Ride Access Pass Systems and Disabled Access (pre 2024)

[Mer]

I'll keep my thoughts on how it should be to this reply:

Photo card with the user's face, disability and barcode on.
Card gets scanned on loading and the host tells the user how long they have to wait for their next ride.
System logs how long the user would have queued and blocks the card from use until the time is up.

Sometimes there may be queues for ride access so let the host scan the card when the group join the queue.
If they leave then the host can scan the card again to cancel it.
No need to blockade guest services at the start of the day because the card can be reused.

The parks just need to make sure that the queue times are accurate, group sizes are enforced and everyone should be happy.

Something similar to this is actually in place at Thorpe this year (a photocard with a barcode, obviously the cards don’t mention the person’s disability). The card has to be scanned, but currently, RAP users still need to get a time out card from GS on each visit which the ride hosts have to sign (for the listed rides). The idea is that in the future, users will be able to scan the card and it will register that ride’s queue time, meaning they’re unable to use it until the time has passed.
Chessie have had photocards since last year I believe (but it’s only Thorpe that have barcodes *I think*).

However, going by the posts in the FB group, there’s confusion amongst ride staff at Thorpe (surprise surprise ), some people have been told they don’t even need to scan the card! And of course, there’s still the forever ongoing issue of ride staff not bothering to sign the time out cards! Seriously, that has been going on for eternity...used to happen when I worked there and that was just over 10 years ago
Likewise, the ongoing issue of staff letting more than 3 helpers on willy-nilly needs to be sorted out.

 

[John]

Surely a main issue is that RAP guests can take, what, 3? 4? More? People onto the ride with them...

On Tomb Blaster last week there were 8 people on EVERY train RAP...

That's 25% of the ride's capacity!!!!

It is insufferable and must change.

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It's even worse than that - it's 10 people per train, a full third of the ride's woeful capacity!

 

[Skyscraper]

Surely a main issue is that RAP guests can take, what, 3? 4? More?


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Officially 3.

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RAP guests can take up to 5 companions actually. Certainly needs reducing, but wouldn't be popular.

 

[imanautie]

RAP guests can take up to 5 companions actually. Certainly needs reducing, but wouldn't be popular.

Where is it 5? Rapids?

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[Skyscraper]

Where is it 5? Rapids?

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Sorry, you're right- it is up to three, just looked on the accessibility guide. Pretty sure it used to be up to five.

 

[AGL]

Last weekend at AT, there was an old lady in a wheelchair with two grown up women and 3 kids with her.

We were waiting for GSG as a last ride of the day, not knowing ride time had been extended a massive 30 minutes on a warm May weekend, and the ride had to stop to let this old lady on. This was after it had taken 10 minutes to get her up the lift. The impact of this al was another 15 mins on our queue time.

She may have been having a whale of a time, but she didn’t smile once and it seemed she’d been used to get RAP for the day.

 

[spinba11]

On Galactica yesterday I never saw a time being put on the time sheet and I must of seen about 20 raps groups go through.

 

[Alsty]

So today, Merlin have announced they have joined The Valuable 500:

We're excited to share that Merlin has become the first company in the leisure sector to become a member of The Valuable 500 initiative.

Merlin is committed to making its attractions as inclusive and welcoming as possible for both guests and employees, but we know we can always do more.

#valuable aims to place disability on the global business leadership agenda and help unlock the value of people living with disabilities. #valuable500, #disabilityinclusion

Sadly I think this makes the prospect of RAP reform less likely, even though misuse of the system is reducing its effectiveness for people with genuine disabilities who would benefit.

 

[IanSR]

I saw this crap on the TV this morning, as if having the subject of Disabilities on the minutes of a board meetings going to magically make life better for the customers with disabilities, who already have to be accommodated for by law anyway.

I did have to laugh when the presenter innocently said "thanks for coming in to discuss this, it's been great to see you"....

...to the CEO of The Valuable 500 who is blind.

Even funnier when the rest of the breakfast presenters all fell over themselves trying to apologise to views who may have been offended by his comments, and his "what?" reply.

 

[RoyJess]

I saw this crap on the TV this morning, as if having the subject of Disabilities on the minutes of a board meetings going to magically make life better for the customers with disabilities, who already have to be accommodated for by law anyway.

I did have to laugh when the presenter innocently said "thanks for coming in to discuss this, it's been great to see you"....

...to the CEO of The Valuable 500 who is blind.

Even funnier when the rest of the breakfast presenters all fell over themselves trying to apologise to views who may have been offended by his comments, and his "what?" reply.

There is nothing wrong with saying "great to see you" to a blind person as there is nothing wrong with saying to a wheelchair user, "let's go for a walk."

