Virtual Queuing in 2021

[jon81uk]

It may have been the same company given that Disney sent the Haunted Mansion President over to see the Towers system in action. The main difference was the Disney machines read the magnetic stripe on your park ticket.

Disney had the good sense to roll out the system across all the major rides though. The saying "you get what you pay for" comes to mind - the walk-up gate price for Magic Kingdom 1 day adult ticket is $179 (so approximately £133). When you are paying those sort of prices you don't expect to be paying for up-charge FastPass+. Towers is close on £100 cheaper for admission (even more so if you use a BOGOF) so I guess Merlin can sort of justify the up-charging.

I was pretty certain the Tussauds system read the barcode or mag stripe of the ticket too, so you could only hold one reservation at a time?

Also not sure where you got your Magic Kingdom price from? Its more like $120 for a single day ticket (depending on the season), although I think Christmas can be over $150 a day, a majority of the year is closer to the $120 end. I agree though that Disney pricing is completely different from most other places, but getting 12 hour days with fireworks or a nighttime show at the end of the day is worth it.

 

[Kraken27]

I was pretty certain the Tussauds system read the barcode or mag stripe of the ticket too, so you could only hold one reservation at a time?

Also not sure where you got your Magic Kingdom price from? Its more like $120 for a single day ticket (depending on the season), although I think Christmas can be over $150 a day, a majority of the year is closer to the $120 end. I agree though that Disney pricing is completely different from most other places, but getting 12 hour days with fireworks or a nighttime show at the end of the day is worth it.

The Tussauds system did read the barcode to restrict you to one reservation at a time. Don't think Tussauds / Merlin tickets have ever had mag-stripes... bar very early season passes issued in 1994 & 1995.

As to the Disney pricing, a slight typo on my part - the adult price ranges from $109-$159 for a 1 day ticket in 2021 (well until Disney put their prices up again, which they will). Disney work on a cost base that other parks could dream about.

 

[Ethan]

Don't understand how virtual queues work tbh. Surely if the park has 10k capacity or so then they will have to allow 1k an hour or so on for rides to maintain throughputs. But then you're going to have like 84 in the queue each time its peoples time to ride which will result in a queue building anyway so I don't get it. Terrible idea

 

[SuperMuscleMan]

Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't Alton Towers used to have some form of virtual queue system in the late 90's/ early noughties? I think I remember reading about it somewhere.

In terms of virtual queuing in other parks I always thought the Disneyland Paris system works quite well. Every time I've been you usually see quite al ot of British tourists crowing round the machines amazed at this concept of a free Fastrack *sort of*, especially with us Brits used to parks like Alton Towers up charging for skipping the queue. I think when virtual queuing is optional and seems a benefit to the average person who's bought a theme park ticket for the day it works. I don't know if this is just because I am an enthusiast, but I always feel as though there is a negative perception of fastrack- that those people don't have to queue because they've paid more than us, creating a them and us attitude. I always vividly remember when the Smiler reopened after the crash- a lot of us had queued from the early on to get in the first few trains and there was a collective boo when the fastrack queue got released before the main queue to go up the stairs. If you give everyone like a fastrack through virtual queueing it puts everyone on a more even keel. However, I can't really see Towers scrapping paid fastrack anytime soon- particularly with the current financial situation.

If they do implement it this season I can imagine they'll use the app-I found this on the app developers website https://attractions.io/covid-19 - and it will be for social distancing purposes. Even though I think by the end of the season they had worked the social distancing out more- there were still issues- for example the Smiler queue seemed to be a big issue- getting everyone in the pit to obey social distancing sounded like a right headache for the ride ops- many of which had to shout over the tannoy every ten mins to remind people to stand apart. Open and closing the queue as well seemed like a faff- whereas I guess with a Virtual queue in theory you would have less people in the pit.

They did VQM in 1998 I think. (Whatever year submission opened). It was fantastic. It was £5 and you were text times to go on the rides if I remember right. I think it ran alongside the paper system but quite simply it worked and at the start of the day you were sent your ride times if I remember rightly.

 

[jon81uk]

Don't understand how virtual queues work tbh. Surely if the park has 10k capacity or so then they will have to allow 1k an hour or so on for rides to maintain throughputs. But then you're going to have like 84 in the queue each time its peoples time to ride which will result in a queue building anyway so I don't get it. Terrible idea

For a system where 100% of ride capacity is dedicated to virtual queue or Fastpass.
Lets say a ride can handle 600 people an hour.
So you give timeslots of 100 every 10 minutes.
If at 10am 300 people want to ride, the first 100 get to ride immediately, then next 100 are told to come back after 10.10, the next 100 after 10.20 and so on. Usually people are given one hour to return, so 10.10-11.10 and so on.

