"Fastpass" like system to be trialled at Movie World

[Richard]

The only thing worse than a bad idea is an unoriginal bad idea. All any of our parks need to do to improve guest flexibility on their day of visit is to invest in and operate their rides at a capacity appropriate for the number of people in the park. Once someone is in the gate, the only time a theme park can make money off them is when they aren't in a queue.

[qldtaw]

I will say though that adding an extra level of comfort option in a plane, or a gold class movie lounge doesn't AFFECT the experience the people not opting for that service have in a negative way, they simply miss out. Paying to avoid a que which makes other who don't wait longer DOES affect them in a negative way.

So your okay with the 1st and Business class passangers be able to check in faster then economy, getting on the plane before economy, being served their food before economy and my personal favourite economy stopped from exiting the plane behind the closed curtains to allow business and 1st class to leave the plane first..... How is this not EXACTLY the same thing as a fast path system for a theme park? Sorry but business and 1st class aren't just a nice seat they are a range of previllages. What about people who buy their tickets online at Event.com.au and can jump the queue at the box office?? These people were just smart enough to download the app and buy the tickets before they got there... What about founding members of Madonna's fan club IKON being the first people in the world to be told she was touring again and giving them the first pre-sale access to tickets? What about VISA card holders getting first dibs on the Lady GAGA pre-sale tickets? What about people with Mastercard? What about the MovieWorld locals pass when it was first introduced for $149.95 for access to the 3 parks until June 30, but of course you needed to prove you lived in a BNE or GC subrub with a specific post code. Wasnt this unfair to people who did not live in QLD? Communism is a theory and system of social and political organization that dominated much of the history of the 20th century. In theory, communism is a classless society in which all property is owned by the community as a whole and where all people enjoy equal social and economic status. We live in a society which has a structured class system. Does it only make sense that this structure would develop along with other aspects of society?

[Gazza]

What about VISA card holders getting first dibs on the Lady GAGA pre-sale tickets? What about people with Mastercard?

Yeah but stuff like that shits me off too. You've used it as an example, but it still sucks and is frustrating more than anything.

What about people who buy their tickets online at Event.com.au and can jump the queue at the box office??

Shit example, because online prepurchase is available to everyone equally.

getting on the plane before economy

Side note, but why is getting on the plane first considered a good thing?...You have to sit where your ticket says so its not like you get "good seats" by coming early. I reckon its better to waltz up later on, and have to dodge less people in the aisles when boarding, and spend less time in that tube. Umad airline?

How is this not EXACTLY the same thing as a fast path system for a theme park?

Cos you don't have to wait 1h in the sun whilst the 1st class passengers are leaving. Duh. I don't care too much if queue jump systems are limited such that queue jumpers don't make a difference...Except I've seen it at rides where the queue is just stupidly longer because of paid queue jumping, and it would be quicker overall if the full hourly capacity could be used to churn through a single queue.

[CruiseSF]

Also aren't theme parks mean't to be places where you can remove your mind from the real world.

[rac2703]

Having now used the the Fast Track system myself today, I can say for the most part it wasn't too much faster. Today seemed a rather quiet day considering it was school holidays so the lines weren't to long to begin with. Superman Escape Fast Track was useless as the line wasn't long enough to make a difference, Scooby Doo saved about 10-15minutes which was good, and the Green Lantern Fast Track saved about 30mins - simply walked up the exit and straight onto the ride. It seems to be fair, now that it is a free system, each Fast Track is split into 15min time frames with a set number per time (depending on the ride). When I first got into the park I got a fast track ticket for Green Lantern at the 10:45-11:00 time, It was about 10:20 so i went and queued normally on the Superman and was on the ride in about 20mins, (they had the 2 trains running most of the day), once i got off i went straight up the Green Lantern exit and got to ride within 2mins (instead of the 40min wait that had backed up)

Edited April 4, 2012 by rac2703

[rappa]

I'm not gonna continue the argument. I just think its sad some people think the way they think.

Edited April 4, 2012 by djrappa

[mba2012]

Sorry if I sound a bit stupid but I don't really get the point of a 'fast pass' system is and how it works. Could someone please explain?

