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What changes to operations should we expect post Covid-19?

I potentially see places like Theme Parks, Cinemas, football matches ect, potentially being postponed until a vaccine is found. To prevent a potential unavoidable second spike. That puts us 12 to 18 months down the line.

I am fairly certain that when the restrictions start to lift. The leisure facilitys will be pretty far down on the list of things being allowed to re open.

I mean a 10th of the worlds deaths have been in the UK. So if that doesn't seal the fate of places like theme parks for a long time, I dont know what else will. Once lockdown restrictions start to ease the number one priority will be preventing large spikes, so any large gatherings will be banned for a long time yet. That includes theme parks. Just my opinion yes but I cant see any other way. I personally at this time would take it with a pinch of salt that ANY park in the UK will open this year. I really hope they do. But given how things are currently panning out, it is unlikely. We are however, still early into what would be the seasons.
 
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In my opinion they will relax lockdown but in stages tourist places will be least of the worries this year, obviously high streets will slowly reopen and they will take it from there. The problem is a fair few places including in Merlin’s portfolio you realistically can not do social distancing. I could be wrong but places like Warwick Castle surely won’t be able to open fully until social distancing is lifted or even the dungeons etc.
 
Not to go off topic too much but there is no chance that the UK has actually seen 10% of all coronavirus related deaths.

Reported deaths, sure. But plenty of countries across Asia, Africa & the Middle East (and even the likes of Russia, Ecuador and Brazil) are clearly underreporting the number of cases / deaths.

I agree with the rest of your post entirely @DistortAMG.
 
There's a few things to consider here.

As has already been mentioned, entertainment and leisure will be at the bottom of the list when relaxing any restrictions. We're also not anywhere near the restrictions being lifted. Full lock down will remain for the next 2 to 3 weeks at least and even china, 5 months down the line, still has restrictions imposed. That takes us near enough to the end of the season here.

Then you have the second wave to consider. China, who blatantly underreported their deaths by quite a significant number, are seeing an increase in cases again that the Chinese government are blaming on people returning to the country. I'll leave it to you guys to judge how true that is and and how many new cases you think they may actually have.

We must remember that the lockdown was an emergency measure to immediately protect as many vulnerable people as possible, prevent the NHS from being overwhelmed and saving lives for the short term. It's kicking the can down the road until a long term plan can be formulated. When the current emergency finishes, it won't suddenly end. There's no way of telling for sure how many people still have it out there and a vaccine is probably 2 years away. The majority of the population won't have it and therefore won't have immunity.

This could work in the UK tourist industry's favour, at least next year, as I can see foreign travel bans and testing being the medium term solution. With so many people itching to get out and have fun but unable, unwilling or unable to afford foreign holidays, a lot of economists are predicting a boom in UK "staycations". A boom that is unlikely to counter balance the bust of this though.

All hypothetical of course, but this isn't the beginning of the end, it's the end of the beginning. With so many businesses unlikely to survive this (this has only accelerated the already serious decline in pubs and non food retail for example), it's impossible to predict with any likelihood what will happen. But don't underestimate just how different the country and our economy will be after this.

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With regards to China, they are pretty much only getting imported cases now, and their deaths have remained at zero for the last few days, as far as I'm aware, so I don't think they're experiencing a second wave, at least not yet.

Also, parks over there closed when the country was locked down on 25th January and some started to reopen in the middle of March with new measures. Shanghai Disneyland Park is still closed, but the shops and hotels have been open since 9th March with new measures in place. As far as I'm aware, most of China's regional theme parks are now back open with extra measures in place, after only being closed for 2-3 months.

For this reason, I think June/July seems plausible for British parks to reopen.
 
Stevie said:
I wouldn't trust China's figures as far as I could throw them. The epicentre of the outbreak in one of the the world's most densely populated countries, and no reported new deaths?
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Maybe it has genuinely stabilised? Reports seem to suggest that they don't have any coronavirus hospitals open and haven't for some time, and they've shut their borders to anyone apart from Chinese nationals returning. I think they have genuinely squashed it now.
 
