sokalkostr

Look, bash me all you want. It simply comes down to this... Disneyland introduces monthly payments and the number of passholders start to skyrocket. Years down the road, Disney realizes and admits they have crowd control problems. While they don't actually admit it's due to the number of passholders, of which I read somewhere now tops 1 million, they make major modifications to the annual passes, and change parking rates and policies due to locals abusing the 3 hour parking at DtD. So it sure looks like that's the root of the problem doesn't it? Rather than remove the option of monthly payments to get the number of pass holders in check, they just keep raising prices, WHICH DOESN'T FIX THE PROBLEM. People will continue to pay whatever Disney wants them to pay monthly, and that's fine, but this won't solve the problem. Forcing people to pay something like $300+ at one time for a pass, then they would see a considerable drop off in the number of passholders. I'm all for surge pricing too. Make the tickets cheaper on days when the park is least crowded, but that doesn't solve the problem with annual passes They have already gotten rid of the So Cal tier so they will probably get rid of the deluxe passes before they get rid of monthly payments and that is why people are upset. Hell people would be upset too if they got rid of monthly payments but at least that move makes sense since that started the whole problem to begin with.

Clearly none of you get my point. I don't expect anything from Disneyland. I'm not one of those idiots all over social media calling for a boycott of Disneyland or one of those "Walt would be rolling in his grave" people. I'm glad you all just feel comfortable handing over your hard earned money to Disney, without a second thought. Shame on me for actually looking into it a little futher, and comparing what has happened in the past. Clearly I have no idea what I'm talking about though, so there is no sense in fighting with any of you anymore. Though to be perfectly honest, I actually know a couple of you personally, but all you see is some whiny CA Pass-hole... so be it

You miss the point. Yes I'm well aware there are lower tier passes available that I could downgrade to. The problem is the crowds are so unbearable on the days the lower tier passes are able to be used, that I wouldn't want to go to the park those days. Those of you on here that aren't frequent visitors don't understand that. Again, those days are the real problem for the park, not the Saturdays that Premium passes are good for. I do get that Christmas season is insane so the decision to create the Signature Plus pass and have it come at a $200 surcharge for those 2 weeks makes somewhat of sense, but to eliminate the Premium, replace it with a fancier sounding Signature pass of which the only new benefit being free photopass (which doesn't really cost the park anything to begin with, and quite frankly unless you had a family with kids, and let's be honest, how many of Premium pass holders do you think have premiums for their kids as well, doesn't really add much value) and add blackout dates for more money....yeah makes total sense.

Two things - 1 - Good, you're one less person in my way when I visit from Vegas. 2 - Knott's is only $80-ish for the year. It's plenty of fun. Now shush. I've got to drive ~4 hours to get to a decent park. You don't. Are you a pass holder? If not then you should "shush" as this doesn't really concern you does it? The minute you are shelling out over $700/year to go to Disneyland you can kindly contribute to the conversation

Because the majority of those "loyal" pass holders take up space at the park and don't spend money. Disney would be very much OK with less people in the park spending more money vs. a full park of people just hanging out and maybe buying a meal. Disneyland is a tourist destination, not a local hang out. The reality is the pricing increase gets the pass to a point where it accurately reflects its value: if you visit regularly, you are still getting a great value given the ticket and parking prices. If you don't? You don't NEED no blackouts anyways. I'll tell you why it is business: whether someone pays for a pass all at once or does the monthly payment option, from an accounting point of view it's all noted the same. Even though Disney may collect all the money at once, the revenue that they can count as revenue on their balance sheet is spread evenly throughout the year.... I completely agree most pass holders do nothing but take up space at the park, I don't argue that at all, but yes Disneyland is a locals park. What other theme parks do you know of that are LEAST crowded on Saturdays. I don't have any reports to back that up, but I know for the last couple summers when I've been on Saturdays during the busiest summer months (June,July) Saturday is by far the least busiest day of the week. Why? Because the only people that can go are regular ticket holders or Premium pass holders. Pick any other day, especially Fridays/Sundays when Deluxe and So Cals are valid and the park is a nightmare. So yeah it is a locals hangout. If from an accounting standpoint it makes no difference whether payments are spread out or paid in full since the price is the same, then why not just get rid of monthly payments? They have them so people will continue buying passes in droves, which doesn't solve the problem. They do it so people that otherwise would be priced out of owning an annual pass can afford it, which still brings in more $$ rather then realizing they have a problem and just cutting out the monthly option. So now it's lets just charge more money so we can keep bringing in the same amount of money with an acceptable loss with current pass holders who decide not to renew. From a business standpoint, it's a genius plan. But it's still not right To yours and many others points, yes, I agree the cost of even the highest pass does make it "worth" it if you go at least once a month, but that's fine, if you all just want to look at it that way. In the past I've never gotten worked up over the price increases but this time, they have gone too far. Again the last $150 increase in Premiums came in 2012 when Cars Land opened. I get that, but to raise prices this much in a time when we aren't gaining any attractions but actually losing them, doesn't seem justified.

