coasterbill

"We don't want to make the most cars, we want to make the best cars." - Henry Ford Intamin does want to make the best, and they do. An intamin has had #1 and #2 on the Golden Ticket list every year since 2001, also Intamin has had #1 and #2 in Mitch Hawker every year since 2001, excluding 2008 and 2009, where Eagle Fortress took second both years. I305, GeForce, Bizarro, Kawasemi, iSpeed, Skyrush, Maverick, and Mega-Lite all finished in the top 10 in Mitch Hawker last year. In my opinion, Intamin has more great coasters than B&M does, not to mention Millennium Force, Goliath, Dragster, Xcelerator, Piraten, and Superman Escape. Don't forget El Toro. The fact that they made the #1 Steel coaster and the #1 Wood coaster is flat out amazing. I don't think any other manufacturer has ever done that.

It's hard to argue with Intamin, but my thought with Arrow is this... Imagine you're going to amusement parks and all you have are flat rides, traditional wooden coasters and an occasional Miller Wild Mouse with flat, rough steel track. Then a company comes along and comes up with huge steel coasters that can do corkscrews and loops. I know it's hard to picture it now but imagine if you've been riding wood coasters for years and all of a sudden Cedar Point's Corkscrew is in front of you with 3 inversions, 2 corkscrews over the midway and a huge (at the time) loop. They totally changed the way people thought about coasters. When you also consider the first hypercoaster (that must have been amazing) the success of the log flume which almost every park had at one point and countless other innovations they really were amazing innovators.

I actually thought the best part of Gatekeeper was the first drop. The keyholes are definitely cool, especially in the front seat but I love that first drop.

Agree with all of this, I prefer the front seat on Magnum as it's probably the least painful seat and you have a great view but if you like a good beating then car 1 row 3 is for you.

I was about to post the same thing. It's hard to argue that Arrow was the most innovative though. - They were the first people to have a coaster successfully go upside-down. - They were the ones that developed tubular steel track, the innovation that made today's large steel coasters possible. - They were the ones who developed Magnum XL 200, the first coaster to break the 200 foot barrier. And it's not just coasters, though that is the title of the thread. - They invented the log flume, the suspended coaster, the mine train, the 4th dimension coaster and built most of the original rides at DIsneyland. Many of these... like the flying saucers were completely new ideas. Despite all this, they did declare bankruptcy so it's not easy to declare them the "most successful manufacturer" but they were by far the most innovative.

Because it was every single coaster in the park. If every single coaster in the park is down to one working train DURING FRIGHT FEST then there is a serious problem with maintenance at that park. Oh and also because the operations manager came right out and said this I love that it's an arrow POS.

Not at all, I'm just pointing out an example of why I can't stand this park. I've posted a lot of other reasons over the last year or two. You say that I don't bash other parks for running one train but I absolutely do, I bash SFNE when they do it all the time (though they never do it as much as SFA). In the case of KD or Great Adventure, they only do it when it's the beginning of the season, the park is totally dead (and even in this case... rarely) or there's something wrong with the other trains. By saying that I don't criticize them when they do it you're implying that both parks do it frequently, but that's not true and you know it. Six Flags America almost always runs one train on every single coaster. If they run 2 it's usually on Mind Eraser and Wild One but not the major attractions (I like Wild One but it's not exactly a marquee attraction for most people). I've never seen Great Adventure run one train on any coaster besides Batman and El Toro when there was a train having an issue or it was opening weekend and the other train wasn't ready yet but since the park is always dead then it's not a big deal. I've NEVER in probably 50+ visits seen less than 2 trains on Nitro, Bizarro, Kingda Ka, Superman, Green Lantern or Skull Mountain and I've only seen it on Batman once. And I'm not worried about the wait time for the front seat... I've waited an hour for the front of Top Thrill Dragster and have no complaints. I was annoyed because there was practically nobody in line and the wait was still a really long wait. Even the other rows were still a 20 minute 3-4 train wait. That's ridiculous. I should know better than to argue with you because I know you'll never admit to this parks flaws. Is it improving? Maybe... but they have a long way to go before they belong in the same conversation as any other corporate theme park in the region.

Which is when I was there. It was a KD trip and we stopped at SFA on the way back. We waited until the end of of the season because we were waiting for I305 to re-open. Every coaster was running 1 train.

I wasn't going to compare them at all, you're the one who compared them. Out of curiosity, how often do you get to the other parks in your area? Kings Dominion, Great Adventure, BGW, Hershey... Six Flags America is horrible compared to all of those parks, and at none of those parks would running one train on every coaster be considered acceptable. Sure KD has been known to run one on i305 but it doesn't happen often. All of those parks are maintained better, have better crews, have better food, have better atmosphere and have better rides (I'm predicting you're going to try to argue this point with BGW which I completely disagree with but I guess that one could be considered debatable if you ignore theming and any rides that aren't coasters). Last year when I went to SFA (only because I needed the Roar credit but we also rode Superman while we were there) Superman was running one train and they were taking forever to dispatch that one train. I waited 40 minutes for the front seat and there were only 9 people ahead of me waiting for it. This would never happen in a million years at any of those parks. You're making excuses for this park like it's a family owned park in the middle of nowhere. It's a Six Flags park in a ridiculously populated area right near in NFL football stadium in the capital of the United States.

