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Blackpool Pleasure Beach: General Discussion

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Dipper_Dave said:
So if BPB ARE proud of their woodies, is there a good reason why the National Historical Markers were removed and never put back on display?
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The lack of any noticeable advertising of their wooden coasters would suggest that they don't think that much of them, or they don't believe the woodies are the reasons people visit PB.

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shakey said:
The lack of any noticeable advertising of their wooden coasters would suggest that they don't think that much of them, or they don't believe the woodies are the reasons people visit PB.
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Well Grand National and Big Dipper rarely have much of a queue, although this is partly down to the lack of queue lines on either ride. They're hardly in the best condition either, Grand National has been painfully uncomfortable on all my recent rides and the Big Dipper is fine one middle rows but not on end rows. So I can't imagine they perform too well in terms of public satisfaction!

I think people visit Blackpool Pleasure Beach because it is Blackpool Pleasure Beach. It is in a holiday resort and chances are those who did visit Blackpool for a short trip will pop to the Pleasure Beach.

:)
 
Rob said:
Well Grand National and Big Dipper rarely have much of a queue, although this is partly down to the lack of queue lines on either ride. They're hardly in the best condition either, Grand National has been painfully uncomfortable on all my recent rides and the Big Dipper is fine one middle rows but not on end rows. So I can't imagine they perform too well in terms of public satisfaction!
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Dipper is an extremely popular ride, it has one of the best throughput's on the park (when it is on 2 trains). On one train the queue grows very quickly, even on quiet days.

I agree that Nash is getting too rough these days (much more than the mouse IMO), but it still gets a resonable queue on all but the quietest of days. (although that may be more down to the poor throughput)
 
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I don't understand why people think the woodies are painful. They're bumpy for sure (that' what makes them great) but I've never been hurt by them.
 
MakoMania said:
I don't understand why people think the woodies are painful. They're bumpy for sure (that' what makes them great) but I've never been hurt by them.
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Don't get me wrong it is all down to personal opinion. But out of curiosity when did you last ride the Grand National?
 
Pain is subjective, there are many reviews left about coming off the Blackpool woodies with bruises. We are used to how they ride and get used to it, usually from a young age.

Nash can be awful on a wheel seat, it's always been a raw experience but it's got worse and worse over the past decade.
 
ScottPBE said:
I guarantee that if it had been left SBNO, all the complaining we've seen about the removal would have been happening but instead it would have been about it being closed, I've seen it all before. Its removal leaves us all in no doubt about its future, if it was SBNO, we'd all be thinking it may open again when the reality is, that wasn't going to happen.
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Top marks for trying to craft the narrative, but nobody is arguing it should have just been left SBNO. People are saying that if wasn't rideable, close it, with an announcement making it clear that it's not opening again. Then they've got the whole season for people to visit to "pay their respects". They could have even used it as a cash grab; some plywood down on the station tracks, with fences blocking the rest of the track, and then charge people £20 for a behind the scenes on the dearly departed, classic Wild Mouse.
 
The biggest problem with Grand National is the restraints, if you don't work out a way to hold them up they slam down like being punched in the stomach every time it bounces down the drops, then the rest of the way round it's like being repeatedly punched in the stomach as it bounces about. Fix that and it'd (for me at least) actually be rideable again.
 
The first (and only) time I rode the Dipper, the curved drop actually made my head physically hurt. haven't been on it since.
 
MakoMania said:
I don't understand why people think the woodies are painful. They're bumpy for sure (that' what makes them great) but I've never been hurt by them.
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There is an element of discomfort on the Nash. If anyone feels pain when riding them... why would you?

It's never quite been the same since the trains were replaced after the 2004 fire. I am not typically critical of restraints but those ratcheting lapbars mean that you feel every bump and pothole in a way that you didn't in the old cars.

I'd happily see Timberliners on the Nash.
 
Wild Mouse was still displayed on the official BPB website throughout December as closed for "maintenance", even into January after it had been demolished. If the decision had not been made when the website was originally updated, I would suggest that an organisation on the scale of BPB should (and would) have the means to update their website.

It is clear that BPB spent money on Wild Mouse throughout the early half of 2017, I don't think anyone is debating that as the evidence is there for us to see; new magnetic brakes, re-tracking, new evacuation walkways installed and other changes. With that said, I do not believe the decision to demolish it was made after staff left for their Christmas break considering it came down during that time! :tearsofjoy:

I would like to reiterate at this point, that this was the condition of the ride's track in October;
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I do not believe it would have been allowed to deteriorate that much if there were plans to reopen it.

It is of course the park's decision to announce the removal of a ride both when, and how, they see fit. However, it has to be understood that the decision a park makes on how to announce such an event will have an impact on how they are perceived by both enthusiasts and non-enthusiasts. Customers who spend their money on the park can ultimately decide on how they feel about the way a ride closure is announced. In addition, when a ride has provided thrills for as many generations as Wild Mouse had, I feel that those people deserved better than the way BPB went about things. It displays a cold corporate attitude, a lack of care, if that's how they choose to come across then so be it.

