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Height Restrictions on rides

T

Themeparksandy1981

TS Member
Wasn’t sure where to put this topic as it’s about all parks and attractions.
Was just checking the height requirements to ride the big one and what shocked me most my daughter can go on all the attractions at Blackpool.
Like for example she can go on Icon which goes upside down but not Rita.
Apocalypse sit down 1.2m Detonator 1.3m
Like X is a good example of this. Hasn’t this had different heights all thou it’s life span.
It’s like at Paulton’s park they get a age requirement as well as been tall enough for most rides.
 
It is crazy how hugely they vary, and with little obvious sense.

My daughter has been going on Paultons pirate ship all year, but when we go to our local Adventure Island she's not tall enough yet for their one which is smaller and has tighter restraints. It's hard for her to understand this!

I think sometimes parks increase some rides height limits to manage demand. If at Adventure Inside all the smallest kids could go on the pirate ship and mini drop tower they wouldn't be able to cope with the number wanting to ride when only the 4 indoor rides are open.
 
I also think height restrictions are partly dictated by theme or the park's discretion in terms of how intense they feel the ride is.

For instance, Gerstlauer's Euro-Fighters and Infinity Coasters can technically accommodate children as small as 1.25m tall, and I know Speed at Oakwood lets 1.25m tall kids on. However, both of Merlin's thrill Gerstlauers have 1.4m height restrictions; I'd wager that Saw's is down to the theme and Smiler's is due to the pure intensity of the ride.

Building upon this, I know that Cedar Point upped Steel Vengeance's height restriction from 48" to 52" shortly before opening as they felt that the ride was too intense to only be a 48" height restriction coaster, so the park does definitely play at least a certain role in determining height restrictions (past the manufacturer-specified minimum, of course).
 
I just checked Adventure Island's website and apparently Rage has a 1.2m min height restriction. The clone at Duinrell (Falcon) is the same so it seems Gerst will go under 1.25 for Eurofighers in some circumstances, no idea what the logic behind it is though. As for Saw, I'm pretty sure the 1.4m limit is just for internal consistency across the major coasters in the park rather than anything else, though I've not seen any documentation from Gerst (or indeed Thorpe) to confirm

RE: age restrictions. They're relatively rare over here but seem to be more common in Europe. Several manufacturers apply them - Storm Chaser's age restriction is almost certainly lifted directly from Mack's manual. I think it's usually based on expected behavioral development (e.g. to avoid having young but tall children trying to get out of an ride during operation). Age restrictions are more difficult to enforce than height restrictions for obvious reasons, so I think some parks instead choose to set the height restriction higher to try to exclude people unusually tall for their age.
 
I think it also to keep queues shorter as in 2016 at Drayton Manor the Buffalo and Drunken Barrels had a minimum height of 0.9m but the following season the Buffalo was raised to 1.05m with Drunken Barrels 1.1m which really upset my daughter at the time as it was hard for her to understand why she couldn’t go on theses attractions anymore.
 
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