You're sipping the Six Flags America Kool Aid if you think running 1 train on every coaster all the time puts them only slightly behind Great Adventure (according to your note in parenthesis). I'm not saying Great Adventure is exactly Cedar Point or Knoebels in terms of efficiency, but they always run every train on all of their coasters (except for Kingda Ka where they run 3) and do it with minimal stacking (except for on Bizarro... they're awful). The Kingda Ka crews and the Nitro crews for example are much better than anything you'll ever find at SFA. Pretty much every crew at Great Adventure minus the Bizarro crew is.

It's okay, but it's going to have a tough time competing with Wild Eagle and Rip Ride Rockit in the 2014 Mitch Hawker Photo Booth Poll.

Talon is a great coaster, but I actually think Hydra is getting really rough for a B&M. I still ride it multiple times whenever I go to the park but this ride isn't really up to B&M's standards of smoothness. I'd go so far as to say it's the roughest B&M I've ridden besides the standups.

NCSO is all the rage right now... very nice work. My only suggestion is that I'd actually prefer the monorail go around the wood coaster and not through it. For some reason it seems awkward to me, but maybe I'm alone in this.

That area around the drop tower is very nice. Keep up the good work!

I prefer Sky Screamers over Windseekers. There's something about the chain that makes it more thrilling. I prefer Skyscreamers too but I like them both. One thing I love about Windseekers (besides the amazing lighting package) is the insane capacity. No matter how crowded the park is I know I can go over to Widnseeker and get on in 1 or 2 cycles. It's just a great relaxing ride. I'm not riding Windseeker 1. It isn't safe.

I loved Riptide Run. It was actually my favorite ride in the waterpark just because I'd never seen a ride like it before. Even without it though Dorney still has a very good waterpark and I'm looking forward to trying out the new slides.

I can only think of a few right now... On Maverick I kind of push out on the straps and then hold my head back against the headrest tight when the turns come up... it's kind of a natural reaction for me and I've never had any issues with roughness. On Mean Streak (like gerstlaueringvar said) the ride is much better if you lean forward and don't let your back touch the back of the seat much. This ride still sucks though. On B&M hypers... arms up, legs out and off the floor (not because they're rough, just because it's more fun that way). On Kingda Ka... this one is simple, to reduce roughness and to have an amazing ride, just ride in the front. No need to brace or anything, the ride is really smooth up there. On Wild One at SFA, don't ride in a wheel seat. This ride is actually really good in a middle seat but pretty rough otherwise. Knoebels StatosFear, arms up, legs out... get ready for the most ridiculous drop tower ever. And this is the most important one... ON KUMBA, ride in the back row in the seat closest to the unload platform. You'll get pulled through every element and on the Zero G roll you will re-lose your virginity. This ride is amazing in every single seat, but that one is just ridiculous... I always get off thinking there's no way B&M actually built that coaster because it's just way too good.

I'm looking forward to re-riding Skyrush in a different seat because this year I rode it in a middle wing seat and really had a hard time enjoying it but given all of the positive reviews it's getting I'm hoping I feel differently after giving it another chance.

Welcome to the forums. Personally I'd like to see them fix up what they have before they add new large-scale attractions but I think we'd all be thrilled if even half of those things you suggested happened (minus maybe the Bizarro thing).

lol... okay.

You're right, those are the only 2 ugly areas but Gotham City is a huge area. It takes up 1/2 the park and all of the best coasters (besides Wild One) are back there. And while Mardi Gras should be an improvement the jury is still out on how much that's going to help that area. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt but that area needs a lot of work.

Flight Deck's new paint looks amazing.

^ I also prefer Star Flyers ride wise but I love Windseekers. They never have a long line because of their great capacity, they look amazing at night and they're a great way to relax for a few minutes, get a nice breeze and get a great view of the park.

They should put this on the cover of their 2014 Park Guide. It would be a terrible waste of your time to visit this park unless you're credit whoring. If you wanted to vacation in DC for a few days and already had a season pass then by all means spend a few hours there but don't waste a whole day at this park... it's terrible. Superman, Joker's Jinx, Wild One and Batwing are pretty good coasters but the park is just so ugly and operations are so terrible that they're not enough to make me not hate this park. Selfishly I'm actually annoyed that they're getting a new coaster because now I'm going to be tempted to go back and ride it.

Um... Comet is the definition of a stand out rollercoaster. The problem is they have Comet, a waterpark and nothing else. That being said this has nothing to do with if the park is successful or not. The locals think Boomerang, Alpine Bobsled, Canyon Blaster and Sasquatch are amazing rides. I think at this point everyone kind of knows Steamin Demon sucks... but people love the other rides.