[rac2703]

Each ride - Green Lantern, Superman and Scooby Doo can have fast track. Basically they are fast passes split into 15min time slots - 10:30-10:45 , 10:45-11:00 ect. each of these 15 mins has about 50 spaces so you go to fast track and receive the fast pass for the next time so if its 10am you can get a fast past for Green Lantern for the 10:45-11am time slot. so instead of lining up in the normal queue at 10am and riding at about 10:30 you can go onto another ride for example Superman and ride it while you wait for the 10:45 time slot. Then at 10:45 instead of queuing for the Green Lantern, you just go up the exit into a much shorter queue (less than 5-10mins) and ride it. Basically you are "virtual" queueing between 10 and 10:45 as you can't ride the Green Lantern between these times but can do anything else in the park during that time.

Edited April 4, 2012 by rac2703

[Gazza]

Wiki up Disneys Fast Pass... Failing that, the first 5 posts in this thread explain it. Basically you get a card you can pick up, with a time printed on it, and it let's you avoid most of the queue by going in a separate entrance at an allotted time (rather than waiting the whole time in the main queue, you get to go off and do other things) When you arrive back at the allotted time you board the ride with minimal wait.

[aussienetman]

Walked past Green Lantern today - 90 minute plus wait - or the oportunity to get a fast ticket and come back and ride at 1:15 with little wait. It was just a young lady sitting at a desk handing out the tickets. If I didn't know what she was there for I probably wouldn't have understood as gp. This is a great idea during peak times for the big ticket rides. I hope this is a successful trial for the park

[mba2012]

I just got back from the parks and my opinion of the FastTrack system... Terrible. We where in the line for scooby and the line was one of the shortest I had seen but It had a wait almost three times longer. The fastTrack people continued to stream into the ride while we waited for a good 45 minutes to move 2 meters! If this becomes a permanent system I will never return to Movie World again. They weren't even telling people in the line that the fast track system actually existed. So people just kept lining up. This person came and asked the attendant about the system and he got one and was on the ride 15 minutes later while we were still a few hours from getting on.

[casey96]

^^ I completely agree. I was there today also and waiting for green lantern and it took about an hour and a half to get from where the yellow monster thing is to the front of the line. Then after we got into the gates they sent three loads of fast track people through. It took us about 2 hours to get through a line that usually would take about 45 minutes. I would hate to see this system installed unless they charge people to use it in that case less people would use it making it less painful and slow.

[RussellSmulders]

well the trial will run to tuesday and after that a decision will be made. and i vote to leave the park as is there is no need to make lines seem longer

[rac2703]

Well if the lines were so long why didn't any of you take advantage of the Fast Track system?

[rappa]

^ That's not really the point. Few parks manage the merge of guests from regular and 'fast' side of a line well and that is the most important part of the system. It doesn't work at all if you let all the fast people on with no wait. Odly enough, Disney manages this balance very well.

Edited April 7, 2012 by djrappa

[mba2012]

Disney actually has proper infrastructure and systems for their pass. They also advertise that system to guests.

[rappa]

That's irrelevant. I'm just talking about the group merging. That's just a person.

[mba2012]

That post was a bit out of place as I didn't see the others there. They need to have a system in which the fast track people get the last carriage on each ride or on scooby the last row of the second car or the second car every second run.

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

Scooby's queue doesn't really allow for that... unless you were to put the fastpath entrance in the exit line as I said before.

[Gazza]

That post was a bit out of place as I didn't see the others there. They need to have a system in which the fast track people get the last carriage on each ride or on scooby the last row of the second car or the second car every second run.

The way it works at Disney is they just merge people into the last bit of the line alternatley. There are no allocated rows etc (Except perhaps Space Mountain at MK, where one coaster track is FP and the other track is Standby)

[rappa]

Yes and most all FP lines still have a wait associated with them. Some can be 20 odd minutes

[Randy23]

If Movie World is did a trial, Do you think Sea World would do one?

[westical]

When it gets some rides. /zing

[joz]

I don't really see the point, nothing at Sea World gets a queue for the whole day, apart from the Flume on really busy days and most of the time the queue is still less than 20mins. I think if they were thinking about it they'd be better served taking the money they might've spent on fast track redesigning the top break to allow more fully loaded boats through the ride and to decrease downtime.

[T-bone]

Sorry to bring up an old topic, but It appears FastTrack has reappeared at Movie World, 1 year after the trial. Edit: Doh, beaten by 4 minutes in another thread.

Edited April 3, 2013 by T-bone