TopThrill182

Park is very crowded today (at least by Magic Moutain's standards). Waited an hour for namtaB. Definitely an intense experience, but I didn't love it. Not sure if it was just because I couldn't see where we were going, but the ear bashing was a bit much. What do others think?

I fully support SFMM, and any business for that matter, trying to make as much money as it possibly can. But ultimately, given the unapologetically crappy state of affairs at the park currently, I'm not sure how far SF management can really push that envelope... Following the DC Universe revamp, along with other improvements in the years leading up to that, I had hopes SFMM was on the up and up. But after the embarrassment that was / is Full Throttle, I fear the park is regressing to its old ways: attend to its hollow Xtreme Park image while neglecting everything else. With each passing year, the park's infrastructure (in my opinion) looks increasingly dilapidated and trashy (and, as mentioned above, Full Throttle's chain link fence theme isn't helping matters), thereby degrading the entire in-park experience. I love roller coasters as much as the next enthusiast, but I also believe a pleasant park environment is integral to my and others' enjoyment of a park. I'd love the see the park invest more in that environment, but I'm not sure what would ever convince current park management to do so...

The Mountain seems to be adopting a fee-oriented business model more akin to what the airline industry is currently using: hook guests with a low admission price, then hit them with fees throughout their respective visits to make up for it. When researching an amusement park trip / vacation, I'd argue the most important determinant in that search (for most people) is the parks' admission prices. Admission to a park is generally the most significant cost and can often be the factor that causes a family to choose one park over another. $25 for parking in this case is, of course, ridiculous, but like having to pay for a tube to use in the lazy river at Hurricane Harbor, I think those fees remain secondary concerns that have less of a capacity to deter guests from visiting than do costly upfront admission tickets.

While I think the ride would have been a better fit for the Boardwalk area, as was originally planned, I still found it enjoyable in the Fiesta Village location. I think the ride actually provides an interesting mix of sensations; it's both thrilling, due to its height, and somewhat relaxing, given the smooth spinning motion. So, I am sad to see it come down! And, making the deconstruction even more hard to bear is the knowledge that the current management at Knott's seems to have little interest in adding anything other than mild family rides at the moment. The chances of another thrill ride coming down the pike in the near future seem small, though I hope I'm wrong.

Regardless of whether or not the park is really at fault here, articles like this one, not to mention the hundreds of negative comments plastered to CP's Facebook page, show that the current parking situation can bad for business on days with extreme crowds. I, too, have experienced gridlock in trying to exit CP's parking lot at closing time on especially crowded days; it stinks. And at midnight, when guests are tired and likely facing a long drive home, it's little wonder tensions flare so quickly. While I understand some congestion in inherent to large crowds all trying to leave at once, I think the park needs to take a serious look at their parking / traffic management and devise a better solution for days like this. It's unfortunate, in my opinion, that yesterday's guests will likely remember this parking fiasco over any other positive aspect(s) of their visit. And I think the park should be concerned that it's made such a negative impression on guests.

Maybe maintenance will use X2's closure as an opportunity to do an extended rehab on the trains and make the ride more comfortable??? #dreaming

Where were the indicator lights previously? (I've never been on NTAG before.) Glad to see the modifications weren't too drastic. And I'd bet dispatch times will improve as things settle down.

Looks like everyone had fun--at Knott's especially! Did anything of particular interest come up in the Q&A?

The in-park improvements Knott's has been making are certainly nice, but I have serious doubts as to whether anyone (or a significant enough number of people, anyway) is inspired to visit the park based off of ambiance alone. Ambiance upgrades are excellent as supplementary additions, but not, in my opinion, as primary ones. If the park wants to remain relevant to thrill seekers (which, I'd argue, is an important demographic for the park's profitable Halloween Haunt), I don't see how it can get away without adding a new roller coaster / thrill ride for much longer. No major new roller coaster has been added in ten years, and, moreover, the park has lost two signature thrill rides in that time (Perilous Plunge and now Windseeker). To say that a major roller coaster addition will suddenly liken Knott's to Six Flags Magic Mountain is, I think, overly dramatic. There is a large gap between the current strategy at Knott's (which seems to pour money into landscaping and fountain renovations) and that at the Mountain (which leaves little money to spend on anything other than a yearly gimmick coaster). Each park, I'd argue, would be well served to find a happy medium. In short, I think Knott's is due for a large new thrill ride of some sort.

I find Sue Carpenter's response to be the most interesting part of that "story" (which, otherwise, was about as non-newsworthy as a news article can get). Why would Carpenter want to openly admit that it's "challenging" to get a hold of the park's lost and found office? haha

And California wonders why it's losing businesses.

