Levithian

I remember when they used to be what looked like ply. Amazons used to have one too.

One pass is the new pass isn't it? https://themeparks.com.au/box-office/village-roadshow-one-pass/locals-offer

Aside from giving much needed shelter from the rain/sun, the main st cover at movieworld really knocked down the visual appeal of the park a few notches.

I would have thought it would almost always be preferable to return vehicles/cars/trains/whatever to the station and let guests disembark in the usual method if it is safe to do so. Your coaster example is extremely flawed. Here's an example; power went out and rivals got stuck and made the news, remember? were the guests evacuated or was the ride restarted and guests exited the ride when the train returned to the station? We don't even have a timeline of events so how do you know what occurred or how it occurred to comment why you think something was unusual or caused the accident.

Its still pirced as "we might as well buy a yearly pass for a bit extra. We only have to come again once in the next 12 months to pay for itself, plus you've got white water world there, the kids will go plenty of times when its hot", or some sort of similar conversation that frequently occurs. I think they actually dropped the price slightly from what it was prior to the accident? I keep thiking they were something like $134.95 before.

They took away all the outside vendor discounts too. No more groupons, etc.

It floods because its on a flood plain of the nerang river. None of that has mattered to previous councils who have reduced or changed flood plains for both nerang and coomera rivers, then stood back with hands in the air when people have their yards and houses go under though. Raising the land a few meters to negate everything but the most severe flooding should not be allowed at the expense of getting rid of overflows. It pushes water into areas that were never at risk previously and effectively creates fast flowing creeks that are dangerous to members of the public, but also strip the land bare due to fast flowing currents. Litetally every major suburb with a creek that drains into these rivers and has been opened up for development is guilty of this. It probably started back when they realigned the nerang river at broadbeach. Not much has changed since, other than the number of houses.

A cage or roof like thing on top of those tubes would be a hazard if the tube flips. It could get pinned in any of the under water structures which would drown people. It might have ended with the ride closed because realistically youd want some form of locking harness/restraint, but that spells doom if a tube flipped over too. So it might have been difficult to have someone prepared to pass the ride from an engineering stand point.

Something large enough to warrant repair would cause the ride to be shutdown pretty much immediately. So if its open, i dont think it has outstanding checks/inspections to be made. I cant see it closing when it was commissioned either. Right in line with the september holidays? Likewise, im not sure if there is enough weeks between september and christmas holidays? 3 or 4 weeks in november isnt a big shutdown for a rebuild. Thats more like double that. So id reckon youd be completing as many checks/monitoring as much as you can to keep the ride running through its first year. Even if it means working through the night. Maybe with a shutdown at the end of feb 2019 for maintenance.

How close is the head? The bar looks like its positioned behind the existing upper back pad. Padding on the bar being to stop riders accidentally banging their heads. Say when like climbing a lift and leaning your head back. Fyi. Momentum of guests in the boats pushes the torso forwards away from the bar when hitting the water after the drop. Not backwards. To hit the bar like a whiplash injury you'd need a boat to accelerate suddenly or violently. As they travel due to the flow of water, only instance i can think of is in the event of another boat hitting you from behind with force. Even if that were to happen, in the previous design the head is completely unsupported. So if that was an issue youd be talking more along the lines of brain stem injuries and base fractures not whiplash. Who are in the business of assessing designs, builds and implementations for issues of safety; who also have the power not to fine you considerable amounts of money, but also close your entire site down. So you speak like this is even a consideration. Make NO mistake. A government inspector will do all the above if you ignore them. For smaller issues theyll usually give you verbal notice or suggestions to fix any issue they have found. Theyll come back in maybe a week or two and see if its complete to their satisfaction. If it is, no issue. All good. If not theyll give you a written notice and a deadline. If you ignore it, action will be taken and theyll likely shut you or part of your site down until they can inspect, make reccomendations and have you repair them. They want to work with you more than punish you. But if youre attitude is rubbish and you ignore them or the safety issues; theyll ream you so hard you wont be able to sit down for a year. So. I asked this before. Open? Closed? Want to ride or have it closed? You arent exactly kissing the ground they walk on, but appeasing government regulators is exactly what you do. You have no choice in the matter if you want the doors to remain open.

Thats not how it works. Obviously you would go back to who made your ride when looking to make changes. If they arent available, youd look to engage a registered engineer to aid in the design/implementation and sign off on the modifications as "safe" or "fit for use". It happens in construction much the same. If the original party cannot be retained when planning changes or modifications, theres a company with a registered engineer thats prepared to put it all on the line and sign off on the project. Theres no chance in hell they would modify something on their own without some process. One; you guys are kinda expecting teams of designers and engineers are readily employed by the park, along with the equipment/machinery to design and manufacture the components. It would end up having to be farmed out. Two; it means they accept all responsibility and are 100% liable. Given what has happened, the government inspectors would hang them without a registered engineer being engaged in the process. Even if they ultimately deemed the modification safe.

They look like they have holes in them for wire rope or tube to allow creeping plants to grow over.

You don't have to stop EVERY single stupid thing a person does. You do however have to take all reasonable steps to limit the possibilities, especially after an incident has occurred. Just posting a sign is not enough. By modifying them it might only be a partially effective physical safety solution, but it is VERY noticeable. So much so in fact that any reasonable person would have no doubt that the covering is there to protect you from injury and stop you standing up. The park is seen to have done something about it, the solution does limit movement. If you climb out of a boat with a cage around it, it's a whole different situation than just standing up out of a boat with no harness or restrictions. Safety amendments aren't always about how well it functions, sometimes it's also about how visual it is too. There is a LOT of deterrence in making something visually striking. More importantly, in situations where it really comes down to the stupidity of guests, (especially when combined with the deaths that occurred on similar aged ride which was lacking safety features), it's automatically clear they made changes. I dare say that you can run boats around with dummies or put your staff on the ride during testing as much as you want, but there is nothing like feedback from members of the public. So if improvements could be made, based on the reports, then I can imagine you would see subtle changes being made in the future.

