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Alton Towers Ruins - Behind a Paywall

By the way, there is an official way to give feedback after the tour. I received an email today giving a link to leave feedback, which I've done (pretty similar to my post above). So yeah, it's good that they're wanting to hear what people thought about it.
 
BarryZola said:
By the way, there is an official way to give feedback after the tour. I received an email today giving a link to leave feedback, which I've done (pretty similar to my post above). So yeah, it's good that they're wanting to hear what people thought about it.
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This is good, I'm doing the tour on 20th so haven't read your review in detail but will make a point of feeding my thoughts back to the park. I'm guessing this summer's tours are an attempt to test the waters and it's likely they'll want to make tweaks for the format off the back of any feedback. My initial feelings are that probably a shorter house-only tour, multiple timeslots on both days of the weekend (as a minimum) and with a reduced cost of £5-7 would be a good way to go.

For the gardens I think a self-guided tour is sufficient but they could make a point of developing a historic guide or even a free audio-tour accessed via the app. I noticed a few attractions on my recent trip to Slovenia replacing traditional audio guides with phone apps and it seemed to work pretty well. Would just be a case of plotting out a tour route and adding signage prompts along it.
 
So, thinking about when Hex reopens, what is actually now completely closed to the public unless you're on the tour? Can we still walk Her Ladyship's Garden freely? The conservatory?
 
Matt.GC said:
So, thinking about when Hex reopens, what is actually now completely closed to the public unless you're on the tour? Can we still walk Her Ladyship's Garden freely? The conservatory?
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Her Ladyship's Garden and the Conservatory have 'generally' been open whilst Hex has been closed. On the odd occasion they've been closed off but those times have been exceptions to the general situation. Up to now, at least.
 
BarryZola said:
Her Ladyship's Garden and the Conservatory have 'generally' been open whilst Hex has been closed. On the odd occasion they've been closed off but those times have been exceptions to the general situation. Up to now, at least.
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That's good to hear. When I went a few weeks ago, it was blocked off at the archway. I enjoy exploring and having a sit down in that area on a summers day.
 
BarryZola said:
Same kind of thing with the Towers too, but to a larger extent. Inside we only saw the conservatory, Drawing Room, up the stairs to the roof and back down, Long Gallery, Banqueting Hall and the Chapel. But again, in this situation you only have less than an hour really. There was no access to the Music Room, Poets Bay and the West Wing. No looking at the Pugin Rooms on the way up to the roof etc. Even the little waxworks room was fenced off from the Drawing Room.
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This is the bit I'm most concerned about, in how they have restricted the access to the towers by putting it behind a tour.

With a tour, they can point guests at areas they want to talk about (i.e. look at this stain glass window, Merlin restored, aren't we such good custodians?), whilst downplaying or ignoring areas that they don't want to talk about (i.e. oh, let's not look in this room over here, it's just a prop store room, definitely no original plasterwork or stained-glass to see in there).

I'd be interested to know if they referenced the closed areas during the tour at all? Or if they just passed by all the locked doors without comment?

Merlin seems to be keen to re-write the history of the Towers, to downplay the importance of the ruins as a whole, as well as rooms that they would like to either permanently use for storage or scare mazes. This has also been seen in how they discuss the ruins in some of their recent planning documents.

What isn’t clear is whether this mischaracterisation is due to commercial pressures (for example that it is just an unfortunate side-effect that The Pugin Rooms are being used as part of The Attic, which now means that some of Pugin's final work is now permanently hidden and at risk of being damaged as part of a scaremaze) or if it is due to the current management's lack of knowledge of the heritage they are supposed to be looking after. Arguably the first scenario is pretty bad, but the second is even worse, because if you don't know about your heritage, you are likely to damage it without knowing.

Ultimately, to the best of my knowledge there is no one employed at Alton Towers specifically to manage the park's heritage and balance the protection of that heritage against commercial pressures, and that shows. If you ask a ride operator to manage a heritage asset, then it makes sense that they will treat it like the other ride, hence why they can't see how to make it viable beyond popping Scare Mazes in there and the occasional 'VIP' experience.

With the new tours, the focus is on what is said by the tour guide, rather than being able to explore the ruins at your leisure. And ultimately this means that for most people the ruins will now be a 'once and done' attraction, whereas, formerly for many people, they would have been a 'once every couple of trips' or 'once a year' type of attraction. That's not a long term plan for allowing public access to the building, which is why I have such an issue with the approach the Merlin have taken.

