webslave

Working from one end of the park to the other, Justice League would be before Batwing, but even so I personally wouldn't be putting JL into category of "adult" or "working"

I absolutely think there's scope for a transport ride in a park spread so linearly; I mean it was only a few years ago they had two. The park is a massive chore to navigate, to the point that it's probably guest-hostile. Artificial barriers to flow all over the place

The park confirmed to me that the monorail is done, but they reserve the right to replace it in the distant future.

That's good I s'pose, but we'd given up by that stage. I do wonder though what happens to the staff assigned to SE for the day if the ride spends the day down. Can they not be reassigned to other attractions where they can meaningfully impact wait times? I could see the benefit on something like Tweety Cages that cycles very slowly because of the cycle of; stop ride -> go and unlock and pin exit gate -> walk back to one of the cages -> unlock cage, assist guests out of cage -> close cage -> move to next cage, repeat -> walk to exit gate, close gate and secure -> return to ops booth to retrieve height bar -> walk to entry gate, unlock and begin briefing riders -> admit riders -> close and secure entry gate -> return height bar to ops booth -> walk to first cage and assist guests -> walk to next cage, repeat -> return to first cage and secure -> walk to next cage, repeat -> return to ops both, brief riders -> start ride. I could see how having a second operator could quite feasibly double the cycles per hour.

They lost SE the afternoon before around 4pm and it didn't come back up. It just really struck me at the time just how thin the line-up was, and just how broken so much of the stuff in the park was or at least was perceived to be. For example; First building you encounter in Main Street is a shuttered outlet that has clearly seen better days. Roof of main street looks generally shabby. Chipped/cracked paint on the street curbs and small scenery items. Most main street windows look dirty/weathered. Every ride photo barcode dispenser was empty and in most cases broken. At least half of all ride photo screens broken/not functional. Items like ride queue length displays clearly long-term out of service. Empty enclosures where static displays previously existed. Major attractions down practically everywhere you look. Major attractions with badly faded paintwork. Major attractions with stuff that just clearly doesn't work. The Doomsday area was to broken stuff what studio showcase was to the Batman franchise. Not to mention, of course, it blows out queue times on other stuff when you have so many rides down. It was a real nuisance that the ride queue times in the app were so far out of whack. A clear example that persisted all day was Marvin; 5 min advertised wait all day, never dropped below 35 mins in reality - all of the kids queuing in direct sun. Not really good enough. Standard VRTP attitude everywhere that there's no sense of urgency. Nothing more frustrating than watching a train sit in the station for a full 5 minutes multiple times while queuing while staff would stop for a good long chat any time one of them rotates out. "Oh wait, have to come back for my water bottle..." I totally get the idea of working safely, but there's working safely and there's walking from one end of the station to the other in slow motion. Adding to the perception of how thin the park is for things to do is the walk from Batwing to the next attraction. As an adult your next working attraction from Batwing is either West or (if you can be bothered) RRRC. I didn't include DD as it was seldom running, and when it was running it... may as well not have been. They were expecting a crowd of 3k people in the park for the day.

I have to say, being in-park today the line-up is super-thin. But it's not just that; it's the overall perception of the park itself. My wife left the 4D movie with the kids after they were unable to show it due to technical difficulties. Her remark; "Does anything in this park work?". As you look around you see broken stuff practically everywhere (not just the major attractions). In fact, about the only thing you see any real effort put into is the up charges which tends to piss you off more than anything. The value in attending on a day like today just isn't there. I get that a park can have good days and bad days but... surely this is a by-design park management flaw now, rather than just an unlucky circumstance?

Imagine being such a shit friend.

These people would sell tickets to their own grandmothers' funeral.

These people have zero fucking shame. Must have sounded great to the boomer management team, though. Also, reckon they could introduce a premium tier for the subscription where they get on-screen talent with an ounce of charisma? Christ.

Honestly, given the employment market at the moment if I were them and tried this I'd be concerned that I'd get nothing but shit-bricks applying next season.

Are you familiar with Lingchi, out of interest?

Sounds like pretty poor discipline. Most departments in most organizations will constantly belly-ache for more space but management need to have a spine and tell them that convenience is not a primary consideration.

MW seems to have a lot of form on this "oh we can't change it now because it's storage". It's like an episode of bloody hoarders. Chinatown alley, much?

No problem - not upset at all. Just found it kinda mind-blowing a guy would be resurrecting a very old and abandoned coaster and letting staff ride it a year after SRR.

Bit mind-blowing to think that a year prior he was one of the people in the gun for an old, self-engineered ride having killed people; and then a year later he's practicing necromancy on something like EMMR, and that a year later he'd be getting grilled at an inquest by the Coroner...

I think the most accurate answer is "you'll know it when you see it". Furthermore, it's going to vary from guest to guest (or group to group), but boils down to whether the guest feels that they got the product/service they paid for. What I'm going to say is not going to be popular but I think there's some validity to it; For some folks one closure may well be enough to justify a remedy from the visit. If, for example, the park has repeatedly made representations to you that you should visit to ride their brand-new ride (and possibly even marketed to you solely about the new ride) then you may well feel that you did not get the product/service you paid for and should seek a remedy from the park. If you were visiting with young children and a substantial number of the children's rides in the park were not open then you may well feel that you did not get the product/service you paid for and should seek a remedy from the park. If you were an adult or teenager who visited the park and found that a substantial number of the thrill rides in the park were not open then you may well feel that you did not get the product/service you paid for and should seek a remedy from the park. All of this assumes a couple of things, though; That the park took reasonable steps to provide you clear and accurate information about known issues (whether within or beyond their control) that may affect their ability to deliver the product/service you paid for, and what remedies they would offer in this scenario. Were proactive in providing updates to the customer about any changes to the nature of the product/service you paid for.

Looks like King Tutts lived to see another day after all:

I'll be doing a VIP tour in a week or so, so if I find anything interesting I'll relay.

Another plausible option may well be that the refurb was already planned and ready, but a failure in something has happened sooner and even if they could manage to get it here in two weeks it's unlikely to pay for itself between now and when that item is made obsolete by the refurb. Let's say it's part of the elevator; would you spend three-quarters of a million dollars for the sake of, say, six months of operation knowing you'll be replacing the whole thing at refurb time - or would you just cop the short-term backlash, not tell people that was the reason, and try and make the conversation about the refurb?

That's exactly it, except rather than directing them to the appstore for download they are presented with the initial screen of the app, since the existing app is rendered as a webpage anyway. It's unquestionably easier.

Yep, an address bar is too fiddly... but let's get them to find their chosen app-store, find the correct app, hope it's compatible with the device, hit install, find their password that they definitely do not remember, then find where the app ended up on the device. C'mon, QRs are mainstream. Yep, plenty of people used pencil and paper. I mean it's not like the QR data was misused by *several* government agencies for reasons other than the user intended. In infosec we actively encourage people not to download apps unless absolutely necessary. As has been demonstrated here; it's most certainly not absolutely necessary. If you can manage to book, pay for, modify, and check-in for an airline flight without an app then the argument that it's somehow the 'only way' for a theme park is nonsense.

Most apps are actually just a webview control, so the experience is identical. We managed to teach people QRs pretty quickly; the hard part of that was a QR that then required an app download afterward.

Didn't have any issues with ticketing last time I was up there sans-app. What's wrong with a simple web application if you were so committed? Similar functionality without the data-grab, and without having to reside on the user's phone. The reason it's the default is because it advantages the merchant, not the buyer.

Not to mention the many of us that despise every two-bit business insisting you install their app as yet another data grab. No thanks, get stuffed.