlogs was hard enough with how wet and windy it was) but the vein has been painted onto (at least) the visible part of the lift hill below the trees as well as the track leading to it out of the station.

Hopefully someone with a better camera than my knackered old phone can get a shot of it today.
 
Davezilla said:
Has the first turn from the lift been installed yet? Seems a long time since the last pieces of track were installed.
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No idea, sorry. As we only go once a year we always chip in for the express parking so I didn't see Nemesis from that angle.

I assume if it had been installed one of the usual places that have covered construction would have noticed and posted about it by now.
 
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