Matt N said:
With regards to China, they are pretty much only getting imported cases now, and their deaths have remained at zero for the last few days, as far as I'm aware, so I don't think they're experiencing a second wave, at least not yet.

Also, parks over there closed when the country was locked down on 25th January and some started to reopen in the middle of March with new measures. Shanghai Disneyland Park is still closed, but the shops and hotels have been open since 9th March with new measures in place. As far as I'm aware, most of China's regional theme parks are now back open with extra measures in place, after only being closed for 2-3 months.

For this reason, I think June/July seems plausible for British parks to reopen.
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Just had a look at the top 10 theme parks in China. All still closed as far as I can see. They are still getting reported deaths (1 today so far) and as others have said you can probably expect more than that in reality.

I'm starting to feel like it may be many months before we see theme parks being allowed to open so for UK parks this may indeed mean a total loss of a season. If we can expect the lock-down to continue for a month and then phased openings with crowded places being the last to re-open.
 
Stevie said:
I wouldn't trust China's figures as far as I could throw them. The epicentre of the outbreak in one of the the world's most densely populated countries, and no reported new deaths?
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I too would not trust the Chinese figures one iota. State-run everything in mainland China, no free press & anyone who speaks out of line is "dealt with". The Chinese doctor who first started to warn of / report the true scale of Covid-19 in China on social media has conveniently disappeared & not been seen since. Draw your own conclusions.
 
Croftybaby said:
Just had a look at the top 10 theme parks in China. All still closed as far as I can see. They are still getting reported deaths (1 today so far) and as others have said you can probably expect more than that in reality.

I'm starting to feel like it may be many months before we see theme parks being allowed to open so for UK parks this may indeed mean a total loss of a season. If we can expect the lock-down to continue for a month and then phased openings with crowded places being the last to re-open.
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Happy Valley Shanghai is open, as is China Dinosaurs Park and many other regional theme parks across China.

Take a look at this article, which talks about what some parks in China are doing: https://interpark.co.uk/chinas-them...s-in-place-to-prevent-the-spread-of-covid-19/
 
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Would like be to know how ride ops are going to check restraints without getting up close and personal.

Orlando's parks will be busting to open again. Will be interesting to see how they do things when the time comes.
 
I do expect retail to open before leisure (including pubs) as it is easier to keep distance in shops.

But will the public who haven't had access to clothes shops for six weeks or more realise they are just buying things they don't need and cut back on shopping? Long-term could other leisure such as theme parks have a resurgence in popularity as people move away from shopping as a day out?
 
The general public are so hard to work out sometimes. You won’t have a clue what to expect till the parks open. I’m happy to be proved wrong but I honestly think the parks won’t be heaving this year. I think there will be busy spells but I’m not sure it will keep up the levels if the social distancing protocols are in place.
 
The amount of people who are more than happy to q in circles around Tesco carpark. They will be itching to q for something different.
Park will be busy busy. If they ever open again.
 
The parks will open but no idea when, queuing At Tesco at the moment is seen as important but I saw a comment can’t remember where but when the discussion was about large attractions and/or gatherings, and when they will reopen he pointed at by that time if a fair few people still haven’t gone back to full time work, or have recently redundant then you’ll have a lot of people who have next to no money after this and then you have the other side of people who this year are terrifying of going to places with a large masses of people.
 
... and all those sat on their ass getting paid and nowhere to spend the money
Had customer last wee telling me he’s saving loads of moneys as they quite easily spend £200 per go on eating out every week.
 
This is the thing, all these places where people spend the money will be open before tourist attractions so the high street shops the restaurants etc
 
rob666 said:
Long stick with a hook in the end?
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Would need to be a very very long stick for the likes of oblivion, unless they just used outer seats. Can't see anyone coming at you with a hooked stick anyway. It's not possible to check restraints and belts properly unless up close and personal. The only way is they observe you checking the restraints yourself. Would that be acceptable though?
 
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