Jay20016

Kumba. Was sort of spoiled.

Sheikra Sheikra's heartline didn't change, they "simply" removed floor sections to make them more open. They've also always had the tiered seating if that is what you're thinking about... As for Mantis, it is the only coaster I've been on that came with groping. For some reason, every time I rode that thing, the attendants in the station would not hesitate to just go all touchy feely in that area. Every. Time.

Yes. If a guest comes back from a ride injured (beyond things like head banging) you should (IMO) stop operation to find out why. I completely agree as well. As the saying goes, safety first. And I'm not quite sure, Tmcdllr, what you mean by "every time somebody complains 'like this' because I don't know of any other complaints like this. In my opinion (and I don't see why this is even a debatable issue), someone getting hurt on a ride (as Comeagain stated, outside of something like headbanging) is serious and should be taken seriously by the park. If Disney, Universal, or Knott's received a complaint that someone was hurt from an obstruction on a ride, you bet they're going to shut down the ride immediately. And to the argument that rides would never run if they addressed complaints whether they were made up or not, well look, Ninja can't run AT ALL right now because they didn't look into something they should have. I agree too, safety first, and if there is an obvious injury such as bruising or bleeding then yes, do the inspection now. But I'm sure the parks get guest complaints all the time of alleged 'injuries' on rides with no obvious signs of the injury and in that case, should they then stop the ride and inspect it every time that happens? Maybe it depends on the alleged injury, I don't know, or, does this even happen often enough- real or fake, to even cause a problem? What do you guys think? I'm sure they are many of you that have visited parks more frequently than I have so what is your take on this, have you seen such an incident before? Working in this industry, yes, if someone has a complaint that seems to have merit (obvious harm, not just "It was scary!" type harm) then we will most definitely hold the attraction until we can investigate it further. Sometimes that involves walking it, sometimes that involves actually riding it. Hell, even if there is an odd sound on an attraction it will prompt us to hold & investigate. The Big Thunder Mountain accident at Disneyland years ago was a failure of maintenance and training. The ride ops knew of an odd sound coming from the train whilst in motion and continued to load the train before the accident happened that killed someone and hurt a score of others. Safety is the utmost importance. All rides should give the illusion of being unsafe, but if it is unsafe for real reasons, then the park has failed its patrons and given them real risk, instead of a perceived one.

The land area near the front of the park (along Lake Buena Vista drive) seems to be where they're staging all of the construction "stuff." Trailers, vehicles, materials, etc. The stuff between the Team Disney building and Typhoon will be for the new entry ramp from I-4. Will definitely be an interesting thing to see when all of the garages, buildings and work is done. Hopefully it will alleviate the traffic right around 535 on I-4 Westbound since that exit on the weekends is just... terrible...

And fans... lots and lots of fans... Disco yeti is not the correct name... 80s hair band yeti is probably better...

And a very unimpressive drainage solution...

Is it really that fewer of supports? Number wise, probably not, but it definitely looks to be a bit "cleaner." It could be the colors of the supports and lack of true theming around the coaster, but... the B&M one seems to be more "open." That could be a good thing or a bad thing as many rides have neat areas of interaction with their supports, but who knows...

The plot thickens...

So, on the old drop it wouldn't really pop you out of the seat until a bit into the drop and you'd not return until damn near the upward section of the hmp in the dynamite shack. The new drop pops you out a bit earlier (pre-lab bars mind you... ) and had you returning the seat quicker in the fall. When it opened, passes were pretty cheap and my friends at UCF would go on random days for a bit here and there. We rode the ever living shit out of it, and it was just a crazy ride. There were times where if you timed it right, the old parabolic drop with the hump in the shack could cause you to just get some Intamin levels of ejector air through the drop and the hump at the bottom. No hands throughout would usually have you just lightly grazing your seat throughout the whole thing. It is still a fun ride, but its just not the holy shit must do that it once was...

