TPDave

Nothing has scheduled maintenance during the open season at Thorpe or Alton. That said, Thorpe's rides have horrific reliability, so some may be down, it has been known (but not frequent) for two or three coasters to be down for the best part of a day. The first part of september will be fine, not as good as the second part (because private schools go back slightly later) but the queues will be short, you should have a fantastic time

Not quite the same, but Dragons fury at Chessington world of adventures (spinning coaster) realy hurts in the brake run. When the cars slowed down, the car is spun round to the correct position to enter the station then locked, this smashes your knees against the edge of the car and really hurts if you're not ready. To answer the point in the first post, i don't like it at all!

No I disagree. Regardless of the fact that the human was an idiot an animal that kills no longer should exist. There just is no reason for their existence anymore. I'm sorry thats rediculous. A hunter who kills a deer is far more likely to kill another one (it's actively aiming to do that) than an animal who acts out of natural instinct to protect itself and its land. Should we then kill the hunter because he ais a danger to other deer, no of course not, because he's human and we humans can do whatever we want because we have guns :S You can't just go round killing thigs because they have killed things, an eye for an eye and the world will soon be blind after all. But i agree that the kid was an idiot.

Only one crocodile was killed. I don't know if it was the one that dragged him in (the article i read didn't say) but they found his remains inside. It's a horrible way for the child to die, and you could say it's not his fault due to ignorance, but really, who jumps a fence into an enclosue, it's there for a reason. I don't feel too sorry for the kid because he was pretty stupid, but it must be really bad for the parents to live through, and to have to deal with all the "bad parenting" comments they will doubtless get...

I'm rubbish with all this stuff. I'm pretty sure i have it somewhere, i downloaded it last time (thanks by the way, it was great). What site can i use for free etc? I'd be happy to upload it if someone told me how Cheers Dave

Blackstone owns all four parks. Simple. Icedragon, of course the huge investment in the park has made sure no competition gets their foot in the door, but in simple geographical (how can such a long world be simple!) terms, there is no park near enough to pose a threat, no matter how much money you throw into them!

Exmouse - I think the notion of competition (especially for thorpe park, being far away from any rivals) is for the most part lost. Obvioulsy Chessingotn has legoland, bt they dont really seem to care. Their lacklustre additions since Land of the dragons kind of shows this, with legoland boasting something like 5 mew attractions in 05/06 (i forget which). Alton towers has flamingoland, and had american adventure, but seems unfased by both, BPB could be seen as a threat, but Alton towers holds it's title as the UK's No. 1 theme park and the apauling state it's been in the last few years prooves that no matter how messy it is, with a claim like that people will flock to it. Thorpe park doesn't know what competiton is. It has pretty decent rides and no competitors at all (Adventure Island is probably the nearest!). It's near london and gets over a million people a year, so they're not doing too badly. So yeah, i don't think tussauds park will be affected by essentially the addition of legoland to the group, ivenstment for rides has always been present, and hopefully blackstone/merlin will fund some more theming to make the days out more entertaining.

Remember, legoland don't have a stake or say in any of the other parks, they are run seperately and ultimately take orders from blackstone. It will be interesting to see what they do, because they now have two parks very near to each-other bothnatural competitors after the same market. In my mind there is no doubt that Legoland is the better park, but the zoo at chessington could proove to be very useful. I'm doubtful, but i'd love to be able to use my anual pass at legoland, at least then i'd visit! ^EDIT: He's wrong. Very wrong.

I'm pretty happy about the merger, tussauds were bought by an investment company 2 years ago and have now been sold to an entertainment company which will provide knowledge and experience to improve the parks. As for thorpe park in 2009, It's not a 4D, tilt coaster or anything like that, and MAY be over 100 ft. But yeah, this could be great for tussauds, i hope they take inspiration from the theming at the other parks owned by Merlin Dave

The handler may well have been there but if the kid was trying to undo the zip, they wouldn't have had time to react and the actor would have moved away in time so the handler didn't need to do anything more. From the video no-one seems upset or anything so there was probably no reason for the handler to do anything.

At about 10 times the cost, it better be! Remember Adventure Island is a tiny park that has taken a huge gamble. I really hope it pays off for them.

Things are going to happen when the train stops. Dunno what but hopefully it'll be good.

X:\ (I love the "meh" face in the ride name :\) Will be getting a re-theme this year. The £60k figure is correct. It's based around the X research studios and you're taking a tour of them, stuff goes wrong and you end up going backwards in the dark. They're just trying to give it some purpose to avoid it being X:\WTF!? Dave "It's finally getting a re-theme" Wilson

Join www.southparks.org - we *might* be getting ERT a couple of weeks after it opens, mind you, the queues at AI never exceed 10 mins unless its a hot summers day, but this is England! It's strange to think that this will be the biggest new ride in the UK this season, it should do wonders for the park...

^A bit pedantic surely? I'm a little dissapointed by AT this year, from what was a lot of hype and secret projects, this season has given us a scary path and a crap playground. At least the rumors about the mine train weren't true!

I've reported a few, but i'm not even sure i need to that because they all seem to disappear with in a couple of hours max. Nice one admin guys for deleting all the crappy threads...

I have no idea how much it cost (I would assume a couple of million GBP) That aside, Rage has started test runs, theres a video up on youtube already. I'm amazed how quickly this has all happened. I really hope Adventure island do well out of this, it's a huge investment for a park their size, who are used to making their own rides. Hats off to them for this happening so fast too!

Totally insignificant and everyhting, but X:\ No Way Out an Thorpe Park is getting re-themed. This should stop it being so much of a WTF?! ride as they're putting a (really cheesy) storyline in containing none other than Professor X Oh no.

Looking good The track looks a bit "not too smooth" in one of those pics though, could be interesting...

Cheers TheMenefee for uploading that. Good show, I love the incredible drama and real life disasters which threaten to bankrupt six flags! (They seem to be well on their way without Tatsu cocking up!). We need a decent flyer in the UK! Air is useless...

I haven't been following this topic closely (i don't have a wii :O) so forgive me if this has been brough up, but regarding the "faulty straps" do Nintendo really need to spell it out to people that waving a remote control around could be dangerous and that even though it has a strap you should be careful not to damage yourself/others/other things with it?

The london eye does go incredibly slowly though. Maths lessons would tells me that this one will move at about 1.2m/h. Thats quite fast for a ferris wheel, shoudl be fun boarding

Apoarently it will be up and testing by late january. Is it me or does that seem a little long considering the couple of days that portable coasters take to build up. I know it's permenant and not designed for quick assembly but it's got a tiny footprint, everything bolts onto a sub-frame and its only a little bit bigger. Loving the colour scheme though

I'm sorry is there a hierarchy of members opinions on here? Surely that in itself would lead to people feeling unvalued (or undervalued) and liable to post crap because if they give their opinion, it won't be considered.