The Flash: Speed Force coming to Movie World

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

Now you're just being ridiculous. 

For starters if you're adding that many coasters, your workforce isn't staying the same size. 

[New display name]

20 hours ago, Gobbledok said:

The park had a major ride breakdown and so they got it fixed and open for their paying guests

Oh my god how embarrassing 

Your application for MW Public Relations Officer has been accepted, should a position become available, you will be contacted.  /s.

[CR4ZE]

Never thought I'd live to see the day when people defend a theme park charging full price on admission with less than a third of its attraction lineup in operation, let alone having not a single thrill coaster available to ride.

14 hours ago, Tricoart said:

Or, better yet, you could just add 4 more coasters, ‘cause new rides don’t break down & their addition’ll never cause any cascading issues (e.g. spreading staff thinner). Right?

Seeing as you like rounding numbers up, the simple maths is that the likelihood of having all but one coaster down decreases as your sample size increases. That's not a solution but it certainly puts the park in a better position to drive gate in the off-season, and manage capacity issues as attendance burgeons during the peak. As for the "cascading issues", is there some new managerial strategy I'm not aware of where you spend north of $50 million in new investments but don't hire staff to run them?

14 hours ago, DaptoFunlandGuy said:

Now you're just being ridiculous. 

For starters if you're adding that many coasters, your workforce isn't staying the same size. 

They must already be stretched thin, human resources-wise, hiring contractors to clear the shit out of Chinatown alley. 😏

Serious question: what's the benefit to these parks in operating year-round? Why not run your season from September to May and get the bulk of your maintenance done over the winter? So many larger, more popular parks around the world adopt this model and it works. Are the operational and staffing costs over the quiet months really worth it when the few guests (locals) who do visit are given such a subpar experience?

[themagician]

[webslave]

21 hours ago, CR4ZE said:

Serious question: what's the benefit to these parks in operating year-round? Why not run your season from September to May and get the bulk of your maintenance done over the winter? So many larger, more popular parks around the world adopt this model and it works.

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.

[Slick]

On 29/7/2023 at 2:04 AM, CR4ZE said:

Serious question: what's the benefit to these parks in operating year-round?

The combination of weather conditions and school holiday break periods are unique to SEQ and different from the US. That's the whole story in one.

Edited July 30, 2023 by Slick

[Naazon]

On 29/07/2023 at 2:04 AM, CR4ZE said:

Serious question: what's the benefit to these parks in operating year-round? Why not run your season from September to May and get the bulk of your maintenance done over the winter? So many larger, more popular parks around the world adopt this model and it works. Are the operational and staffing costs over the quiet months really worth it when the few guests (locals) who do visit are given such a subpar experience?

What Slick said, but to expand/elaborate, our winter is not really what other North nations call 'winter' and their largest holiday period, their summer is our winter.

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

On 29/07/2023 at 2:04 AM, CR4ZE said:

Serious question: what's the benefit to these parks in operating year-round? Why not run your season from September to May and get the bulk of your maintenance done over the winter?

The ability to attract and retain staff when you're only offering work 6-9 months of the year makes life very difficult. I imagine Raging Waters does struggle to keep good staff year on year. Unless you're also into snow and rotate between the snow fields and the waterparks, it must be hard to keep it a 'stable' job.

As for maintenance, which so far nobody has addressed for you - there was quite the discussion here on Parkz a short while ago about the parks down here not having the capacity to maintain all the major rides in a 2-3 month window, due to the lack of skilled workers. 

Some suggested that American workers could be shipped in to fill this void which was largely pooh-poohed for various reasons, and rightly so.

[Ogre]

Did Superman today and it was interesting with Flash there! Felt you like got particularity close to the yellow track if you sat on the right. Going to be have some fun interactions when it opens!

[CR4ZE]

On 31/07/2023 at 7:39 AM, DaptoFunlandGuy said:

As for maintenance, which so far nobody has addressed for you - there was quite the discussion here on Parkz a short while ago about the parks down here not having the capacity to maintain all the major rides in a 2-3 month window, due to the lack of skilled workers. 

Absolutely makes sense; that's why I said "bulk of" not "all" maintenance.

On 31/07/2023 at 7:39 AM, DaptoFunlandGuy said:

The ability to attract and retain staff when you're only offering work 6-9 months of the year makes life very difficult. I imagine Raging Waters does struggle to keep good staff year on year. Unless you're also into snow and rotate between the snow fields and the waterparks, it must be hard to keep it a 'stable' job.

Playing devil's advocate here; they would have a skeleton crew of full-timers to run basic ops in the off-season and have the younger crew on casual shifts as needed. Inevitably, they'd be cutting labour costs down but staff retention could indeed be an issue.

It was just an idea I thought I'd float, as there would be some benefits, but I was curious to hear whether the experts thought the negatives outweighed them.

20 hours ago, Ogre said:

Did Superman today and it was interesting with Flash there! Felt you like got particularity close to the yellow track if you sat on the right. Going to be have some fun interactions when it opens!