I've been a pass holder for over 10 years and next year I'm not renewing and here's why... I get that annual increases happen, however this is the 2nd time in a calendar year they are doing it, and it's not just the usual incremental increases. They are specifically trying to address the problem of overcrowding that they as a company have let go on and on. Now that major construction is happening in the park for Star Wars land, they basically are trying to thin the herd by these new changes. They have even come right out and said that. Revenue from annual passes far exceeds what the park brings in from visitors and out of town guests. Disneyland is a locals park. That's where the difference between Anaheim and Kissimmee come in. I'd bet most of the guests at WDW are not pass holders, but look back at Disneyland's first 24 hour day. Almost 80% of visitors that day were annual pass holders, and Disneyland set record attendance that day. This was the first real sign there were problems. The decision made was to eliminate the so cal passes, and basically force people to buy the Deluxe or higher. So Cal Select is pretty much useless anyway! I honestly don't understand the decision to eliminate Premiums, if anything I for sure thought the next step would either be to eliminate So Cal for good (can still currently renew) or eliminate monthly payments. And here is where they have clearly showed their intentions... I may be wrong but I believe the cost of Premium before the latest increase was $779, and was $699 when the last annual increase went through. So in other words they basically raised the price of Premium $150 over the course of a year and now added 2 weeks of blocked out days during the Christmas holiday. If you want to have that same priviledge it equates to a $270 increase in price over a year!! I understand that Disneyland and Disney is a business, but they are going about this problem completely the wrong way. Why would any loyal Disney pass holders want to pay this much more, in a time when the park is closing down attractions, not opening new ones? As I mentioned before, eliminating the monthly payment option would all but solve the crowd problem, but then Disneyland doesn't have that steady stream of incoming money from pass holders whether they are using their pass or not, and now they are looking at it as "well they are only having to pay another 20-30/month. I'm sure most people will still do that" You tell me how that's not greed, and it's just business...

Wow I'm really glad I went the same night, cause if I hadn't been and I saw all those spoilers, I would have been upset. Should probably preface the report with there are spoilers. After going to HHN last night, I can honestly say, Knott's doesn't even stack up. The level of scaring and production is far and away better at Universal, but to Knott's credit, they are trying. Voodoo and Paranormal were the best themed by far. I love that Knott's actually borrowed some of Universal's scare tactics in those mazes as well. My problem with Knott's is that monsters just standing around in mazes is not scary! At Universal there are never monsters just standing around. They are always jumping out at you from somewhere, and the actors that are just kind of standing around in the mazes are supposed to be part of the scene and are "acting" My Bloody Clementine was such a let down. That "maze" had the potential to be amazing, but little to no talent, and not a lot of theming kinda killed it. Even my gf who's terrified of this stuff said it wasn't scary. Paranormal was an even bigger let down though. After the first room, I never once thought I was in a mental hospital. Apparently we were in the "basement" the whole time. Lots of actors though, and got a few scares in there, but definitely not what I expected. The effects were pretty cool though Didn't get a chance to do Special Ops. We got into the park just a couple min after opening, and headed straight over to Special Ops. I could only describe it as mass chaos. Just a sea of people with no organization whatsoever. Just people pushing through a crowd to try to get a time card to come back. When we finally got up there, they were already at 12:45. The line was already well over an hour for it as well. When we did come back for our time, the line was still an hour plus, and this is with reservations. We were tired and opted not to wait. They need to seriously re-work this!! The Hanging was brutal to watch. Aside from a couple decent one-liners and moments that made the crowd cringe, the rest of the show wasn't very funny and seemed much more disjointed then shows in the past. The whole audience interaction part didn't work either. And the dancing...comical. Stop trying to make the Hanging the next Bill & Ted Knott's!! Haunt has always been a tradition for me, but it just seems to be a let down every year. I keep holding out hope though that they will return it to it's glory years but this year definitely was not one of those.