I'm still miffed about the reprofiling of Ripsaw Falls. When Islands of Adventure opened, that was one of my favorite rides there, the drop was utterly insane... then they refurbed it for whatever reason... For Reference: Original Drop vs. Drop Today

So, with all of these rumors about its potential demise... who has some pickup trucks?

Cool pictures, by far my favorite is the night time shot of the new miniature golf area.

How about a bunch of slalom turns so that I can say that I love the "C-Sections"? *Audience Groan*

Can't say that I'm surprised at this, though in all of my times, the closest I ever got to riding the tower was whilst riding MaxAir. Going to be interesting to see what its like now without the tower to give that disorienting feeling when you basically pull up to the top of the swing and see it upside down. As for DT, can't say that it is a surprise. Nothing worked but the coaster the last time I was there, including the A/C. Though, it is a little sad because that is/was my first and only bobsled coaster. It does stink that a lot of the "filler" rides are leaving parks as of late though; I've always been one to just enjoy rides in general, despite not having the tallest drops, fastest speeds, or most inversions. There is something to be said for those rides that you can hop on with a relatively short wait, have fun, and move onto the next big one. I think we enthusiasts often forget that essential point to theme parks; fun can come from the most unlikely of areas or from the "least" interesting looking coasters.

Sorry if it has been stated before, but is the train moving left to right, or right to left in this?

I recall reading about this- and I like Arrow, so I was glad. The thing I didn't understand was how Viper's future is secure based on reliability and low maintenance costs while Shockwave and Great American Scream Machine where scrapped partly due to reliability and low maintenance costs. I think you answered your own question: GASM and Shockwave were eaten by Viper to survive. 3 coasters go in, only 1 comes out. In all seriousness though, as more and more of these are being taken down, warehouse parts, even those currently on the ride, especially in a company as large as Six Flags or Cedar Fair could be shipped around to enable those still standing to continue to work. Furthermore, I do not think that you'll see what happened to the Suspended coaster happen to the normal sit down ones. There are a metric shit-ton of arrow loopers in the world, 7 inversion or no, and thus there are still a great demand to have these parts manufactured. Couple that with them being ultimately "less" complex than those of the suspended, and I think we'll see them remain in parks for a while longer, so long as demand for them still exists.

Or cost an arm and a leg.