In an ideal world, Alton Towers should have some type of Director of Heritage position as part of the senior team at the park. If they got in a suitably experienced person (for example someone with a background at the National Trust, English Heritage, etc.), they would be in a much better position to protect the heritage on site and open it up to the public in an appropriate (and dare I say commercially viable) way.
 
As far as I can remember there was no reference to the rooms that were kept locked, although potentially I could have been momentarily out of earshot at some point as the ear-pieces were not always necessary as the tour guide's actual voice was usually loud enough if you were with the group, so I had stopped using the ear-piece for listening half way through.
 
Squiggs said:
This is the bit I'm most concerned about, in how they have restricted the access to the towers by putting it behind a tour.

With a tour, they can point guests at areas they want to talk about (i.e. look at this stain glass window, Merlin restored, aren't we such good custodians?), whilst downplaying or ignoring areas that they don't want to talk about (i.e. oh, let's not look in this room over here, it's just a prop store room, definitely no original plasterwork or stained-glass to see in there).

I'd be interested to know if they referenced the closed areas during the tour at all? Or if they just passed by all the locked doors without comment?

Merlin seems to be keen to re-write the history of the Towers, to downplay the importance of the ruins as a whole, as well as rooms that they would like to either permanently use for storage or scare mazes. This has also been seen in how they discuss the ruins in some of their recent planning documents.

What isn’t clear is whether this mischaracterisation is due to commercial pressures (for example that it is just an unfortunate side-effect that The Pugin Rooms are being used as part of The Attic, which now means that some of Pugin's final work is now permanently hidden and at risk of being damaged as part of a scaremaze) or if it is due to the current management's lack of knowledge of the heritage they are supposed to be looking after. Arguably the first scenario is pretty bad, but the second is even worse, because if you don't know about your heritage, you are likely to damage it without knowing.

Ultimately, to the best of my knowledge there is no one employed at Alton Towers specifically to manage the park's heritage and balance the protection of that heritage against commercial pressures, and that shows. If you ask a ride operator to manage a heritage asset, then it makes sense that they will treat it like the other ride, hence why they can't see how to make it viable beyond popping Scare Mazes in there and the occasional 'VIP' experience.

With the new tours, the focus is on what is said by the tour guide, rather than being able to explore the ruins at your leisure. And ultimately this means that for most people the ruins will now be a 'once and done' attraction, whereas, formerly for many people, they would have been a 'once every couple of trips' or 'once a year' type of attraction. That's not a long term plan for allowing public access to the building, which is why I have such an issue with the approach the Merlin have taken.

In an ideal world, Alton Towers should have some type of Director of Heritage position as part of the senior team at the park. If they got in a suitably experienced person (for example someone with a background at the National Trust, English Heritage, etc.), they would be in a much better position to protect the heritage on site and open it up to the public in an appropriate (and dare I say commercially viable) way.
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Surely these concerns can and should be raised through Staffordshire moorlands district council and I assume Historic England?

SMDC can raise repair notices and I would argue Merlin have not been maintaining their building or gardens (which is their legal obligation to do) as they have fallen progressively into further and further disrepair.

I appreciate Covid and all that has happened but the before and after shots of the gardens now is appalling. There’s been no effort to bring it back to how it was even 5 years ago.

And as we know the Towers themselves now seem like more of an inconvenience. Remember the car park money was supposed to be for the access road and improved transport (never happened) and I’m sure a similar plea will be made about this.

They’ve had decades to make meaningful progress of just maintaining and/or restoring their historical assets and despite some well placed signs and platitudes, it’s gotten worse.
 
It’s sad they’re charging people to go into something that used to be free. I used to walk around here all the time as a teen, play hide and seek with my friends because we’d go to the park that often we needed something different to do other than the rides.

It’s a shame it’s in the state it is tbh. I was looking at my local history and Trentham Hall which was designed by the same man who designed the Houses of Parliament. Unfortunately that’s not present anymore and it was demolished, only a small section remains.

Anyway there’s a book I found that contained loads of old letters from the Duchess of Sutherland who used to live at Trentham hall. There’s a few occasions where she mentions going by coach (horse and coach not stagecoach 😂) to Alton Towers to visit the Earl. She mentions how grand it was and the armoury etc.

Like a lot of great houses they all go to rack and ruin. I guess we should all be thankful the towers themselves aren’t going to get any worse than they already are and improvements have been made.

It’s a shame it’s not free, but tbh I probably would pay to walk around it again because it’s been years since I last had the chance.