Hell has frozen over!! Never thought I'd see the day they would actually do this! I watched the full announcement video before knowing what all the parks were getting and as I just kept seeing Larson Loop after Larson Loop, I started to get worried. The moment I saw Revolution, I couldn't contain my excitement...the whole office heard me. I'm actually more excited about this then when TC was announced! New trains are awesome, but please for the love of god remove all the trims, then we would really get to experience the ride the way it was in it's glory days. I also immediately picked up my season pass for next year, and wasn't planning on doing Fright Fest this year, but now I have to since the passes need to be redeemed by the 1st of November, so smart move SFMM!!

I've been to Haunt every year that I can remember, and I do think the skeleton key thing is a cool idea. I'd be interested in trying it out this year, but seeing as it's already pulling teeth to get my gf to go to Haunt, we'll probably have to skip it. The interesting thing though with it last year is that I usually go on slower nights, and most mazes had little to no waits, and the people with skeleton keys/Fright Lane, ended up waiting a lot longer than the regular guests...kinda defeating the purpose of Fright Lane at least. I had high hopes for Haunt last year, especially after seeing the Haunt presentation, and year after year, it hasn't lived up to my expectations; though I did enjoy a few things from last year. The problem is there are more and more LA Halloween events year after year that are raising the bar (ALONE, Delusion, the Evil Twin Studio group, Blackout, etc) not to mention Universal keeps bringing it year after year so it's hard not to compare what Knott's brings to the table. I still go every year, but as more of a tradition now more than anything else. I can't remember the last time I really got a good "scare" inside any of their mazes. I'm glad to see Special Ops is coming back and is being improved upon. That was one of my favorite parts of Haunt last year. I have mixed feelings about them not attempting Trapped again. The concept was always great but executing that successfully in a theme park just never worked right over the last few years, and I think they finally realized that and knew that space would be better suited for an actual maze. Like most on here, I'm most looking forward to them bringing the actual talent back inside the mine ride, and the new effects sound promising. Glad to see them re-imagining Voodoo a bit as well. That maze was on Universal theming quality last year but severely lacked scares and was really short.

Here's how things turned out for us on our trip... It ended up working out at all 3 parks! www.themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=70788