I'm all for making attractions, shops, venues etc... more accessible for disable people. But what has been put in place need to be workable and priority should be given to those that need to use them.

So for the RAP system, so what is the solution? First we need to identify the problems.

> People abusing the system
> People applying for a RAP that can easily use the normal queue
> People using fake Dr. letters
> Using the RAP as a free fast track
> People using the RAP and normal Queue line alternatively to cheat the time out system
> Large group of people bringing along a disable person just to use the RAP as a free fast track
> People obtaining multiple RAP cards to cheat the time out system
> Carers using the RAP without the disable person
> Time cards not being marked or being checked properly by ride operators
> People entering the RAP before the time out

So what is the solution?

We need a system that benefits those that are in genuine need of RAP but penalise or offer no benefits/advantage to those that can queue normal.

Below is my personal recommendation and thoughts to changing the system.

Cares Ratio/limit

I don't believe that there should be a limit of carers to a RAP user, provided that the RAP is operated efficiently and correctly.

Should a RAP user have a least one carer? I personally think that this should depend on whether you have obtained a free carers pass/ticket or not.

If you haven't obtain a free carers pass/ticket, you are saying that you are more than capable of riding/evacuating the rides on your own, so you should be allowed to ride without a carer.

If you have asked for a free carer's ticket or pass, then you are saying that you are in need of a carer and should there for not be allowed to ride without at least one carer.

A workable system

The only way to stop the abuse is to issue all RAP's and carers with a scan-able wrist band. There should be three scanners machines situated at various points at each ride.

The first scanner is at the entrance of the RAP queue line. When scanned at this point, it will tell you whether you are clear to enter the RAP queue line or whether you are still timed out, if you are still timed out, you need to go away and returned once you are no longer timed out to scan your wrist band.

The second scanner will be where the dispatch is, this will tell the ride op if you have been successfully scanned at the first scanner and if you are all clear to ride, if not, the RAP user will need to return to the first scanner to be scanned in.

The third scanner will be at the exit of the ride and when scanned, it will calculate your time out.

The wrist bands should also be fitted with the same type of security tags that you get in main shops. The main queue line will have those security post that you see in main shops and will alert the ride operator that a RAP or Carer has entered the main queue-line.

Both RAP users and Carers need to be scanned as above to ensure that they don't alternate between the main queue line and RAP to bypass the time out.

If the software is a good one for working out the time out, they could also program them so that say for instance that you are in the X-sector and was given a 30 mins time out, it will allow you to re-enter a RAP queue in the X-sector after the 30 mins time out, however if you decide to use your time out to walk across to the Forbidden Valley, the system will not allow you to enter a ride in that area for another 20 or 30, mins on top of your time out to ensure that you do not take full advantage of using up your time out by walking to another area, if you get my drift?

The above idea will stop the system being used as a free Fast Track.

A Deterrent

As well as taking away the free fast track aspect, there need to be a little additional deterrent to deterred the abusers. This deterrent will be a small price to pay for those that really do need the RAP. This may be controversial, but it's no difference for paying for a driving licence or blue badge, I suggest that everyone that uses the RAP and the carers to pay a small fee of £20 per person (including each individual carer and RAP user paying £20 not per group).

Those that pay on the gate, will need to pay the £20 pp with each visit and those that are MAP/Seasonal pass holders only need to pay £20 pp for the year.

The £20 fee could be called an administration cost which could go towards the cost of running the system.

Just an after thought, maybe anyone with a blue badge has the £20 wavered (+1 carer only)

Again like I said, the above are just my thoughts and ideas, please feel free to add, or come up with an better alternative.

 

[speedy]

There is nothing wrong with saying "great to see you" to a blind person as there is nothing wrong with saying to a wheelchair user, "let's go for a walk."

YES People get so worked up over the words used regarding disabilities, when (I can't speak for everyone but at least in my own experience being partially sighted) we just want equal access and for people to not be assholes.

Also I agree with the rest of your post, I think though the extra charge shouldn't be necessary if everything else is implemented correctly. Amusement parks are expensive enough as it is!

 

[DiogoJ42]

In a country where people are regularly arrested for posting the "wrong" words on Twitface, it's not hard to see why some would be paranoid about getting their newspeak wrong to someone's face.

 

[Lurker]

The first scanner is at the entrance of the RAP queue line. When scanned at this point, it will tell you whether you are clear to enter the RAP queue line or whether you are still timed out, if you are still timed out, you need to go away and returned once you are no longer timed out to scan your wrist band.

The second scanner will be where the dispatch is, this will tell the ride op if you have been successfully scanned at the first scanner and if you are all clear to ride, if not, the RAP user will need to return to the first scanner to be scanned in.