Addressing the statements made by CPBE, RCCGB and ECC, it's all well and good for the park to utilise coaster clubs to speak through, but these things should come from the park itself. The (lack of) communication and subsequent statement released by BPB is the park's official choice of making the information available, and therefore my opinions are based on this.

"Our current winter work programme has seen the permanent closure and dismantling of the Wild Mouse and the removal of the facade of the former Trauma Towers attractions. This will create an area for future exciting developments.

Blackpool Pleasure Beach is a constantly evolving amusement park and has been for the past 122 years. The changes it has seen over the years are what has made it the great park it is today. This, coupled with a relatively small amount of space, means that in order to progress and look to the future we occasionally alter the landscape of the park to make way for future developments."

In response to various comments regarding when it was released, the higher-ups within BPB will have planned and organised the demolition, therefore I would suggest that they could (and perhaps should) have taken the relevant steps to make the relevant people aware so that a statement could have been put out as a matter of priority. I haven't claimed that I think the staff knew before they left for Christmas, in this case I think those at the very top are to blame for failing to act fast enough on releasing a statement, and in addition whoever approved the appalling statement which was (hurriedly) released last Saturday.
 
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What cements to me that this was absolutely done on the sly was the 'last minute' decision to demolish it over Christmas, which is hardly a traditional boom period in the deconstruction and demolition business. It's almost as if they didn't want anyone looking....

I think the park have handled this in a very cack-handed manner, and it's certainly soured my anticipation of Icon, but I'm not hugely surprised either. Alas, onwards.
 
Been thinking recently what could the opening of The Wicker Man have on the general opinion of The Grand National and Big Dipper. There's already people who refer to BPBs woodies as rickety, unsafe, issues of being bashed about by them as well. And now you've got the high likelihood of people who've only ridden wooden rollercoasters at Blackpool then comparing them rather unfavourably to Towers new smooth wooden coaster.
I'd hope this isn't the case but as mentioned above the national could definitely do with new trains asap.
 
Jamie said:
Wild Mouse was still displaying on the official BPB website throughout December as closed for "maintenance", even into January after it had been demolished. If the decision had not been made when the website was originally updated, I would suggest that an organisation on the scale of should (and would) have the means to update their website.

In response to various comments regarding when it was released, the higher-ups within BPB will have planned and organised the demolition, therefore I would suggest that they could (and perhaps should) have taken the relevant steps to make the relevant people aware so that a statement could have been put out as a matter of priority. I haven't claimed that I think the staff knew before they left for Christmas, in this case I think those at the very top are to blame for failing to act fast enough on releasing a statement, and in addition whoever approved the appalling statement which was (hurriedly) released last Saturday.
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I agree with you on this. Although obviously the park was shut anyway, its poor that the ride remained on their website AFTER it had ceased to exist. I kind of get why they d*molished it without fanfare, though I think that claims of 'lunatics' chaining themselves to the ride or scaling it and refusing to come down in protest were exaggerated a bit. Its possible for a protest to be peaceful, and like was said yesterday, some kind of arranged farewell would have been appreciated by fans of the park. If the decision was made in October (and lets face it, it must have been discussed at length over months or even years) to close it for good then perhaps even a fairly low key goodbye to the Mouse could have been arranged at a couple of weeks notice, even if it was limited numbers, ticket only type thing, with some merch ready to sell at it. We'd still be gutted at its removal obviously but would have been much happier at the way the whole thing was dealt with by the park owners. Time will tell if anything of the Mouse was salvaged to sell in the shop, I hope it was although I have a few parts from it anyway. I do recall when the individual ride pin badges came on sale (Autumn time?) last season there was never a Wild Mouse one. In fact the ONLY Mouse themed thing I recall being on sale (apart from retired parts) was the hoodie that just happened to have the ride listed on it, amongst others. I even remember mentioning on the old fan site the fact that a Mouse badge wasn't available, and being told something like "they'll probably sell them but haven't got them in stock yet." . . .

As regards the track close-up, one could probably find fault in anything if you zoomed in enough (a crack in one of their beloved plant pots; disaster!) . Can we be sure that there are absolutely no little holes like that across any of the other woodies? I know the track gets checked often but does someone really check every single bit of timber daily? I just mean that said defect doesn't necessarily mean that they weren't planning to reopen the ride.

So we've established that they wanted it removed without fuss, but what I find bizarre is that they thought it could be torn down on a Saturday and nobody notice it had gone until the intended announcement was made the following week. You could see it from the prom! They could have avoided any fuss yet still been honest, and had the announcement ready to go as the demolition was coming to an end. It would then have been too late for any kind of protest or fuss yet the timing of the announcement would have made more sense. I still can't believe that we found out because someone passing by happened to notice it had gone, forcing BPB to answer to a coaster club as to what the hell was going on.
 
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Rick said:
I think the ride still being on the website after its demolition is being overplayed here.
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This. Other parks have done similar, most park websites are likely to be outsourced or high up bosses might not know how to edit them - I know for a fact if you tried to get most of the leadership team at work to change something on our website the response would be "er...?"
Remember Ripsaw? Heading down the M6 and we were being told it's "just under winter maintenance" and was still on the Towers website.
 
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