First off, no photos so I apologize I have been wanting to take a trip to Texas for the last 10 years and ultimately it worked out this was the only time I could go this year. This trip was also special in the fact that originally I had planned to possibly hit my 300th coaster on this trip, but ultimately in the end I came up 3 short. Was originally going to do 4 days and hit Sea World on the 4th day which would have given me the 300th but due to the long drive from San Antonio to Dallas, we decided to scrap Sea World on the last day. The minute my girlfriend and I walked out the doors of DFW on Wednesday night we knew we were screwed! Being from so cal, there was nothing that could prepare me for the sheer heat and humidity of Texas in August. I thought there was no way I'd survive 3 back to back days of theme and water parks, but we did and ultimately had an EPIC trip!! Day 1 – Six Flags Over Texas Our hotel was literally right next door to the park so we got there just after opening. Here's a breakdown of the day La Vibora - It hadn't opened yet, but was testing so we waited about 5 min and sure enough, it opened up, and we waited maybe another 5 min. The only other bobsled coaster I'd been on was Disaster Transport at CP, so it was fun to ride one out in the open. It was a lot more fun than I had expected. NTG - To my shock there was no line, maybe just a 2 train wait in the station. We waited for the front, and wow what a ride! I had been on one other RMC prior, and Twisted Colossus, at least in my opinion just edges out NTG as the better ride, due to the fact that TC has the inversions and the added fun of racing (if you’re lucky enough to have it happen). We went back around and rode the very back, and holy hell that airtime coming off the lift!! Definitely a better ride in the back. Titan - Again no wait! Wasn’t really sure what was going on. Thought maybe the heat had scared everyone away but as it turned out the park was only open till 6 that night so it actually worked in our favor since the park was basically DEAD most of the day!!  Titan was awesome! Definitely better than our sister coaster Goliath @ SFMM. The double helix before the mid course almost made me black out as did the other helix. It was intense! Yosemite Sam dark ride and Roaring Rapids. Superman - After about 15 min we were on. This was only my second combo shot tower, and I much prefer those over the simple drop tower like Supreme Scream at Knott’s. Shock Wave - Like most of the other coasters, no wait. It’s amazing how fun a Schwarzkopf can be when it doesn’t have horrible lap and shoulder restraints ::cough:: Revolution ::cough:: Runaway Mountain 2 mine trains - regular one and the kid one for the credit Justice League 4D - This totally surprised me. It’s basically Transformers but on a smaller scale and interactive. We both loved it, and I was really surprised to see that level of a dark ride in a Six flags park. Pandemonium (15 min wait) Mr Freeze - Holy hell! was that intense. Awesome ride though. I’ve done the Premier spaghetti bowls but they are child’s play compared to that ride. Also basically another walk on. Batman - Typical clone Judge Roy - This really surprised me how fun, and that you actually got some decent speed and air on a coaster that old. We left the park around 5 and managed to ride every coaster in the park with the exception of the kiddie coaster, all without using Flash Pass!! We survived day 1, got in our car and drove a little over 3 hours south to New Braunfels. Coaster/ride tally for the day: 11/17 Day 2 – Schlitterbahn We were there bright and early at 8:30 and parked right in front of the ticket booths at Blastenhoff. We bought the $20 early access pass to get into Blastenhoff with the rest of the resort guests at 9am (an hour before the park opened) At 9 am we threw our bags on a lounge chair and booked over to the tower. Here's a breakdown of the day Master Blaster - We ended up only waiting about 15 min! What an awesome ride that is!! I think we even got a little air going over one of the hills. Wolfpack - About 25 min wait. It was nice to not have any brake pads to slow you down on it Black Knight - 15 minute wait. As we were exiting the splash pool we saw the mad dash of people running in since the park had officially opened, but we had basically finished off Blastenhoff by the time the park opened!! : ) We put our stuff away, then headed over to The Falls to make our way over to Surfenburg. The Falls - I’d almost say The Falls was my favorite ride in the whole place. It was so much fun. We got off at the Surfenburg exit, then headed over to Dragon’s Revenge. Dragon's Revenge - Waited about 35 min. I kinda expected more from it, but that final scene and drop caught me totally off guard. We got back in The Falls and I totally wasn’t expecting the bottom section, completely different from the top. We rode the aquaveyer back up then got out by Blastenhoff. Grabbed our stuff and jumped on the tram to head over to the West park. By now it was only 11:30. The West park was PACKED!! We put our stuff away than grabbed our tubes and headed over to Raging River. Raging River - Waited almost an hour, but seeing as it’s a 45 min ride, figured it was worth it. It was long, but there were so many parts we would get stuck in, and not a lot of exciting drops or chutes to go through. I loved how it weaved it’s way in and around all the other attractions and under the buildings etc. Hillside - Waited about 45 min, but unlike Raging River, we both really liked Hillside. The drop at the end completely caught me off guard, and again I loved how it went inside the building. Whitewater - (waited about 30 min), and wow that first drop was intense, totally reminded me of the Congo River Rapids at Wild Rivers (RIP) the rest of it though wasn’t super thrilling. Cliffhanger - (waited about 20 min) What I thought was the most intense, turned out to be the biggest let down, aside from the drop at the end. It was about 4 and we had finished all the tube chutes. I was super happy, and realized we were probably gonna be able to do everything in the park. Next up we headed to the Bonzai Pipelines. Another 20 min later and we were flying down those. Super fun, nearly fell off my tube around one corner. Downhill Racer - 10 min. Holy crap, the air