The third scanner will be at the exit of the ride and when scanned, it will calculate your time out.

This seems somewhat complicated, and I think there are options to simplify.

If you scan on at the station before dispatch I don't think it's necessary to scan out, just add the approximate ride time (5 mins) to the total queue time.

If you reverse the system for a virtual queue, where you sign in at a scanner outside the entrance, and return to that ride at the given time, this eliminates the problem of using the time for walking between rides. You can only be in one queue at once, so once you've signed in you can hang about that area until it's your time to join the queue.

 

[BarryZola]

You really will be asking for trouble from the media if you start asking disabled people to cough up £20 extra to get on the same rides as more able customers. Other than that, I do agree with your overall sentiments.

 

[Lurker]

If so many people are cheating the system for fasttrack, then an uptick in fast track sales should pay for the system.

 

[IanSR]

YES People get so worked up over the words used regarding disabilities, when (I can't speak for everyone but at least in my own experience being partially sighted) we just want equal access and for people to not be assholes.

Also I agree with the rest of your post, I think though the extra charge shouldn't be necessary if everything else is implemented correctly. Amusement parks are expensive enough as it is!

Its also usually the people that are not disabled who get the most offended, or as demonstrated on the BBC apologise to the disabled person for the comment incase they wer offended.

My cousin is wheelchair bound, she doesn't get offended if someone suggests going for a walk, it's usually the rabid green haired stranger who does.

 

[Benzin]

I don't think by law you'd be allowed to charge for RAP (or equivalent) as it's not technically providing equal access (i.e. standard guests don't have to pay to queue) to disabled visitors...

 

[imanautie]

I don't think by law you'd be allowed to charge for RAP (or equivalent) as it's not technically providing equal access (i.e. standard guests don't have to pay to queue) to disabled visitors...

As it stands rap provides superior access not equal...

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[RoyJess]

Also I agree with the rest of your post, I think though the extra charge shouldn't be necessary if everything else is implemented correctly. Amusement parks are expensive enough as it is!

You really will be asking for trouble from the media if you start asking disabled people to cough up £20 extra to get on the same rides as more able customers. Other than that, I do agree with your overall sentiments.

I don't think by law you'd be allowed to charge for RAP (or equivalent) as it's not technically providing equal access (i.e. standard guests don't have to pay to queue) to disabled visitors...

I did say that my proposal for charging for the RAP would be controversial. Even if the RAP was operated in a way to ensure that the RAP user would wait no more than the normal queue line, it will still get abuse as people will use it just because they can. The same goes for disable toilets, where there is a radar scheme in place, these toilets hardly get abused, but without a radar key, the disable toilets seem to be a free for all.

Even like I said, make the RAP free for blue badge holders + 1 carer, so additional carers and non blue badge holders pay the additional fee.

Over on the VIP thread, by their own admission, RAP users have willingly paid many more times for this for a VIP pass as the current RAP system isn't fit for purpose. I can see genuine RAP users be more than happy to pay to have a system that is workable as oppose to having a free system that is open to abuse by many. As a carer for a disable wife, we often pay over the odds for things to ensure that my wife's needs are met. An example of this is that we book the Enchanted village for our Alton stay, we could go for cheaper accommodation, but the fire doors and small lifts are no good for my wife's laid out chair.

If you reverse the system for a virtual queue, where you sign in at a scanner outside the entrance, and return to that ride at the given time, this eliminates the problem of using the time for walking between rides. You can only be in one queue at once, so once you've signed in you can hang about that area until it's your time to join the queue.

I quiet like that idea, go to the RAP entrance first, get your wrist band scan, it will give you a time based on the current queue time, for you to go off and return at that time. If you change your mind and decide to ride a different ride, then you simple scan your wrist band at the entrance of your new ride choice and it will give you a new virtue waiting time while cancelling your previous virtue ride queue time.

Also having 2 scanners, one at the RAP entrance and the second at the ride dispatch, could also work out the actual RAP queue-line waiting time as well which could be deducted from the time out/virtue queue time.

 

[Benzin]

As it stands rap provides superior access not equal...

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If it was operated properly etc.

Even when used it and been given no time on things like Nemesis we don't whore it out... Hell when Liseberg asked if we wanted to ride multiple times (max of two) the awkward Brit inside screamed loudly at the prospect of "cheating"...

Plus Liseberg didn't even use a timing system...

The instant way to ensure it doesn't get abused is ensure staff firstly explain the system clearly, then actually abide by it... Probably a lot less people gaming the system if they had to keep waiting 45 minutes for the big attractions... Not like it's on use for everything in the park after all...