ajfelice

Weekdays at Kennywood typically never result in outrageous waits. Usually just a few trains or so despite their very poor efficiency. However, pick a day with the least chance of rain as Kennywood is not afraid to close the entire park for the rest of the day as early as 2:00pm even if it's not going to rain later that day. They give you a come back again rain check, but that doesn't help you out very much when you are traveling a significant distance. To have minimal waits, head right to Lost Kennywood for Exterminator and Black Widow. Then make your way over to Phantom and Swing Shot. After that the park evens itself out pretty good where the order of rides really doesn't matter in terms of gaining an advantage in less wait time.

Kennywood closed at 2:00pm today. The inclement weather has mostly all moved east of the park. Parking lot traffic is jammed as thousands on people are trying to leave as the sun shines. Rain checks or not, this is a terrible business move. Got evacuated from Sky Rocket, so I guess that's one positive.

When I take my early Wednesday nights off work or when I just need a moment to get away from the stresses of work, I sneak a ride on XScream at Waldameer Park. Hands up on the drop of course. Sometimes doing this on the clock means answering radio calls as the tower ascends.

Took a visit to Knoebels on Monday and had just as much fun as I always do there. Phoenix and Twister were both running excellent. Black Diamond continues to grow on me as one of my favorite dark rides (I know it's technically a coaster credit). Without going into too many more obvious details that have been talked about so much, their flat ride collections is arguably one of the best in the USA as well. Flying Turns actually didn't impress me very much. I was never expecting the next greatest thing to grace upon the coaster world. Nor did I expect a high-intensity, crazy relentless ride. But simply Flying Turns for me was very forgettable. I applaud the time and dedication of Knoebels for getting this ride open, but it's simply not a memorable experience for me. Perhaps the 45 minute wait had some effect on my opinion, but it simply wasn't an experience I would wait more than 15 minutes for ever again. Operations were as fast as ever, but Phoenix crew sure put on an interesting sideshow between dispatches. Texting on platform and while on controls was the theme of each visit I made on Phoenix. In addition, this guy below was also copping a feel with his female coworker every moment he could get as well as attempting to seduce her in plain view of everyone in the station. Pretty classy! Also, as someone who was trained on small park quirkiness of safety and not afraid to do things big parks wouldn't fathom, I still can't believe the operators at Knoebels are comfortable standing in the track of Phoenix as the train parks less than a foot behind them. Skid brakes, fin brakes, or magnets, I still can't find myself being comfortable trusting a ride not to ever overshoot and possibly hit me.

Marketing is a beautiful thing. Hence why I decided to earn a Bachelor Degree in Marketing. Cedar Point's tweet did exactly what they wanted it to do; make all of you talk about Cedar Point on social media and get the park some cheap exposure. Absolutely brilliant idea! Probably for some short period of time a coaster will take on the nickname "King James," but Cedar Point isn't stupid enough to permanently rename and re-theme a ride to feed the ego of a famous athlete. -Signed a Cleveland Sports Fan

I'm going to guess indoor Maurer Spinner. Just a hunch....

This accident was due to an enthusiast during an event attempting to join the "one click club." An open buzz bar would have resulted in the same incident.

As cool as buzz bars can be from the guest/enthusiast perspective, any maintenance personnel would beg to differ. They are tricky to keep them running reliably, and in the end, individual restraints are simply safer. Times have changed and rides have modernized in the name of safety and reliability.

^An even easier rule: Do not cause a scene or get depressed when your group of 8 people doesn't all ride in the same train together. After all, it's not like a ride is significantly different when the people in the rows in front of you or behind you are not people in your group. And the two minutes you wait for the rest of your group at the end of the exit ramp isn't going to cause psychological harm.

My point was that parks are often hesitant to buy very large used rides (example: a B&M coaster) because the total cost of the project is right around the cost of just purchasing a brand new ride. For smaller flats and some smaller coasters, it can be cost-effective to buy used.

From some inside the industry investigative research about purchasing large used rides and coasters, I believe a likely problem with relocating a coaster the size of Led Zeppelin/Time Machine is the cost. From the cost of acquiring the ride, disassembling it, shipping it, and assembling it, you are basically paying for a brand new coaster. So why buy used when you can get a brand new ride for a similar price? If speculation is true, someone must be getting this coaster for a bargain.

I have sat for hours at controls of this ride. The time Ravine Flyer II spends in "gravity" ranges from just barely under 30 seconds under perfect conditions, to about 32.5 on a sluggish cold day as there is a timer clocking each run. If you want to add on the time RFII spends slowly moving off the brake run and into the station, you will go just over a minute, but the "ride" from the top of the lift to the brakes is usually about 31 seconds.

Ravine Flyer II is 31 seconds from lift hill to brake run. An incredible relentless woodie that is on the short side, but not lacking in intensity.

As much as I love to point out the stupidity of some guests who attend parks, this comment of yours is slightly offensive. A guest who has no clue about the engineering and the individual safety restrictions specific each ride should not be blamed for an accident due to lack of "common sense." It is the job of the ride operators to make sure that each guest who attempts to board their ride is physically qualified to safely ride. Yes, there might be posted signs and warnings, but in the end it comes down to the people who are responsible for making sure that each rider is safe. Please, before making an outrageous remark like this, think about who enabled this accident to occur before blaming a guest who likely never studies coasters or knows very much about them at all.