you get off these things is insane!!! So much fun! We both really wanted to do Hillside again so we waited about 25 min and did it again. Neither of us had really any desire to trek back over to do the Der Bahn speed slides, so we finished off the West park by doing the Soda Straws. We jumped back on the tram and headed back over to Blastenhoff. Jumped back in the Falls for a couple more laps, then headed back into Blastenhoff around 6:30 to see if we could maybe grab one more ride in on Master Blaster. The line was still really long and we were both pretty exhausted but there was one thing we had yet to do. Torrent River. Who knew a lazy river combined with waves would be so much fun. We took a few laps around and then grabbed our stuff and called it a day. Drove about 30 min south to San Antonio and checked into our next hotel. Ride tally for the day: 13/16 including re-rides on The Falls and Hillside. Day 3 – Six Flags Fiesta Texas We knew we wouldn’t get a repeat of SFoT, especially with it being Saturday, so we got to the park a little after opening, and immediately went to get a Flash Pass. We opted for regular which ultimately proved to be a perfect choice. We started off with reserving Superman which only had about a 30 min wait at the time. Meanwhile we headed over to Iron Rattler. Iron Rattler - With only about a 15 min wait, we opted to wait for the back. Iron Rattler is by far my favorite RMC out of the three I’ve ridden. The combination of extreme air time, the inversion, the double S turn and the use of the quarry wall with the drops and tunnel, makes it my favorite of the group. It probably sits at #3 of my favorite coasters of all behind Bizarro, and El Toro. Roadrunner Express (15 min wait) - surprisingly fun, and one of my favorite mine train rides (I don’t put those in the same category as Thunder Mountain @ Disney though) Superman - Reserved on FP - Again, love the use of the rock wall for the drops. Poltergeist - Reserved on FP - Typical premier spaghetti bowl. We grabbed lunch then got in line for Batman. Batman - 1 hr - Despite a rather full looking queue the line moved fast and we waited just under an hour. Batman was just stupid good fun! I was laughing hysterically during it, and it was so much smoother and overall better than the Intamin version (Green Lantern @ SFMM) After that we headed over to the boardwalk area and jumped in line for Pandemonium. Unfortunately it broke down but we also had a reservation for Scooby Doo Ghostblasters so went over and did that. After doing Justice League over at SFoT, Scooby was pretty lame, though we had a blast (no pun intended) battling each other to see who got the higher score and annoying the hell out of each other with the blaster gun noises. Pandemonium - waited about 5 min. And I really like the loading system they use vs the one at SFoT. Goliath. Pretty much walked on to Goliath and there’s not much to say, it’s your typical B:TR clone but mirrored. Then came the low point of the day. I rode the kiddee coaster for the credit. Part of me died inside but it got me one step closer to 300 so I had to. My girlfriend of course videoed it and put out to the world and she said it was easily the highlight of her day. Boomerang - Reserved on FP - I was reminded how much I hate those things, but I needed the credit so I went into it knowing I wouldn’t enjoy it. We reserved one more ride on Iron Rattler which at that point had an hour and half wait, so we headed over and closed out the day with a 2nd row ride on it. By the 3rd day, especially after the full day at Schlitterbahn, we were DONE physically. We barely made it through the day. Total coaster/ride tally for the day: 9/10 You might be wondering how two so cal people managed to do 3 full days back to back at these parks in 100+ degree weather and sweltering humidity every day without dying. Well the key was hydration. The best $30 I ever spent was getting one of those hydration backpacks. Luckily none of the parks I’ve been to have a problem with them, and they even let us bring in sealed water bottles in addition to the water pack. A few times throughout the day we would stop at food places and grab cups of ice to pour in there, but we pretty much had ice cold water all day long and best of all, it was free! I highly recommend them if you are heading out to a theme park when it’s super hot out. Day 4 – Non theme park stuff Checked out of our hotel and headed into downtown San Antonio to check out the Alamo and Riverwalk. We got to the Alamo and walked around outside, but the line to go in was way too long so opted to head down to Riverwalk. We grabbed a couple tickets for the river barges and after waiting about 20 min, we were off on our little guided river cruise. We finished that up, headed to the car and started the long drive back to DFW. Thanks to Waze, it steered us around all the traffic on I-35 by taking the toll road. We stopped mid way to grab a Whataburger, and sorry Texans, those don’t come close to In-N-Out or Five Guys, as much as you might want to believe they are better. We headed to DFW and headed back to So Cal.

It's pretty funny, I'm actually in the same boat. I'm planning a trip right around the same time. My itinerary is as follows... 8/5 - Fly into Dallas 8/6 - SFOT, Drive to New Braunfels 8/7 - Schlitterbahn 8/8 - SFFT 8/9 - Sea World or SFFT again, Drive back to Dallas and fly home My girlfriend and I have SF season passes, I have gold, she has regular. Planning on doing GOLD level flash passes at SFOT and SFFT. I've never been to any of these parks and I'm on somewhat of a mission. My current coaster count is 278. If all goes to plan, I'm hoping to hit 300 on this trip, that 300th being Iron Rattler. For Six Flags, based on the days I'll be there. Thursday for SFOT and Saturday for SFFT, will GOLD level flash passes be enough? For SFFT, does the water park offer flash passes as well? Any additional plan of attack I should have for either of those parks? For Schlitterbahn, we are doing the $20 early entry add on to get into Blastenoff an hour before the park opens, what's the best way to tackle that park? We don't really have the ability to add days or sightsee, so it's just non-stop and hoping to do whatever we can to explore as much of these parks as we can. Thanks for your help!