GaryH said:
People in the 80s didn’t run off to solicitors advertising no win no fee compensation claims when someone twists their ankle in the towers because the floor is uneven. Yes, that’s the world we live in today.

Bump you head on something in those days and it was your fault for not looking where you were going. Do it now and it’s someone else’s fault for not warning you at least 200 yards ahead and not having a flashing yellow light and klaxon to warn you. Company is named on social media, news sites and incurs a H&S fine. Result the company removes access or puts up signs and fences everywhere.

Who would have thought that climbing into a ride area carries the risk of death! Apparently lots of people don’t know that these days.

People sadly don’t take any responsibility for their actions anymore , it’s always someone else’s fault.
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When I used to work on The Flume years ago you’d be surprised how many people put in claims for injury’s. It used to cost the park thousands every year. Fun ride to work on though!
 
I did the tour today (13th July) having booked as soon as these were announced out of curiosity. My thoughts at the time of booking were that the tour surely HAD to include some areas of the house that hadn't previously been accessible within the time I've been seriously visiting Towers (post-2010's, really). This was the main reason I booked, as I imagine did quite a lot of people. Unfortunately, this wasn't the case - as will become apparent.

The positives:
  • Everything was well organised. I was impressed with the supplied earpieces, which really did help with hearing the guide whilst also simultaneously being able to walk around (and even well out of sight). The signage is clear on the lawn in front of the Towers - and they have certainly well-staffed the experience with 3 staff members allocated to the group (I felt this was slightly excessive really, it could quite easily have been done by 2 with only 15 people!).
  • The Garden portion of the tour (the first half). Whilst this segment by no means entails going through every nook and cranny, it was nevertheless quite well pathed and covered the majority of the main attractions of the Garden without having to walk a huge amount. The only area lacking was the Swiss Cottage, which was referenced in the spiel and was pointed out, but not ventured toward.
    • Rather suspiciously, the route and attractions covered almost exactly (and I mean, exactly) matched the contents of @Danny's excellent two part Gardens feature series from many years back. Part 1 and Part 2 here, if you want to know exactly how this tour went. 🤔
  • All of the staff were incredibly friendly and made the experience enjoyable. They were happy to spend as much time at each place stopped at as the group wanted, and it never felt rushed at all. The full tour took around 1 hour and 45 minutes for our group today, so a friendly set of staff really helps that time feel worthwhile.

The negatives:
  • The house portion. As alluded to, I was under the impression that with this being dubbed an "Iconic House and Garden Tour", it would at a minimum include ALL of the iconic and best preserved rooms within the Towers themselves. At a minimum, I expected that there would be some rooms that I hadn't seen before - i.e. when you were able to freely walk around. In actual fact, the only interior rooms we were permitted to enter were:
    • The "T" Drawing Room
    • The Banqueting Hall
    • One of the upper floor rooms on the way to the roof (but only the one room)
    • The roof (not interior granted, but an area)
    • The Chapel
  • Not only was this significantly less than what was previously accessible, but the presence of other rooms was not really even alluded to - barring the brief mention of there being a music room across from the Conservatory. In addition, our entrance to the grandest room in the house (the Banqueting Hall) was somewhat spoiled by an awkward preface of "we consider this area to be, ahem, multi-purpose" before being forced to stroll through a remnant portion of the Attic that they haven't bothered to remove. The very fact that all of the old interior signage is still in place, clearly directing towards badly boarded up stairways and inaccessible corridors, is almost an insult having paid £10 for the privilege.
  • The guide. Don't get me wrong, I don't wish to criticise any individual - but I think we were quite clearly afforded significantly less value on our tour than was present on the previous few (or at least, from the reviews I've read - including @BarryZola's). The original tour guide, so we were informed, has just gone on a 3 week holiday - and so our tour was conducted by someone who a) quite clearly hadn't run any such sort of guided tour ever before, and b) did not have much memorised knowledge. Much of the spiel was read off of some hastily printed sheets, and there were long portions of silence. This is absolutely no fault of this particular individual, who was clearly doing her absolute best under the circumstances - but you would at least expect tours to be consistent and not entirely reliant on one person being a font of knowledge!

Conscious that I've gone on longer than I had thought I would here, but hopefully that gives some context on things. I personally don't see myself doing this tour again, certainly not with the content provided. I left feeling disappointed at the expectation vs the reality in terms of what we were actually able to see. Merlin - please review this and consider adding a significant amount to the house tour!

I added a few pictures & videos to an album here, if anyone's interested.
 
Really enjoyed our experience. Our tour guide Stephen was fantastic. He is clearly very knowledgeable and enthusiastic.