Can someone explain to me why the park would choose to build a new Topper Track coaster as opposed to using the I-Box technology? Is it simply a matter of the Topper Track being less expensive? I guess I don't understand the benefit(s) of Topper Track all that well... Won't it degrade and provide a rough experience over time, just like every other wooden coaster?

I wish California would publicly grade amusement parks as the state does with food establishments. I'd be interested to see what SFMM would get... Thoughts (mostly negative ones, I warn you) from my visit on Tuesday: -Has the park passed out third party promotional materials at the parking booths before? Definitely not a fan of receiving a Famous Footwear catalogue upon entering... (It really cheapens the park experience, IMO.) -Full Throttle still looks like it's sitting in a construction zone, even though I suppose the park has technically finished the project. Everything about the ride area screamed, "We want to spend as little money as possible on this!" From the temporary queue rails to the afterthought of a station canopy (not to mention the red rope light sloppily hung around the entrance to the tunnel), the whole setup felt cheap and lackluster, even screaming of laziness. -Can someone explain to me how Full Throttle's theme is different from X2's? -The Full Throttle ride experience is surprisingly great. I was shocked at the ride's quietness and smoothness. The hang time on the loop is plain awesome. -Scream is still running one train?! What a joke! It was running one train when I visited last spring. Is the maintenance department totally incompetent, or are they running on a shoestring budget? Either way, this speaks very poorly of the park. (On the bright side, though, it prepared me for what Full Throttle will be like in a few months.) -I had trouble finding many attractions that weren't in urgent need of paint. -The Scream / Colossus midway is looking especially neglected and trashy, IMO. (Now that Scream's colors have faded so significantly, the parking lot motif has become, unfortunately, much more prominent.) -Much of the park's infrastructure (e.g. buildings) looks like it's ready to crumble, especially in the back half of the park. -While employees were, for the most part, fairly friendly, I was rather surprised at the collective casualness on display. There seemed to be a lot of fooling around on ride platforms, with employees more interested in joking around with one another than doing their jobs. I understand it's nearing the end of the season, but still. The fact that a Goliath employee joked over the sound system that her co-worker hadn't actually checked any of the restraints was rather off-putting. -I realized how very little there is to do at the park other than roller coasters. I enjoyed my visit, and appreciate having so many roller coasters so close to LA, but the in-park experience was rather craptacular when compared to my other theme park destinations this past summer. The place could definitely take a few years off from adding anything new and invest that money into some much needed TLC throughout. I can't help but feel that the park has fallen back into some of it's pre-Shapiro bad habits.

Does anyone know more as to what Cal/OSHA's problem with the ride actually was? I know people have posted something about a ladder not being in code... And shouldn't Mondial take some responsibility for this whole fiasco? Correct me if I'm wrong, but when they manufacture a ride, shouldn't said ride be in code for the place to where it's being delivered / assembled? I can't help but wonder if this will amount to some sort of lawsuit against the company.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that Knott's will get to keep its Windseeker yet (of course, WoF's announcement doesn't seem a good sign in that regard). Not only has the park not added any major roller coaster since Silver Bullet, but it has also lost thrill rides since then: Perilous Plunge and now, potentially, Windseeker. I appreciate family rides and realize their importance in nearly every theme park setting, but I'm curious as to why Knott's seems content to abandon the thrill seeker market. Moreover, even accepting the fact that Knott's now seems inclined to grow in a strictly family friendly way, I'd still argue the park's recent family additions have paled to those at nearly every other SoCal park. And as evidence of this, Knott's was the only major SoCal player that witnessed a substantial attendance decrease in 2012: 4%. Disney's California Adventure saw a 22% attendance increase; Universal, 15%; and SFMM, 4%. (To be fair, Disneyland saw a 1% decrease in attendance, but that, in my opinion, seems attributable merely to the extreme growth at sister park DCA). I'd argue these numbers call Raffi Kaprelyan's vision into question. I remain interested to see what direction Knott's takes going forward, but can't help but feel that the park's direction is becoming less relevant to me as a childless consumer. And I'd be surprised if other tween / teen / young adult customers at Knott's don't start feeling the same way.

Not a huge fan of the name. I wonder why they couldn't just reuse the Windseeker name as they have done for every other installation? Still keeping my fingers crossed that this is NOT the Knott's Windseeker (though, I wouldn't be surprised). The Windseeker footprint is so small at Knott's, the chances of anything else remotely interesting going in there seem small to me. But I guess we'll wait and see!

