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[The Smiler] Construction Updates / Ride Speculation Part 2 *SPOILER FREE*

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GaryH said:
I agree Scott, this will really hit Alton in terms of bad publicity. Personally, I still dont think its totally Alton's fault, if its something out of their control, and lets remember it has been testing and been running ok, apart from that press day incident, so for this to happen now must be a huge kick in the gonads for Alton, who no doubt were looking forward to the opening day just as much as we were.
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Don't forget all the troubles this week Gary though mate, ratcheting the first hill, digging up half the site for cabling, the breakdown - there was a sense of "oh no" permeating through the thread.

I guess it is of course possible this was a very last minute thing, I'm not ruling that out of course, but the preparations weren't right - they had to have the last H&S check I would logically assume once work was as complete as it would be for ride opening right?

I don't know, just doesn't ring true to me that they aren't at fault this time - though the problems themselves are plainly not Alton Towers fault, I believe the planning around it regarding being sensible for opening, is.
 
LOTS OF ANGER AND RAGE AIMED AT THE DELAY OF THIS RIDE OPENING AND THE COMPLETE DEVASTATION IT HAS CAUSED.

Just wanted to fit in. Good job I did the sensible thing and planned a Drayton Manor trip tomorrow.
 
We can argue about who technically the blame lies with but Alton Towers is ultimately responsible for the ride and making sure it's open on time. Blaming it on sub-par contractors is a pretty weak excuse especially as they chose them.

I think it's quite right that the blame goes Alton's way, they promised an opening date that they couldn't get the ride open by. We can't just be blind fans, sometimes you have to separate yourself from sentimentality and look at what's actually happening. If you booked a night in a hotel and it wasn't open on the promised date, that would be unacceptable, and so is this.

Anyone saying that they don't care about the fact it's open late really should. This is supposedly the UK's premier theme park. If this is the standard, then it doesn't look great for the UK industry in the immediate future.
 
But......... AT have been trying to rectify the faults, no doubt Gerst have been telling Alton, "veee vill have zeee ride open on time" and now at the last minute they have turned around to Alton, said "oopsy, vee lied" and Alton have to bear the brunt.

No doubt as well Gerst would have been the ones to inform Alton when the ride would be complete and ready for opening.

Im not saying Alton are totally fault free, but..... I think quite a lot of blame must also lie with the ride manufacturer.
 
Gerst might have nothing to do with it though... If the ride itself is fine but there's an issue with the queue or the ride area or the station or fire exits or any one of a number of potential H&S slip ups then the blame lies with Towers.

It was clear the ride would have a reduced throughput tomorrow but *if* the issue is H&S it is likely to be Towers at fault and not Gerst.
 
.....true...... but given Alton are well rehearsed in building queue lines, I cant see that being a reason.... or it could just be H&S being complete and utter jobsworths!
 
It really is a shame though, and I agree Scott, it is the same for any big company. It's all business. Ironically whatever I spend in their parks is generated by another large corporation with a similar ethic. In fact it's my part of my job to basically justify if any investments will see return. No dount they are / were all sitting round a table figuring out exactly how much loss they will make compared to the mere few they will disappoint. We are enthusiasts,
Who only make up a small percentage of visitors.

Luckily said corporation who I work for, do not deal direct with the public, but for sure, this is not an ideal situation for a company that relies on the public's funding, fundamentally.

This will (and has) made a dent (albeit small) in their reputation and credibility as a supplier.

Edit: and sorry to annoy you, but I didn't think that they would/should care, that was my point.
 
So,

Thirteen - barely opened on time, had a lot of downtime in the first six months because they hadn't got their calculations right, and ended up neutering what was already a relatively tame ride.

Sub Terra - barely opened on time, had to be closed twice for improvements because it was so unreliable and so badly received.

The Smiler - Delayed two months, open date announced with just a few weeks notice, then cancelled the day before due to it not being finished.

There's a pattern here.
 