The two hours did fly-by. It is a decent length walk so definitely wear comfortable shoes. There are plenty of breaks to rest as you observe while the guide provides information. Some great photo opportunities.

It was like 25 degrees blazing sun during our walk so an opportunity to grab a drink between the gardens and the towers would have been appreciated. I was gasping!

The earphones they provide are loud and clear but I ended up removing mine about half way through as they are quite uncomfortable.

The views from the roof were definitely the highlight! Took a video of The Smiler


From: https://youtu.be/6Nm184JgWCE?si=tFLBVqhIcNJMHj5_
 
I did the history tour this week and was very pleased overall!
The Garden tour was great, though the House part felt like an add-on, seeing only a few rooms.

The guide (a local middle aged gentleman, I didnt catch his name) did a fantastic job and was great to listen to. There was a lot to cover but it never dragged. I learnt a lot about the Gardens I never knew and thought the level of detail was a great balance. Great!

I hope it gets expanded in future as a separate ruins tour to explore the rest the House, with displays of the rooms as they once were, but for £10 I was very happy with the combination.
 
That was my overall feeling. If they're charging a tenner, the current tour is OK as a general overview. Anything more than a general overview would require separate tours. Most would want just the Towers ruins.
 
Myself and @John did the House and Gardens Tour on Saturday. A few people have already given their perspectives on earlier tours so I'll try not to go over things that have already been said in my write up.

The gardens tour follows a good route and it works quite well to have the earpiece so that you can hear the tour guide even when not in direct earshot. Though I've been down into the gardens many times there were a few points of interest I'd not really taken the time to look at properly, such as the bathhouse and Loggia of the Muses. However as I suspected most of the things the tour covers are things you can see anyway by simply wandering, with the exception of the conservatories which we were opened up so we could go inside. It was disappointing that the Gothic Prospect Tower couldn't be opened up as well - this was apparently vetoed by Health & Safety due to the low height of the railings on the upper levels. I think if they could get more areas opened up that aren't generally accessible that would increase the value proposition of the tour for me.

The house tour was fairly well done, although as others have said there haven't been any new areas opened up that weren't previously accessible when the ruins were open to the public. In fact there were some rooms and a section of the roof that were previously accessible that are now closed off due to safety concerns. Now that all visitors to the ruins are accompanied by a tour guide, I would have thought there might be parts of the Towers that could be safely visited with a guide if not independently - I suspect the Health & Safety Exec has been a little overzealous here. Perhaps with time they'll be able to put the work in to make these areas safer, or at least conduct more detailed risk assessments, so that these parts of the ruins can be included.

Unfortunately it was quite noticeable that the tour guide's knowledge didn't extend much beyond what they had in the printed booklet in front of them, and it transpired that this was a member of the VIP Events team who was quite new to the park. Obviously it's understandable that this is a new role which it will take people time to skill into, and she did say that she was keen to broaden her knowledge and had been given some books to study by a colleague - but I do think it would have been nice if the tour guide roles had been offered to local experts rather than members of the Events team. Organisationally they have bundled in this experience with the 'VIP Experiences' which include the bigger-ticket track walks, special events and VIP fastrack packages, and I'm not sure this is quite how I would have chosen to position them - as the tours should neither be expensive nor exclusive, but something that as many people as possible can enjoy.

My feedback to the Events team was that the gardens portion of the tour could quite easily have been self-guided, and that an hour-long guided tour of the house would be sufficient, with more slots available throughout the day so more people can enjoy them. I don't think it's realistic to expect the Towers to be opened up for free access again, but I do think it should be possible to get to a point where there are 2-3 tours per day and it is possible to book on the day.
 
Its a real shame they dont get one of the team who worked on the Towers History website that existed a while back to do the tours so the person actually has some knowledge of the history of the place, not reading from a printed sheet.
 
To be fair, I think the usual guide (male) does have some knowledge away from the prompt cards, but it sounds like others who fill in for him maybe are pretty new to the history of the place.
 
I’m not going to lie, the more I’ve read, the more I think a “self guided tour” still paying for entry via the conservatories, with more of the towers open and you get given a “tour guide machine” and enter the numbers of each area. Could be a much better option.

Go at your own pace, lots of detail for those who want it, maybe with some better “media” devices that have video on to. It could be done really well. And the £10 would keep the scrotes out. It can be run more often, only require one member of staff and less arduous.

It could also be much easier updated and made suitable for various languages too.

But then again, the H&S clown consultancy they use would want to justify their existence again.
 
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