Was at the park yesterday with some family that have youngsters (15, 9, and 5) and they had the queue open in a testing phase. Probably 15 or so people in dress attire watching and interacting with parents sitting along the edges getting feedback and what not. It is definitely better than standing in the old line, but, you are right, it misses an opportunity for things for all ages. The posted wait for the ride was around 40 minutes, with about 10 minutes of a normal line before you got into the tent. Once inside, you're in a small line as they limit the number in the play structure. The lines sort of crisscross here and it could cause some problems later with careless cast members, but it might just be because of only one of the actual rides being open. Once they give you the pager you're free to roam, or as in the case of the adults and older kids, sit along the wall. There are benches all along the outside edges, but some were hard to come by, especially if you have a large group all looking to sit together. Some groups left their bags and strollers in front of/on top of and staked a claim to seats that they never sat on; only returning to gather their stuff once the pager went off. The play structure is pretty open, and if you are in certain spots you can see the entirety of it (minus a few walls here and there with the tower on "fire") so you can really see the kids at all times. The posted age limit for the large climbing area was ~3-8 though there were definitely some older kids running around inside of it. There wasn't an enforcer, if you will, but it might be needed once the 2nd spinner opens up and, presumably, more people are allowed into the tent. The little kid play area (those under 3) was just a few low climbing and sitting things, nothing too special, but at that age I doubt they're very sophisticated. It will be interesting to see if they do allow adults into it at all, especially with some of the climbing areas. There are some large circular stairs that look like trampolines though they're not. They're probably a good 1.5 to 2 feet tall stairs and some of the really little kids had to have mom or dad come to the rescue on the way down. The group i was with, the little one loved it. She immediately ran around, did it once, and came back asking to go through it again. She didn't understand that this wasn't the "ride," and she could go again, unlike Barnstormer her then favorite ride of the day. The middle in the group went into it as well, he just turned 9 and is pretty small for his age, and had fun at first, but came back to our bench pretty early on stating there wasn't too much to do. The one thing he did want to try had a ton of kids around it and he gave up before getting a turn on it. It was this hanging swing/seat thingy guy in one of the hallways of the play structure. There were only like 3 or 4 in a line, and the majority of the kids sat around that side of the course. Our pager went off about 25 minutes or so into the tent, and we then resumed waiting in line both inside of the tent for a bit, and then outside of it just before getting onto an elephant. That section of waiting was another 10 or so minutes too. The new Dumbo spinner looks awesome and is very detailed... The line seems to work, but it really does lack for things of all age. A lot of the adults sitting on the bench were approached and asked about their comments/concerns and even had a small discussion group going for a bit with a couple of the cast members with clip boards, but it seemed that the majority of the complaint was "This is it?" It just seems like a wasted opportunity to not really have things for the entire family. People were definitely asking about carnival games, or interactive games... something for the kids that might be too old/big to go through the play structure. The other major complaint I heard, was that there wasn't any sort of First Aid near by. Kids hurt themselves all of the time, and a little guy got a pretty good scratch/carpet burn it seemed, and the family was told they'd have to go all the way to Casey's Corner for anything to cover it. Something that also was unexpected, was that letting the little one play for that amount of time seemed to tire her out. This was her 2nd time to Disney without a stroller and after walking as much as we had up to that point, and then playing for roughly 30 minutes straight, she got pretty tired and needed to be carried for a bit. We ended up stopping and getting some ice cream and just sat until she seemed to get her energy back... But, could cause some problems with the crankier kids once they get tired. She definitely enjoyed it more than the trip last year with the long, hot, wait at the "old' Dumbo. So the whole thing is not bad, I'm not meaning to sound too negative on it, but it just seems as if they didn't go as far as mentioned in all of the earlier press releases. after i first heard that they were going to do like boardwalk games to but i think this is a better idea as most of people who go to disney world will have kids and the just can't cater for adults on every thing and something tells me that it's better than a macdonalds McDonald's ones have more slides. So if your child likes to climb a lot, Disney's might win. If they like slides that are taller than 5 feet, McDonald's might win out.

So they go to Hollywood Studios with Star Wars Weekends going on where people can and do dress up and are making a story about it when they try to go to the other parks? And once again, as seems to be the case with any of the major news stations in Orlando, they look to make their name by going after the people who put them on the map...

How does that just not totally fall apart.... its amazing! Most coasters are strong enough to support the weight of the trains and forces without anything other than the spine and rails; the supports are there normally to just hold the weight at whatever height they need. That isn't to say that some elements lean on the supports more than others, but that if not everything has to be "supported" to be strong. As far as what I've always considered to be one the more prettier drops from the top, is Apollo's Chariot. The way that the hill hides the true height of the first drop is fun, as is the twist under the first drop in the camel backs.

Their new ad slogan IMO...

The main reason, park and/or pool lights. Most water parks are not setup with pathway lights and given the already mounting dangers, darker areas and blind spots could prove deadly for inexperienced swimmers. Typhoon Lagoon used to host a lot of Extra Magic Hours at night, but not in recent memory. That said, they still do have private surf events at night...

BGT depends a lot on locals, but also tourists that are willing to put in the ~1.5 to 2 hour drive (depending which side of Orlando you're staying on) drive to Tampa. With gas prices going absolutely freaking ridiculous, I'd wager that played a role in it... The entire area is very nice, if not lacking a bit of shade, but for some already on a trim budget with the economy as it was, that could undo any of the boost from the new ride.

Think that was the original plan, not this newly released one with more money for the project. And about the AutoCad bit, I was wondering if it was just an error in the picture, but I was really digging the drastic straight edge transition at the lift hill.

And I think that closes out the thread, nothing else can be said about it... Except... for $30 this could all be done easier.