I said a few months ago that I really didn't like the whole idea on paper, but I can't deny the potential for ride interactions as an asset. No progress on ground works?

[djmcbell]

The whole "ride interaction" part is interesting - or more rather that a big deal is being made of it (though doesn't Luna Park Melbourne count, as the entire park is within the coaster's footprint?).

I'm not keen on parks where there is a clear degree of separation between all the rides. I did a road trip through America once, going to a few Six Flags parks, and it seemed (especially Six Flags America) like everything was separate and in different corners of the park. At least Movie World has theming, what little of it there is in some places, to the them together.

Always amused after going to Cedar Point, and people on a forum were saying how I'd never come across a park like it again, where the rides were so densely packed. No, my regular park at the time was Blackpool Pleasure Beach, the very definition of rides interacting with each other - going through each other, over, under... it's like a regular coaster orgy.

Rides interacting with other rides - and not even other rides, Blackpool Pleasure Beach used to have two rides that both went through the same restaurant! - is a good way to add a "cool" factor to a ride. Obviously depending on how many people are bothered by it. Whether it's something MW are going to be bothered continuing though, or whether this is just a happy coincidence based on where they had room for Flash...

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

1 hour ago, djmcbell said:

going to a few Six Flags parks, and it seemed (especially Six Flags America) like everything was separate and in different corners of the park.

This kind of layout tends to favour the Six Flags business model. Standalone rides with their own separate envelopes ensures that the 'new hot ride' they bought 10 of can be dug up after 2-3 seasons and relocated to other parks to do the same thing for another 2-3 seasons, without impacting any other operating attractions during the removal\install.

[Gazza]

I also reckon it's because its easier and cheaper to "slap something down".

Designing something that wraps around other rides takes a lot more effort and coordination, and sometimes even requires modifications to existing rides.

And lets face it SF barely want to spend more than chainlink fencing and sheds on their rides sometimes, let alone a bigger design budget...

[Ogre]

On 02/08/2023 at 6:00 PM, CR4ZE said:

No progress on ground works?

Not from what I could see.

[Rivals]

It looks like they will not be purchasing a new train for Flash, as seen in a new promotional video. 

 

(Movie World Instagram)

[Gazza]

All I see is they put people on the existing Surf Rider train for a promo shot, there's nothing further that could be concluded from that.

There's a promo shot of Vortex floating around with Intamin restraints instead of Huss for example.

https://seaworld.com.au/attractions/rides-and-precincts/the-new-atlantis

Edited August 14, 2023 by Gazza

[rac2703]

Could Flash be opening much sooner than originally stated? They are already looking for people to film ads for the ride. 

[REGIE]

It would be a nice surprise. We’ll see. A lot of work left with “theming” and testing

[New display name]

It wouldn't surprise me if Flash doesn't open but MW use it as a carrot to increase attendance.

Edited October 17, 2023 by New display name

[REGIE]

Yeah that sounds more like the village we know

[wikiverse]

On 18/10/2023 at 9:39 AM, New display name said:

It wouldn't surprise me if Flash doesn't open but MW use it as a carrot to increase attendance.

For a small $40 upcharge, you can buy a one-shot virtual ride*

 

(*Village Key members only)

[Brad2912]

Uninspired article on GCB with Bikash mentioning yet again that it’s a “ride within a ride” that is unique, and GCB calling it a major new ride. 
 

Hoping to open for Easter

https://www.goldcoastbulletin.com.au/news/future-gold-coast/when-flash-wizard-of-oz-rides-will-open-at-movie-world/news-story/9288ed9ca54a1737cd008aa017e9d18c?mibextid=Zxz2cZ

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

I'll wait until it's not on pay per view.

[Tricoart]

5 hours ago, DaptoFunlandGuy said:

I'll wait until it's not on pay per view.

Seriously, IMO it should at least be considered common courtesy to not post links to ‘news sources’ that’re paywalled atp. If it’s a relevant story that’s worth talking about, and you’re the only one with access to the article, it shouldn’t be too hard to just copy/screenshot the relevant portion & state the source’s name, instead of hinting at what’s relevant & linking the paywalled site.

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

9 minutes ago, Tricoart said:

Seriously, IMO it should at least be considered common courtesy to not post links to ‘news sources’ that’re paywalled atp. If it’s a relevant story that’s worth talking about, and you’re the only one with access to the article, it shouldn’t be too hard to just copy/screenshot the relevant portion & state the source’s name, instead of hinting at what’s relevant & linking the paywalled site.

Being fair, for a subscriber who is signed in on their device, they may not even register that the article is going to be paywalled when they share the link.

That said, these forums are a good source for historic info, which is why it is preferred to upload images to the site rather than hotlink to other sites - because when other sites inevitably break those links, the images are no longer accessible \ viewable in the discussion. By the same token, it would be good practice to share at least the text of the article (suitably quoted and referenced of course) when sharing an article link, regardless of whether it is paywalled or not, because then at least the content is accessible even if the original source takes the article down or breaks the links.