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Thorpe Park: General Discussion

Enter Valhalla said:
As riveting as it is hearing about your worldly travels I would point out that Paris is not my only experience of a Disney park and that I have encountered long queues at Epcot and Hollywood Studios too. I don't really see what point you're trying to make. I'm not saying that PA never gets long queues but having visited both PA and disney parks during both peak and off peak periods, Disney queue times are in most cases the longest. Obviously there are exceptions- Baco's massive morning queues and Tomorrowland PeopleMover being constantly walk on, but I am generalising like I always said. I do feel that my one sentence about PA queue times has really touched a nerve with some people which was never my intention.
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Operations at the majority of Disney parks beats smithereens into operations at PortAventura - and many other theme parks.

You would never, for example, have a situation where there is a 1 hour wait at a Disney park with a coaster running on less than half capacity.

Furthermore, a ride like Furius Baco barely achieves 700 per hour (indeed, using the throughput app on successive visits, once it was as low as 500) - such low throughput at such a popular park is far too low! Baco achieves only around half the capacity of rides like Shambhala and Dragon Khan! It is very much a Sonic Spinball situation - right by the entrance, low capacity.

One great thing for Thorpe Park is that there isn't really one sole coaster that everyone sees upon entering the park... it's a bit of a choice!

:)
 
Enter Valhalla said:
As riveting as it is hearing about your worldly travels I would point out that Paris is not my only experience of a Disney park and that I have encountered long queues at Epcot and Hollywood Studios too. I don't really see what point you're trying to make. I'm not saying that PA never gets long queues but having visited both PA and disney parks during both peak and off peak periods, Disney queue times are in most cases the longest. Obviously there are exceptions- Baco's massive morning queues and Tomorrowland PeopleMover being constantly walk on, but I am generalising like I always said. I do feel that my one sentence about PA queue times has really touched a nerve with some people which was never my intention.
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To even mention PA's operations (the worst I have ever seen in a major park) in the same sentence as Disney's (the pinnacle in a major park) is an insult to the latter, frankly. Yes, Disney queuetimes often are longer than PA's. That's because their parks get around three, four or even five times as many guests.

Queue lengths are not an indication of the quality of operations. The only indication of operations is throughput. I love EP, but when Disney are firing on all cylinders, their operations hand the consolation prize to their German friends. Anyone who would seriously compared PA's shoddy, lazy and cynical way of running rides to Disney's often near-superhuman efforts is somewhat deluded about reality.
 
California Screamin's throughput while I was there...I rest my case.

californiascreaminthroughput.jpg
 
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^ it's supposed to get 2400, so that's not actually that great ;).

PA's operations are variable. They can be pretty good, but at off peak times things will be on 1 train with reduced staffing and that combined with massive fasttrack usage is a major issue, much like at Thorpe.
 
Keeping with the off-topic topic. Disney are definitely the leaders on batching. I have been waiting for Space Mountain at WDW MK with seven trains of people stacked ready to board.
 
Thorpe Park has its annual pass holders day today,

The scene at half 10
10377173_783696915018943_8083861118320112254_n.jpg


At 10:45 the queue was still growing

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And once inside, most of the advertised rides are closed and only 4 entrance turnstiles open...
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All photos taken from Theme Park Guide.

Don't worry once inside, you can ride Nemesis Inferno, The Swarm, Flying Fish and Detonator... and that is it.
 
Cost-saving.

If ANYTHING has its capacity maxed out, then purely from a ruthless business point-of-view it stands to reason to increase prices - or cut offerings in this case - until capacity is no longer reached. It's called getting away with as much as you can.
 
Rush and Quantum were both advertised to be open - they had lots of engineering around them working on them so i doubt thats to cost save. Saw - The Ride had a car at the bottom of the lift with dummys in it - no life around it at all.

X, Detty and Loggers Leap opened which were not advertised which made up for it (For me personally anyway!)

Coasters stayed open 30 mins extra both days. Apart from the horrific queues on the Saturday seems to have been a quite good AP preview.
 
Must have been a mix up somewhere surely? As much as I bemoan Thorpe's latest....attractions I still like to think that they're not that evil that they'd advertise stuff as open even though it's closed on purpose.
 
I miss-read the question, I thought it was a query regarding the pre-announced line-up.

Nevertheless, getting rides back online when it's a day full of annual pass holders isn't a priority from a money-making point-of-view.
 
It's good that they opened 3 other attractions in place of the ones advertised but closed though. :)
 
I quite like it, but I do like the whole "Island like no other" style they have going on now, it works well and does link in to last years advert.

Still undecided on the actual new attraction!
 
On the lighter side of things. There are 2 magpies nesting in the track of Colossus' first corkscrew ( Don't worry they are safe by the looks of things)
 
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Magpies are awful birds! They kill off smaller birds and their numbers have horribly increased over the years at the expense of others.

May Colossus get them!
 
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