 

[Ethan]

For a system where 100% of ride capacity is dedicated to virtual queue or Fastpass.
Lets say a ride can handle 600 people an hour.
So you give timeslots of 100 every 10 minutes.
If at 10am 300 people want to ride, the first 100 get to ride immediately, then next 100 are told to come back after 10.10, the next 100 after 10.20 and so on. Usually people are given one hour to return, so 10.10-11.10 and so on.

Yes I understand that but surely it will effect the capacity of the rides. For example, Nemesis provs get through 1.4k per hour so if there's 5 minute slots, 12 per hour, then they'd have to get through about 117 in 5 mins before the next slot comes into the queue.

 

[jon81uk]

Yes I understand that but surely it will effect the capacity of the rides. For example, Nemesis provs get through 1.4k per hour so if there's 5 minute slots, 12 per hour, then they'd have to get through about 117 in 5 mins before the next slot comes into the queue.

But if you have an hour to return in then it isn't a regular flow, so yes there might be times when no one returns at all, then 10 minutes later a big crowd. This is why Disney FastPass still has a standby line despite 80% of the capacity being allocated to FastPass.

 

[Ethan]

But if you have an hour to return in then it isn't a regular flow, so yes there might be times when no one returns at all, then 10 minutes later a big crowd. This is why Disney FastPass still has a standby line despite 80% of the capacity being allocated to FastPass.

Ah I see what you mean so you think they'll do hour return slots. Problem with that is thats less slots then several per hour meaning you get on less rides. That would mean you'd only be able to get on 1 ride per hour, so 6-8 rides in a day depending on how long the parks open for

 

[Kraken27]

They did VQM in 1998 I think. (Whatever year submission opened). It was fantastic. It was £5 and you were text times to go on the rides if I remember right. I think it ran alongside the paper system but quite simply it worked and at the start of the day you were sent your ride times if I remember rightly.

VQ Mobile worked from the guests viewpoint, i.e. you got your ride times allocated at the start of the day, then a text with a code on when each timeslot came due. The handheld units the staff had to verify the codes worked for about the first month. After that we just had to have the handheld unit and blag it, so it looked like we were verifying codes.

There was a VQ Mobile sales buggy that went round Forbidden Valley selling VQM. Thankfully Towers had the foresight to change the decals on the buggy so it showed a sample "ride code" text message with a code of the incorrect length (it had an extra two characters on). On Easter Sunday when a certain group of guests visit we had no end of people trying to blag it with text messages they had created themselves - all with codes on that were too long.

 

[rowan]

what we have to remember is that we need to read the application fully as later on it says that one of your responsibility's is "to increase and promote ticket upgrades and extras such as dungeon tickets, scare maze and virtual que" this is a quote from the website as well later on it says "manage and promote all secondary revenue streams included with the virtual que both of these are from the website so we can conclude that it will not be a free service and will be payed just like lego lands reserve and ride so the base package will allow you to que virtually and go the next attraction based on the que time mid package only waited 50% of the time and gold will be like 10% as it is in lego land and six flags. as well later on it says about rental devices just like six flags system of ride and reserve. merlin have tested this system at lego land and realised that this is the only way they can offer a FastTrack system as obviously being a business they want to make and recuperate as much as they can so by introducing this system they can sell a FastTrack system in a COVID secure way.

as well alton recently updated their ride access pass info just a little change but if the system was for everyone and not a paid service .then merlin would have done this as the ride access pass wouldn't be needed where as on the changes all it said was about pre registering. as well as on the career site it literally confirms and says 2 times that it is a paid extra and a extra revue stream its towards the bottom.

as well as FastTrack is a large part of Alton's income as people travailing or visiting one day a year generally will buy a fats track and the single pass the offer at the munite doesn't sit well with the customer as to FastTrack wicker man one time for a family would cost £40 so alton needed and have developed a safer system

also Alton would not cut the disabled pass after the bad anti disabled claims they got this year and how they are working with a disabled lady to improve the system so for pr reasons (public resources) and would not be a choice for Alton.

trust me please don't read the other comments and believe everything would be online and you couldn't just enter a que trust me i have a business degree and the wording and language clearly shows it is a paid system so no need to panic.

keep safe all and keep smiling

 

[Poisson]

Just seems like an additional complication, but if this massively reduces FT capacity then I support it. I doubt it like, it's almost free money for Merlin.

