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Blackpool Pleasure Beach: 2023 Discussion

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I love the Pleasure Beach. For a day out (for me) you can't get better - it's a ride intensive site with some unique and good rides. My issue is that there doesn't seem to be much in terms of long-term planning. They don't seem to be aware of what makes them unique.

In terms of investment. I would say the money spent on maintenance at PB is well targeted, and the engineers really do a great job. When you compare ride availability throughout the season, PB seem to be smashing most other parks.

If I was Amanda, they need to be looming at something big and terrifying. Something easily marketable. If it were up to me I'd seriously be looking at an Inamin Gyro Drop.

Longer term, I'd want the removal of Steeplechase, and replace it with an RMC single rail coaster. I'd then be looking at the removal of Revolution and replace it with a swing launch big-tall thing (something like what they are doing with Dragster).

Pleasure beach needs to be big and in your face. Keep the place tidy and nice, but concentrate on easy-to-sell big thrills.
 
Its been a while since ive shared any cool photos on here! What can I say, it has been a busy summer! Lets change that, starting with these! Here are some excellent Valhalla construction photos, they have been shared with permission from the owner, Andrew Wood.

Workers prepare some of the Big One's old turnaround track to carry the load for some of the yet to be installed rock facade.
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Workers mount one of the rides pumps into place inside the building.
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Looking inside the ride during construction. The lift hill on the bottom left is the first lift hill of the ride, the one behind the crane is the final lift hill, before the water hammers. You can make out some of the powerful pumps in this photo, specifically the pumps used to fill the lower troughs.
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The now removed top turntable during construction.
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Finally, we have the bottom turntable. This is a 'dry' turntable, which rotates the boats with them completely out of the water. Unlike the top one. For perspective the ice room would be behind the person taking the photo in this pic.
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Looking from the back left of the building if you was stood at the station looking at the waterfalls. The porta cabins on the top right of this photo are where the station is today. We can also see the run off for the first of the large drops (far left) and the run off for the final drop (middle) in this photo. This was very early on in construction.
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I only realised the two main drops are right next to each other a couple of years ago. Shows how squeezed in it all is, though there's a huge amount of empty space in there too.

I also hadn't figured out until relatively recently that the ride is quite a bit bigger than it looks from the front, as it also occupies some of the building behind Derby Racer, visible in the final photo above. The underside of both drops can be seen through the access gate to the right of the station.
 
I went a few weeks ago with a friend, hoping to do Valhalla a whole bunch of times. Watching from upstairs in Lokis for the ride opening, we must have gone over to the ride around 1:30. Managed to get a rare free parking space earlier right opposite Travelodge, where just the other side of the wall people had paid £18 to park. Great opportunity to have change of clothes & shoes handy without having to pay for a locker. So, swimming trunks, old shoes, old jacket with busted main zip on, with 2 phones double bagged in side pocket, we boarded the first vessel. "When fear leads the way, the destination is never glorious" we are told upon entering the building. Sadly a fair few effects were off all afternoon - no red mist coming down on first lift hill, no hammers, no rolling log, and the explosions & fire at the very end were sporadic. I love the exploding boat effect on the left before the boat goes back outside, but it went off I'd say one in every three rides. Fortunately the water vortex & ring of fire were on all the time. We soon realised on the final drop, if you raise your hands, you can actually feel the warmth of the fire on your fingertips. I love the fire & skeleton display on the left on the final drop runoff. It looks fantastic.

We had a target of 10 rides, but when we hit that, we were enjoying it so much, and CBA going to get changed to do other rides, that we stayed on. We then went for the ambitious (though unrealistic due to time) target of 20. We were very lucky, it was the perfect storm of the ride actually working all afternoon, there being nice warm weather, and non-existent to very short queues each time. After the first handful of rides, my paper ticket had utterly disintegrated in my coat pocket, from this point onwards the staff just scanned me in. We had a good mix of seats. Front row was hilarious for the water that pours all over your feet from the left after both lift hills, and from the right just before both main drops. That's always happened on the front left, but I don't really recall it from the right before the drops, so I don't know if that's got worse over time. The shaking of the boat on the bend before the main drops is pretty violent, not sure if it's supposed to be or it's just a by-product of the boats not being the right ones for this ride, but on a 'heavy' boat it was very noticeable. Back row was hilarious waiting for the reaction of the aforementioned soakings to those on the front. Other than said amusement, I don't find the back row a very pleasant ride, as you are lifted out of your seat (yes, airtime on a water ride) then slammed back into it at the bottom of the drops.