Blaze said:
So,

Thirteen - barely opened on time, had a lot of downtime in the first six months because they hadn't got their calculations right, and ended up neutering what was already a relatively tame ride.

Sub Terra - barely opened on time, had to be closed twice for improvements because it was so unreliable and so badly received.

The Smiler - Delayed two months, open date announced with just a few weeks notice, then cancelled the day before due to it not being finished.

There's a pattern here.
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They seem to do alright if the new attractions are living creatures though, the Crabs were on time!! So, it's not all bad I gue.... Oh no, wait, they died! Never mind, my mistake! ;)
 
smudge said:
and sorry to annoy you, but I didn't think that they would/should care, that was my point.
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Oh no, don't be sorry. While I did respond to your post I wasn't directly saying that yours individually was annoying. It's more the general mentality these days that companies will feel as if they owe something to individual customers who complain and say they're loyal. Unfortunately, companies do very little nowadays unless there is a large group of people who are moaning at once. :)
 
I really doubt this has anything to do with H&S. It will have just been used as an all encompassing excuse just to palm people off so they can temporarily get outraged about Health and Safety for a few days without revealing the actual problem.
 
I think the only thing we do know is we have all been fobbed off again, wether it is AT's fault, Gerts fault or H&S.
 
It is entirely Alton Towers fault.

Construction should have started in autumn 2011......not the following summer.

Ground works for Nemesis started a whole 3 and a half years before the ride was due to open, not 12 months as in this case!

The management need firing.
 
GaryH said:
But......... AT have been trying to rectify the faults, no doubt Gerst have been telling Alton, "veee vill have zeee ride open on time" and now at the last minute they have turned around to Alton, said "oopsy, vee lied" and Alton have to bear the brunt.

No doubt as well Gerst would have been the ones to inform Alton when the ride would be complete and ready for opening.

Im not saying Alton are totally fault free, but..... I think quite a lot of blame must also lie with the ride manufacturer.
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Blaming Gerstlauer without any evidence at all is more unfair than blaming Towers. As far as I am aware, Gerst have been brilliant to work with and have done their job well. I believe that the ride itself is ok to open, albeit on 3 trains. It is possible that this new delay has been caused by a break down of some sorts, but if so I doubt it is due to Gerst not finishing what they need to do.

But it does sound like this is an H&S problem with the site, not with the ride itself. Whether this is because things are not complete or because things have been done that don't meet certain requirements I do not know and I doubt we ever will know. As I said before, if this had all been planned properly they would have had plenty of time to resolve an issue such as this. As it is construction work was probably still taking place today therefore there is no time to resolve any H&S issues before the scheduled opening of tomorrow; hence another delay to create more time.

:)
 
This is one of the most ambitious rollercoasters EVER built. A record number of inversions, no straight bits of track, built partly on a hill and partly in a hole dug in the ground, with a bunch of special effects and moving parts. Partly constructed during highly adverse weather.

It looks really bad for the park to be this late, and to postpone the opening again at such short notice. But if there's ever been a time where this is forgiveable, this is it.

That said, I'm in Sydney, Australia, and am not personally the least bit affected by the postponement. So what do I know?
 
Nemesis was entirely built in a pit with extremely tight sections. It was a European first, only one other in the world existed at the time. Oblivion was a worlds first and had a 100ft tunnel to be dug out. Air was both above and below ground. So really this ride is nothing that special. It has no real major special element and in theory should have been fairly easy to construct. Yes its a fairly large track with a complex layout, but it should have not been to difficult to work out how to put it together and in what order.

What I believe set this ride back the most was bad weather and poor planning. If either one of those wasn't here, then the ride would be open now. However, with both of these, the weather made construction difficult and poor planning left almost no time for this to get sorted. As bad weather stayed, the ride just got later and later. By the time the park had realised that things were so majorly behind and tried to correct it, they could not have gotten the ride open in March and would now have to rush to get it ready for May. With weather not improving much, it meant the ride had to be rushed and everything done all last minute. That is why I believe (and yes this is just my theory) this ride is still not ready.
 
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