I have no doubt Atlanta can support two water parks, but I don't understand how Six Flags benefits from owning two water parks less than half an hour away from each other. (And yes, I realize traffic may extend that travel time at certain points of the day, but the two parks are still extremely close to one another.) Unless Six Flags differentiates the parks in some way (e.g. White Water becomes the cheaper, more neighborhood-y water park option whereas Hurricane Harbor is marketed as the more expensive, state of the art water park), it seems to me that they will start competing with one another. In marketing Hurricane Harbor, Six Flags runs the serious risk of drawing guests away from White Water. And if someone has an example to the contrary, please share it, but I've never seen cannibalization work out in favor for the company in question. Wouldn't it be more efficient for Six Flags to consolidate their water park operations and send everyone to the new Hurricane Harbor (sort of like what we're seeing in the airline industry where airlines are reducing route overlap and hubs to maximize remaining occupancy)? It doesn't seem like that much of a marketing stretch to convince people to drive another 25 minutes down the road (and that extra time will be less for those living closer to SFoG). In short, unless White Water was filled to capacity every day, I see little reason to add another water park a short trip away unless that new water park will provide a marketably different experience of some sort.

Zumanjaro looks awesome! While I'm not sure the view will be as interesting as that of LL:DoD, I do think it will be super neat to watch Kingda Ka trains coming and going. As someone who hasn't been to Great Adventure since 2007, has Rolling Thunder really gotten that bad? I'm shocked to hear that the park is removing it. I remember the ride being a lot of fun--not overly rough and full of pops of airtime. (Maybe my memory is failing me, though. haha)

As much as I love coasters, I find the construction of new water parks to be exciting, too. I'm curious, though, why SF wants to have two water parks just down the road from one another. How will they avoid cannibalization? I assume they'll try to differentiate the parks in some way, but I wasn't able to discern any specifics in the announcement.

Does anyone else feel like the Plinko front of the line crap is getting ridiculous at the Point? When I visited the park last Saturday, August 10th, it seemed like an absurd number of people were playing AND winning the game (the four pack more often than not, too). As a standby guest, yielding to an unending stream of FL users is already painful enough. But now, standby guests have to yield to Plinko winners, too--of which, on a crowded day, there are an abundance. In the station for TTD Saturday evening, every other train was arriving to the station already half filled with exit pass people. That reduces the already reduced capacity for standby guests considerably. It stinks that CP seems so willing to sell my spot in line to anyone with cash. /rant (PS, I'm aware this game has been around since the beginning of the season, but I've noticed a much more pronounced effect from it during my most recent visits.)

First I had to suffer through the removal of Perilous Plunge, and now this?! Make it stop! I can't believe the willingness (if not excitement) of many on this forum to let this ride go. Am I the only one who really enjoys the Windseeker fleet? I find the ride to be one of the more enjoyable and re-rideable rides out there, the iteration at Knott's included. To me, it's exhilarating without being too aggressively thrilling (if that makes any sense). Moreover, the lighting package is second to none. What makes this rumor particularly hard to swallow is the knowledge that, in light of the park's current management team and their recent park additions, there seems little hope of the park adding anything other than a conservative family ride as a replacement. Furthermore, given the park's space limitations, the chances of Knott's adding another 300 foot attraction seem even more remote. How expensive could it possibly be to make the necessary modifications to the ride? Moving the ride will cost money, too, you know. #reallyhopingthisrumorisfalse

The park is slammed today; I wouldn't be surprised if it's one of their busier days yet (if not the busiest). 2 hour waits for Raptor, Millennium, and Maverick throughout the day. I'll check out Dragster when I return this evening; it was down until the late afternoon. Even less popular rides like Magnum, Corkscrew, and Blue Streak have waits of 45 minutes to an hour. And after experiencing the effects of Fast Lane as a non-Fast Lane user on a busy day, it really stinks. The standy lines have grinded to a near halt.

In watching the POV again, I have to agree. From the batwing-esque element all the way to the final brake run, the layout actually looks like it might provide some good speed and intensity. I'm left wondering, though, what sort of sensations that final helix will provide!

Anyone else notice how B&M has received quite the plug on Kings Island's website? Granted, a park is going to say good things about whichever manufacturer has been selected to build their new ride(s), but I can't help but take this as a slight swing at some recent, less-reliable manufacturers for CF (e.g. Intamin and Mondial). Perhaps I'm reading too much into it! haha

Love the name, logo, color scheme--really everything on the marketing side of the ride. The ride itself leaves me somewhat less impressed. No complaints, really; I just fear this will be another "good but not great" B&M. With all of the elements existing on such a grand scale, I'm curious if the ride's pacing will feel overly drawn out and lethargic. The inline twist reminds me a bit of Gatekeeper's return keyhole element, which is taken at a similarly slow speed and provides a fun amount of hang time, IMO.