After each ride we hurried back round as quickly as we could with sopping wet clothes & squelching shoes. The staff must've thought we were crazy, and they would be right. On a few rides there was not a single person waiting, most were just one boats worth of queue, and just on the last few there were 2-3 boats worth. On a couple of those we were lucky to be called forward as a 2. Time was against us for 20, but we just managed to squeeze in the 18th ride right before the gate was closed. Absolutely nuts. The reaction of those outside looking at us was very funny, some of them had been on once and were visibly annoyed at how wet they were, wringing out T-shirts and tipping water out of their shoes, whilst were were in an utter state and didn't care one bit. Always funny watching people board the boat bone dry, some not having a clue what awaited them. I can't say that getting changed in a Velvet Coaster toilet cubicle was that much fun, but it was worth it. My shoes and lightweight clothing weighed a ton afterwards. I am sure there is someone crazy enough to have done more than 18 rides on Valhalla in one day, but it was good to smash my previous record of 6 - that day it was quite cold, with longer queues, and I felt I'd get hypothermia if I stayed on any longer. It is a pretty excellent ride, I must say.
 
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Dipper_Dave said:
I went a few weeks ago with a friend, hoping to do Valhalla a whole bunch of times. Watching from upstairs in Lokis for the ride opening, we must have gone over to the ride around 1:30. Managed to get a rare free parking space earlier right opposite Travelodge, where just the other side of the wall people had paid £18 to park. Great opportunity to have change of clothes & shoes handy without having to pay for a locker. So, swimming trunks, old shoes, old jacket with busted main zip on, with 2 phones double bagged in side pocket, we boarded the first vessel. "When fear leads the way, the destination is never glorious" we are told upon entering the building. Sadly a fair few effects were off all afternoon - no red mist coming down on first lift hill, no hammers, no rolling log, and the explosions & fire at the very end were sporadic. I love the exploding boat effect on the left before the boat goes back outside, but it went off I'd say one in every three rides. Fortunately the water vortex & ring of fire were on all the time. We soon realised on the final drop, if you raise your hands, you can actually feel the warmth of the fire on your fingertips. I love the fire & skeleton display on the left on the final drop runoff. It looks fantastic.

We had a target of 10 rides, but when we hit that, we were enjoying it so much, and CBA going to get changed to do other rides, that we stayed on. We then went for the ambitious (though unrealistic due to time) target of 20. We were very lucky, it was the perfect storm of the ride actually working all afternoon, there being nice warm weather, and non-existent to very short queues each time. After the first handful of rides, my paper ticket had utterly disintegrated in my coat pocket, from this point onwards the staff just scanned me in. We had a good mix of seats. Front row was hilarious for the water that pours all over your feet from the left after both lift hills, and from the right just before both main drops. That's always happened on the front left, but I don't really recall it from the right before the drops, so I don't know if that's got worse over time. The shaking of the boat on the bend before the main drops is pretty violent, not sure if it's supposed to be or it's just a by-product of the boats not being the right ones for this ride, but on a 'heavy' boat it was very noticeable. Back row was hilarious waiting for the reaction of the aforementioned soakings to those on the front. Other than said amusement, I don't find the back row a very pleasant ride, as you are lifted out of your seat (yes, airtime on a water ride) then slammed back into it at the bottom of the drops.

After each ride we hurried back round as quickly as we could with sopping wet clothes & squelching shoes. The staff must've thought we were crazy, and they would be right. On a few rides there was not a single person waiting, most were just one boats worth of queue, and just on the last few there were 2-3 boats worth. On a couple of those we were lucky to be called forward as a 2. Time was against us for 20, but we just managed to squeeze in the 18th ride right before the gate was closed. Absolutely nuts. The reaction of those outside looking at us was very funny, some of them had been on once and were visibly annoyed at how wet they were, wringing out T-shirts and tipping water out of their shoes, whilst were were in an utter state and didn't care one bit. Always funny watching people board the boat bone dry, some not having a clue what awaited them. I can't say that getting changed in a Velvet Coaster toilet cubicle was that much fun, but it was worth it. My shoes and lightweight clothing weighed a ton afterwards. I am sure there is someone crazy enough to have done more than 18 rides on Valhalla in one day, but it was good to smash my previous record of 6 - that day it was quite cold, with longer queues, and I felt I'd get hypothermia if I stayed on any longer. It is a pretty excellent ride, I must say.
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What a day mate! Can’t wait for the next🤩
 
I'm back with a few more Valhalla photos. Again, used with permission. All of these photos were taken in the dead of night. In the frantic build up to opening day, the ride was run throughout the night frequently. This was the only way they could get the attraction ready in time for opening, by utilising a day and night shift.