Right, many smaller parks have these policies due to having less resources. Keeping rides open an hour past closing will require the park to have maintenance staff, ride operators, and managers in addition to many other park workers at the park when many of them have already been at work since the odd hours of the morning. Many of those same people need to be back to the park the next day at odd hours of the morning, so demanding them an extra hour of work has quite the impact on their energy and effectiveness as team members. It may sound selfish, but in reality many of those people needed to keep the park/rides open longer need some time to rest and have some life when they put 15 hours into each day at work. Simply adding more people and resources is not always cost-effective for a smaller park like Knoebels.

I don't think Cedar Point or any park in the world really cares about having the most hybrid coasters in the world. The General Public wouldn't catch onto that very well either as they really don't care if a coaster is hybrid or not, or even know what hybrid is.

Weight, weather, wind, train modifications, lubrication frequency, fat riders, skinny riders, and you name it will have a significant effect on how "fast" any coaster will run. Going off a few videos from random points in time doesn't tell you the full story. Each day a coaster is going to run slightly different based on a whole bunch of variables at work.

Glad to see you enjoyed your visit to Waldameer and your laps on Ravine Flyer II. Too bad you couldn't see our new XScream Lights at night. It's even more cool when you ride it and see how the LEDs light up everything around the tower. A little insight into the two-train operation with one train closed off: We will open the second train up when crowds justify it. The reason is that we will find ourselves just taking more time to buckle down empty seats. It becomes a time-consuming hassle and distracts from focusing on the seats that are actually occupied (the other train sits out on the brake run even longer too). Once the line wraps around the corner of the queue by the transfer shed consistently, we will open the second train like we did later that day. Personally, I have suggested we just block off one or two cars in each train so we can use both trains equally (closing queue stalls),and not give an impression of laziness when we aren't quite at two-train operation levels. Without going into too much detail, it's easier to put a train on in the morning than it is to add one later. Taking a train off is pretty simple.

Goliath was probably the only disappointment of my visit to SFNE last week. It was very intense as others suggested it to be, but in the end the roughness was just too much. Not a headbanger, but more of a jackhammer feeling at the low points of the track. I tried an inside seat in hopes of some redemption, but it was still a very rough ride. Too bad as I really had some decently high expectations for Goliath.

Let me make this more clear. Fireworks nights are NOT a problem for Waldameer. You will be fine attending Saturday or Sunday of Memorial Day Weekend or Labor Day Weekend. The holidays themselves aren't the best clientele, but incidents like this one are isolated. The only people that were affected were the people instigating. You should never be concerned attending a fireworks show. The days that have had issues are the days following a fireworks show. And unlike the news portrayed, Waldameer was not in chaos or rioting. Most people had no idea what was happening.

Fireworks nights are not the problem. Fireworks are held the day prior to Memorial Day, 4th of July, and Labor Day when crowds are actually much higher. The last time fireworks were held on Memorial Day was 2011 only because a major storm cancelled the show originally planned for the night before. Even before 2011, Waldameer held fireworks on the days prior to holidays for several years. Fireworks night are actually a very exciting night to be in the park. Lots of families who bring multiple generations to the park, and many groups of friends meet up for the evening. It's really a community event as Waldameer is one of the very few places to see fireworks in the Erie area anymore. Crowds are far from unruly on fireworks nights. Memorial Day Monday with absolutely no fireworks, special events, or offers was the night that had this incident. The incident will continue to be investigated and analyzed to determine the appropriate actions to be taken in the future.

Actually it's pretty Kennywood-like to run one train with some pretty long lines. Doing things like starting busy Saturdays with one train on Phantom and Thunderbolt is very frequent.

I figured this random plug would be most fitting for a Throwback Thursday moment.... Last weekend I learned that a piece from the former Haunted Castle dark ride found it's place in Waldameer's Whacky Shack thanks to our dark ride enthusiast and artist who has provided us with many neat updates and restorations over the years. Once you come out of the spinning barrel, you make a right and see an old door guarded by an apparition. Just below the apparition is another "door" (a maintenance access route) with this piece hanging above it. Not sure how long it has been there, but it fits well alongside the other Bill Tracy scenes. I thought it was pretty neat how we have a small piece of history from a storied ride in a Six Flags park lost about three decades ago. Back to the Zumanjaro, El Toro,and Kingda Ka discussions as well as the general Six Flags bashing...

Quite frankly, it was embarrassing in my stint working at Cedar Point telling guests we were down for weather when it was literally a "mist" at best coming down. My favorite example of crazy weather policy was a tiny drizzle completely putting Blue Streak down and out until the second train was removed out of fear of slipping the brakes. For one, the brake run is covered. Secondly, being trained beyond basic operations of roller coasters with the same brakes, the only fault ever recorded for a tiny overshoot of the brakes was during a hot dry day. We have run two trains on an uncovered brake run in torrential downpours with never once tripping the "emergency brake" at the end of the brake run. Most rides are able to handle some pretty heavy rain as they are in fact operating outside after all. Sad how one event on one ride changes the tone for the entire park.

Since the guy saying this was an outside contractor and not actual park worker, he counts as GP in my book. In preparation for some two-train operation testing, the red train of Ravine Flyer II was getting sent out of the shed. Of course due to the colder temperature, the train didn't make it all the way back into the station to clear the transfer. As usual, any available guy in the park is called to help manually push the train back into the station. As we are standing around the station waiting for a few more helpers, one of the outside contractor workers looks over at the blue train on the brake run and sees the red train partially out of the station and says in the most drawn out and jaw-dropping tone, "Holy Sh!T, you guys got TWO of them!......And you run them BOTH at the same time?!" I haven't seen such an eye-opening expression on someone's face in a long time. The head mechanic lost control of himself laughing right then and there, and the other mechanic and myself barely held ourselves together until they left the platform. Who would have thought a roller coaster could operate with two trains at the same time? Was he raised in Mt. Olympus?