 

[Ethan]

what we have to remember is that we need to read the application fully as later on it says that one of your responsibility's is "to increase and promote ticket upgrades and extras such as dungeon tickets, scare maze and virtual que" this is a quote from the website as well later on it says "manage and promote all secondary revenue streams included with the virtual que both of these are from the website so we can conclude that it will not be a free service and will be payed just like lego lands reserve and ride so the base package will allow you to que virtually and go the next attraction based on the que time mid package only waited 50% of the time and gold will be like 10% as it is in lego land and six flags. as well later on it says about rental devices just like six flags system of ride and reserve. merlin have tested this system at lego land and realised that this is the only way they can offer a FastTrack system as obviously being a business they want to make and recuperate as much as they can so by introducing this system they can sell a FastTrack system in a COVID secure way.

as well alton recently updated their ride access pass info just a little change but if the system was for everyone and not a paid service .then merlin would have done this as the ride access pass wouldn't be needed where as on the changes all it said was about pre registering. as well as on the career site it literally confirms and says 2 times that it is a paid extra and a extra revue stream its towards the bottom.

as well as FastTrack is a large part of Alton's income as people travailing or visiting one day a year generally will buy a fats track and the single pass the offer at the munite doesn't sit well with the customer as to FastTrack wicker man one time for a family would cost £40 so alton needed and have developed a safer system

also Alton would not cut the disabled pass after the bad anti disabled claims they got this year and how they are working with a disabled lady to improve the system so for pr reasons (public resources) and would not be a choice for Alton.

trust me please don't read the other comments and believe everything would be online and you couldn't just enter a que trust me i have a business degree and the wording and language clearly shows it is a paid system so no need to panic.

keep safe all and keep smiling

Oh thats alright then thank god for that. Again though I don't understand why they'd introduce virtual queue as a new fastrack system as those systems reduce ride wait time by a certain percentage. Whereas fastrack currently is limited to the point where you can buy it and walk on most things. So I don't know why they'd make people wait more but still have to pay similar amount for it

 

[pluk]

The Tussauds system did read the barcode to restrict you to one reservation at a time. Don't think Tussauds / Merlin tickets have ever had mag-stripes... bar very early season passes issued in 1994 & 1995.

It read the barcode to only give one place per barcode, yes. But it didnt need to recognise it as a park ticket barcode, so you could get tickets scanning your lunch.

The virtual only que trial on swarm was equally as fallible, so do not expect lessons to have been learned!

 

[Kraken27]

It read the barcode to only give one place per barcode, yes. But it didnt need to recognise it as a park ticket barcode, so you could get tickets scanning your lunch.

The virtual only que trial on swarm was equally as fallible, so do not expect lessons to have been learned!

Well I frequently "operated" the Virtual Queue on both Nemesis and Air and it definitely had to be a barcode in Tussauds format. Others would scan & you'd get the beep, but no VQ ticket would be issued.

The system was totally fallible as you only had to look at the format of the Tussauds barcode, e.g. where the letters and numbers were in the Alpha-Numeric sequence printed under the barcode. Then just go online and find a barcode generator & you could generate your own barcodes in the right format. You could easily get 100 to a page of A4.

 

[AT86]

..or you could just press the button on the back of the machine to issue a VQ ticket without needing to scan anything

 

[pluk]

Well I frequently "operated" the Virtual Queue on both Nemesis and Air and it definitely had to be a barcode in Tussauds format. Others would scan & you'd get the beep, but no VQ ticket would be issued.

The system was totally fallible as you only had to look at the format of the Tussauds barcode, e.g. where the letters and numbers were in the Alpha-Numeric sequence printed under the barcode. Then just go online and find a barcode generator & you could generate your own barcodes in the right format. You could easily get 100 to a page of A4.

Maybe the Thorpe ones were more vulnerable then, I'm sure you didn't have to go to those lengths to trick them. The more recent issues with the swarm are more concerning with the recent technology involved.

Either way, if there is going to be an increased or updated system used it really does need to be able to stand up to abuse.

 

[Alsty]

..or you could just press the button on the back of the machine to issue a VQ ticket without needing to scan anything

Any competent person who'd operated the virtual queue machines would know to use the key switch to disable the button, or even disconnect the cable inside.

 

[imanautie]

Any competent person who'd operated the virtual queue machines would know to use the key switch to disable the button, or even disconnect the cable inside.

Did towers staff really have time to do that?

 

[Alsty]

I always did it, and most of my colleagues did too. I think those that didn't were unaware you could disable it.

 

[Kraken27]

I always did it, and most of my colleagues did too. I think those that didn't were unaware you could disable it.

I always used the keyswitch to disable the button on the back. In the season(s) before these were added you'd just open the lid of the machine when setting-up and disconnect the spade-connector on one of the leads leading to the switch to disable it. You'd normally leave the button active (pre-keyswitch seasons) on one machine - the one you would be standing near most of the time, so you could manually issue tickets.