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Cuts 2015: How the consistency of the product is being eroded.

On Alton Towers Twitter they have replied to a message about opening time of Th13teen tomorrow, saying it is now open from 10am. Good news if true and continued, let's hope for other things to get changed back!
 
Ketz said:
On Alton Towers Twitter they have replied to a message about opening time of Th13teen tomorrow, saying it is now open from 10am. Good news if true and continued, let's hope for other things to get changed back!
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It's for one day.

I wonder if some VIP's are visiting.....
 
PeteB said:
Mind, on the subject of loading, operations are no where near the level of efficiency that they used to be - and I'm only talking as recent as 5 years ago not the magical 90's.
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At the weekend the only coaster not running a good capacity was Oblivion. They bash through stuff the same rate as usual. There is no cost saving to have low throughputs on most rides and there is a lot of pressure to keep up throughputs because of Fastrack.

As for Nemesis SRQ, I don't agree with diminishing a product and towers excuse is BS, but the SRQ did slow down dispatches a lot, it used to annoy me.
 
Looks like The Skyride, Dark Forest and Cloud Cuckoo Land are now open from 10am on weekends. Although all still open at 11am on weekdays. Despite that slight improvement it looks like they've balanced it out with ride closing on weekends now at 5pm, rather than 5:30pm.

The next problem Towers may face and guests may catch on to, guests who pay on a weekday pay the same as guests on weekends, but ride availability is different, right or wrong? I wish they would just adopt off/on peak tickets again and lower availability during off peak times.
 
In most ways it does make sense dropping the single rider queue from Nemesis which did delay dispatches, and it is a logical cost saving. My main concern would be that there will now be more people coming through the exit (disabled guests, parent queue share, guests with priority passes because a ride broke down or they made a complaint, and fast track), meaning they could easily rope off several rows to accommodate them. This will be a bummer for those who want to ride near the back because it’s more intense.
 
Funcone said:
In most ways it does make sense dropping the single rider queue from Nemesis which did delay dispatches, and it is a logical cost saving. My main concern would be that there will now be more people coming through the exit (disabled guests, parent queue share, guests with priority passes because a ride broke down or they made a complaint, and fast track), meaning they could easily rope off several rows to accommodate them. This will be a bummer for those who want to ride near the back because it’s more intense.
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Hopefully on busier days at least they will contine to use the old fasttrack merge point at the bottom of the stairs under the lift hill. Also (in my opinion) all priority passholders & parent q-shares should also use this entrance. The only people using the exit to enter should be disabled people who cannot manage the stairs.
 
Funcone said:
meaning they could easily rope off several rows to accommodate them. This will be a bummer for those who want to ride near the back because it’s more intense.
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Couldn't tell you the last time I rode Nemesis back row. It's chained off every time I go on it.

On cutting down staff, I never understood why they need someone in the Th13teen station telling people which row to go to. Each row is clearly numbered and you can see there's only 2 seats in each row. People are smart enough to see an empty bay and fill it.

Why do I need to be told to go to row 4 which already had 6 people queued at it? Why when I ignore him and go to the back (or 2nd front) do I need to be shouted at "I told you to go to row 4"?

Surely that's the most pointless job in the world and more worthy of cuts?
 
PeteB said:
Couldn't tell you the last time I rode Nemesis back row. It's chained off every time I go on it.
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That's a fair point, although with more people being sent through the exit it could be more than just the back row that gets chained off. On the plus side, it might mean the front seat queue gets relatively shorter. Although I can see there being issues with Fast Track guests wanting to sit at the front. And dare I say it, VIPs... I can imagine the off loader getting a bit of abuse over it, 'we've paid all this money and you're not going to let us sit at the front?' Oh well, the joys of being a ride attendant.
 
I've never understood that with Th13teen. If you're going on Th13teen you've probably been on most of the major rides on park, which you choose where to sit, if you're capable of picking a seat on the majority of other rides why do you need help with Th13teen? Really pointless.

I find it embarrassing when they shout at a guest 'no go to row 4 not 3' or something along those lines, it's like being in a classroom and you've been naughty for not obeying the teacher.
 
PeteB said:
Surely that's the most pointless job in the world and more worthy of cuts?
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In terms of throughput, the batcher sorting people into rows at the airgates is one of the most important in the station, (if they know how to do it properly). Done well and you should very rarely need to take from the single rider queue as you can pair up and slot together different party sizes to get the most efficient operations.
Vampire at Chessington rarely runs with a batcher and the station is often chaos as a party of four has to split across two rows but if there is already people in that row everyone is trying to ensure they will all be on the same train.
Disney (again) are amazing at batching, look at things like Tower of Terror for efficiently getting the right number of people on each despatch.
 
They have a batcher in Th13teen because of the SRQ, if you get rid of them you have to get rid of the SRQ too.
 
James said:
I've never understood that with Th13teen. If you're going on Th13teen you've probably been on most of the major rides on park, which you choose where to sit, if you're capable of picking a seat on the majority of other rides why do you need help with Th13teen? Really pointless.

I find it embarrassing when they shout at a guest 'no go to row 4 not 3' or something along those lines, it's like being in a classroom and you've been naughty for not obeying the teacher.
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You need to go to the assigned row so they can get the most number of people in every train, increasing throughput and lowering queuetime.
For example, two parties each of three guests could be at either end of the train, with a single rider in the odd seat. But put the two parties of three in rows next to each other and you don't need to use any single riders, meaning two more guests from the standby queue can ride, making the queue go faster.
Another example, of two parties of two people decide to sit near the middle of the train rows 4 and 6, leaving an empty row between them, then a group of eight come along. They can't fit in the train altogether as the party of two have blocked most of the seats so the group of eight wait for the next train. If the groups of two had both gone on row 7 and row 8 then the party of eight could take rows 2-5.
 
So hold on a minute... They removed the SRQ queue because it "enabled them to dispatch the trains quicker", yet they are putting the Fastrack entrance there, which will cause exactly the same problem on a bigger scale?
Absolute idiots, if they are going to lie to customers, they should at least think it through first.
 
Jamie said:
So hold on a minute... They removed the SRQ queue because it "enabled them to dispatch the trains quicker", yet they are putting the Fastrack entrance there, which will cause exactly the same problem on a bigger scale?
Absolute idiots, if they are going to lie to customers, they should at least think it through first.
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See that's where they fall down, I genuinely found Nemesis SRQ inefficient (and unpopular) but this proves that that wasn't really the consideration.
 
I am waiting for the VIPs and fastrack to start pushing in before RA saying they paid to go in front of everyone.

Oh and AT's facebook page is asking for people to sent in photos for photo of the week, I sent in the barriers by the towers stopping access to DF CCL and hex. :D
 
Jamie said:
What a load of rubbish, lots of people used the SRQ on busy days, and if they close row 8 off for Fastrack then I will not be happy at all! Im starting to question whether Alton Towers' "research" actually exists.
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Talking of row 8, we were queuing up for it in Monday and right until the air gates opened were we then told we couldn't sit there and had to move to a different row. By this time, the train was full and we had to wait for the next one. It wasn't a major deal as the park was dead but I was disgusted that the member of staff was fully aware we were there and only chose to tell us at last minute as she let VIP fastrack users onto the back and she left row 8 chained off and we had to sit in row 7 on the next train with nobody on the back...
 
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This happened to us last year in Thorpe when queuing for front row Nemesis inferno at the end of the day, disgusted, we went to guest services, complained and got fast track tickets for our next visits.
 
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