One of the turntable run up's within the ride. This may be the bottom run up. It is hard to tell.
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The botton turntable looking into the wind tunnel after the backwards drop. The eagle eyed among you will recognise the black 'binbag' tunnel in the picture.
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Testing the flaming arrows which can be seen to the left, while a boat passes.
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A boat crests the top of the final drop.
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There may be more to come in future. These photos were lost and I believe they are being posted as they are found. This is why I am posting them as I get them, as I just don't know how many, if any more are to come.

They are being posted to a Facebook group by the owner and on to here by me with permission of course. Enjoy 😉

Hopefully there will be more to come at a later date. We will see.
 
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Icon in the rain this afternoon.
One train.
Enso train, with the back two rows chained off.
So 12 riders, roughly every five minutes, and the ticket barrier was locked off after each twelve punters, then the gates would be filled with another twelve.
So about 144 punters an hour...
Gross.
 
Surely Pleasure Beach need to be looking at a decent new attraction soon. It has been a long time since we've seen such widespread and relatively substantial investments going on across the UK industry over the last few and next few years. I feel they need something to keep themselves relative and current. All that said, we will probably get a new fountain.

While I'm here, I'll wet the whistle with a few more Valhalla construction photos, first one is the ice room. Looks miles better than it does now I think. Even in what I presume is an unfinished state.
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The next two photos are from the bottom of the first lift.
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Both of these scenes were created by Farmer Studios I believe. The same people responsible for Storm Force 10, Maelstrom, the long gone Excalibur and the OG Terror Tomb at Drayton Manor and Chessington respectively.
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Again, photo credits and thanks to Andrew Wood.
 
rob666 said:
Icon in the rain this afternoon.
One train.
Enso train, with the back two rows chained off.
So 12 riders, roughly every five minutes, and the ticket barrier was locked off after each twelve punters, then the gates would be filled with another twelve.
So about 144 punters an hour...
Gross.
Click to expand...
rob666 said:
Icon in the rain this afternoon.
One train.
Enso train, with the back two rows chained off.
So 12 riders, roughly every five minutes, and the ticket barrier was locked off after each twelve punters, then the gates would be filled with another twelve.
So about 144 punters an hour...
Gross.
Click to expand...
Off peak operations at pleasure beach are really poor, it’s almost like they want to discourage people going. Big One trains often run with half the train sealed off meaning big queues build up even on really quiet days. Rides open late and close early, and most of the staff look like they don’t want to be there.
 
In truth, there weren't enough punters on the park to justify greater ops, staff were pretty close to outnumbering punters yesterday anyway.
Two new student groups filled the place out a bit.
Big One was running the first two cars...for those people willing to ride it in the constant driving rain...there was a very short queue.
And most of the staff don't want to be there...a considerable number will be losing their jobs in a few weeks.
 
On park today and PMBO is woeful. I'd say Dipper and Nash are more palatable to people who don't like rough coasters. It's gone from not great to slightly unpleasant. A shame.
 
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Found the scaffold. A platform of it has been built under big one's first drop. Not obvious what it's for, but there's an even larger pile of scaffold piled up so they must be making a bigger structure
 
Strong 'everyone's given up' VIBES across the park today.

A moment of madness early afternoon - The turnstile system failed, I'm reliably informed it was park-wide. The manual release keys/buttons were not working either. Must have been at least half an hour of fence-ducking and unusual entrances. Once restored, they seemed more unreliable than usual and needed a lot of staff input. Some were just spinning freely, not sure if you'd call that a fault or a feature!


In slightly more positive news, the park has received some halloween decoration - there's pumpkins in many of the planters, and the grass bits near Grand National/Ice Blast have had coffins and gravestones added. The music playlist is also themed(ish)
 
b2311e said:
Strong 'everyone's given up' VIBES across the park today.

A moment of madness early afternoon - The turnstile system failed, I'm reliably informed it was park-wide. The manual release keys/buttons were not working either. Must have been at least half an hour of fence-ducking and unusual entrances. Once restored, they seemed more unreliable than usual and needed a lot of staff input. Some were just spinning freely, not sure if you'd call that a fault or a feature!


In slightly more positive news, the park has received some halloween decoration - there's pumpkins in many of the planters, and the grass bits near Grand National/Ice Blast have had coffins and gravestones added. The music playlist is also themed(ish)
Click to expand...
Another reason to get rid of the turnstiles lol.
 
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