Arkham is an updated SLC. The vekoma restraints still push down on your thighs too, they just have the added bonus of strap like upper body harness pressing down on your chest too. Both shifted away from upper body restraints by changing the seating position (tilting it way back and lowering the weight center), so the focus of the lap bar is now on your thighs.

Do you seriously think, given what has happened, and given the current outlook by a significant number of people that our parks are still death traps, dreamworld could survive another serious incident? Even if it wasn't to kill someone, it would only highlight that they knew about the issue given someone had previously injured themselves and throw a MASSIVE PETROL TANKER full of fuel on to the fire that safety is lacking in our parks and (insert which ever catch cry you choose; torn down, government should step in, etc,). What would happen is the press would be all over it. They would start by referencing the deaths that occurred at the park, then they would blow up the previous story about the person that nearly drowned due to stupidity and turn it into a safety issue, questioning why another one of their old rides has been left to injure or kill someone, had they learned nothing from the past? Throw in some comments about ride break downs and safety, then round off the story by questioning the government safety inspectors, did they do their jobs properly? how can this happen? which would force the governments hand to step in with whatever ill advised, spur of the moment method they choose so they can show the members of the public they take this sort of thing seriously. Basically, the majority of the public would listen to the media reports like last time, only now, some of the people who felt the media were continuing to attack the parks needlessly after the deaths would be swayed, wondering maybe there is something to the reports after all. Not only that, but you'd force the governments hand to make a grand spectacle out of anything they did, while the park sits there and suffers, possibly going through another round of closures while inspectors go through the park again. Short of a massive fire, I really couldn't think of anything worse that could occur at the moment.

What do you expect for track designed 30 years ago? Not only that, but something that runs that fast and has that many transitions and inversions? The turn of the decade? or are we talking another 8-10 years? Is it on its last legs because you had a bad ride? after they spent a few million rolling out VR? Some of you guys have some really unrealistic impressions of just how large our parks are vs overseas. You don't even look at getting rid of fully functioning capital until your forced, it's just not in the budget to write off attractions like that. While guests keep riding it, it'll stay open. Edit: Pro tip. You need a little gap between the lap bar and your thighs. If everything is pushed down so tight its pushing into your legs in the station, it's only going to get tighter.

You can't get rid of the shaking, bouncing or vibrations from an SLC. They are running around with extended wheel gaps where they will bump from side to side of the rails. It only gets worse as the wheels wear. You can lessen it if your track is almost flawless and your restraints are good, but it's never going to be "a smooth ride" when you compare it with designs from this century. Choice between legs and head taking a beating, yeah, im ok with newer restraints from either kumbak or vekoma pressing down on your thighs vs the old over the shoulder type that left people bleeding and really restricted your vision. Biggest feature out of the updated seat / restraint designs wasn't so much the comfort, for me it was how you could see pretty much everything. Before you had two big "padded" cushions next to your head, you couldn't see much other than what was directly in front of you, or just above you. Now you can look in pretty much any direction.

Ardent to blame for everything, or the maintenance department of dreamworld doing their jobs and the operations manager of the park relying on the experience of their staff and outside contractors to come up with a workable solution that fits the brief?

Some people like to talk like there hasn't been a host of engineers, safety inspectors and advisors that have gone over what was probably numerous designs to finally come up with something that ticks the boxes of; safety cost doesn't expose them to further risk by the modification and finally, have an engineering firm prepared to sign off on the modifications as "safe" and "fit for purpose". Anyone thinks the design is exclusively of the park alone, that they plucked an idea out of thin air, applied it to the boats, with this as the result is being silly. That's before you even factor in the weight of the accident hanging over your head.

It is what it is. Do you want to ride or do you want it to be closed and bulldozed? because those are your only options.

Is that for an event though? Not for day trade As it says 2 weeks notice. Does it even apply to movieworld and wet n wild as dont they have to close the outside rides at movieworld by 8:30 or something on fright nights, etc because of the noise restrictions to housing behind and next to the park?

Even if they did have demand for it, the question is will council allow it. They probably have strict conditions to run a limited number of events as it is, with regards to noise and neighbours. They might not be able to run the rides at night, even if its only for a period of a month or so.

Tourists paying $199 aside, is $79 really that much better value than $139? given the choice of parks you have from village. Even at nearly $200; people were paying $110 for yearly passes and having to shell out of tickets to white christmas, etc, now the price has gone up nobody seems to be looking at the inclusions? what about dropping the "until june" pass and just giving you a proper 12 months from the date its active? It wasn't very long ago that dreamworld was about $150 a year for a pass that included dreamworld and www. Plenty of people were still choosing dreamworld/www over village even when the village option was cheaper.

Because of liability. Thats the single biggest reason. Regardless of overseas, if your safety people and your insurance companies assessors deem something a risk, then something has to be done about it regardless of what hasn't happened overseas. You could be the first to have the accident, and if it's deemed that you knew there was potential for something catastrophic happening like rolling over one of the logs or allowing someone to stand up and ride it down the drop again, without addressing any of the potential hazards, you'll be crucified by everyone. The public, the media, the courts, everyone. Do you think the theme park industry on the gold coast could survive another accident so soon? Trying to retrofit anything new to something old is always a bastard. Can you imagine how many designs failed before it actually got to a physical one, let alone one they are going to open the ride with?

If their expansion plans pay off, it could be a good way to free up capital now without having to borrow money for the next stage of development. Share price goes up, business expands, turnover increases along with their borrowing potential, maybe look at buying the land back in the future?