Cedar Point (CP) Discussion Thread

[DirkFunk]

^I think he meant SFMM Goliath. For me, MF has nice floaty air, the last hill by the station is probably it's most forceful but even then its not that strong. I always look for great air on Mavericks first drop and first hill as well as the end of Magnum. Other than those the only ejector moments I've ever felt were Skyrush, Phoenix (I don't think my butt was ever actually in the seat that ride), Storm Chaser, and Lightning Run.

 

I don't even think of Phoenix as ejector air. Airtime that's way over -0.1 is ejector in my book, so basically RMCs, some Intamin rides, and some old time outliers that have generally been changed or torn apart (Tx/Coney/Riverside/GA Cyclones, Cyclops at Mt O, Colossus at SFMM in the first year or two, Montana Rusa at La Fiera supposedly pre-mid 90s revamp).

[ejot]

Speaking of which, I remember 4 years back we had our fast lanes went through the fast lane lineup on Millennium Force, just to be turned down at the station when they said Fast Lane does is not open during the 1 hour early time. I wonder if this is still their policy.

 

Would be really great to get any advice on the park to get the most out of it, thanks!

You can't use fast lane til early entry is done. You can buy them early though. Millennium and Mav are the best early entry rides imo. But if you have fast passes don't worry too much, just relax, you'll get in plenty of rides and rerides.

[jynx242]

Yes, I forgot to mention MF's intensity...there's definitely some good ejector on MF.

I will never fully comprehend the claims of ejector on Millennium. I think it's a great ride in a fantastic location and it keeps its speed like a champ, but I've never experienced anything beyond pathetically anemic floater while riding it.

 

Also, MM has some great coasters with good variety but I do think the coaster quality level is higher at CP overall. To compare the full experience at each park, CP comes ahead by a long shot.

 

Love this

[PVA62]

^I think he meant SFMM Goliath. For me, MF has nice floaty air, the last hill by the station is probably it's most forceful but even then its not that strong. I always look for great air on Mavericks first drop and first hill as well as the end of Magnum. Other than those the only ejector moments I've ever felt were Skyrush, Phoenix (I don't think my butt was ever actually in the seat that ride), Storm Chaser, and Lightning Run.

 

I don't even think of Phoenix as ejector air. Airtime that's way over -0.1 is ejector in my book, so basically RMCs, some Intamin rides, and some old time outliers that have generally been changed or torn apart (Tx/Coney/Riverside/GA Cyclones, Cyclops at Mt O, Colossus at SFMM in the first year or two, Montana Rusa at La Fiera supposedly pre-mid 90s revamp).

 

I agree but I personally put Phoenix in there because no other coaster has basically made me stand up from my seat during the ride. Yea I'm not thrown into the lapbar but I'm also holding on so I don't feel like I'd be ejected from the coaster. Just my opinion on it, but I think we can all agree it's a bad@$$ ride! But enought about Phoenix...

 

My wildest dreams would be for a RMC Mean Streak, but i wouldn't mind seeing the whole thing torn down and putting in a family coaster, dark ride, and flat or 2. I think there would be enough space back there for that.

[coasterbill]

I agree but I personally put Phoenix in there because no other coaster has basically made me stand up from my seat during the ride.

 

Yeah Phoenix is the only standup coaster I actually enjoy. That return run of bunny hills might be my favorite thing on any coaster ever. I see DirkFunk's point though even though I don't entirely agree with it. Phoenix does provide a different type of airtime than say El Toro or Maverick does.

[PVA62]

Yeah Phoenix is the only standup coaster I actually enjoy. That return run of bunny hills might be my favorite thing on any coaster ever.

 

[Zack44]

I went to Cedar Point on Saturday and it ended being a mediocre day at the park for me personally. There were periods of rain, even heavy downpour, so I wasn't able to ride too many coasters, but I still rode plenty. I went with my mother plus 4 family members who all came to the park after I did. I first rode Rougarou and Millennium Force on my own then joined up with the group and we all rode Rougarou together. After that, they went off to ride Blue Streak while I waited to register for the Iron Dragon VR for about 30 minutes. Meanwhile, my mother entered the park later on because she was tired from driving 1 1/2 hours to the park, so I met up with her, then grouped up with everyone else.

 

We got on line for Gatekeeper and waited a good 15 minutes before the first batch of rain came in. We all decided to eat lunch at Chickie and Pete's near Raptor & Blue Streak. Once the rain let up, I convinced everyone to ride Raptor, which was about a 5 minute wait. Keep in mind that we all had the regular Fast Lane wristbands, so we didn't have to wait very long for everything we rode. After Raptor, we tried Gatekeeper again. My mother and I successfully rode it, but just as everyone else was about to get on, the worst period of the Saturdays rain began. My mother and I were really lucky because it was my favorite "new" coaster of the day (I already rode Millennium Force 5 years ago.) We took shelter in the GateKeeper gidt shop then decided to temporarily leave the park.

 

We grouped up at a local Dunkin Donuts and everyone except for my mother and I decided to call it quits and go home. My mother and I re-entered the park around 5:30 when the rain lightened up a bit. I ended up riding Mean Streak so that I could get the credit before it closes forever next month. The coaster itself was not very good, but the fact that I rode it before its closure was great. I then walked around and waited for Gemini to open, only to be hot with rain again. I ended up riding Wilderness Run just to get another credit. Meanwhile, my mother rode Wicked Twister then gave up. Unfortunately, I didn't ride the VR Iron Dragon due to the rain, but I still have the yellow information guide as a souvenir.

 

Overall, I'm fortunate that I rode 5 new coasters, but just like my last trip to CP five years ago, Mother Nature worked against me. 5 out of 10.

 

Ridelist: Rougarou 2x

Millenium Force 1x

Gatekeeper 1x

Raptor 1x

Mean Streak 1x

Wilderness Run 1x

 

VR Iron Dragon 0x

 

I'll post my pictures momentarily...

Edited August 15, 2016 by Zack44

[Zack44]

Here are my pictures (in a mostly random order)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks for reading!!

[bluestreak]

^ Um... did you by chance go Saturday, not yesterday (Sunday) because I got there yesterday at 4 and we weren't hit with any rain and everything was open. I know earlier in the day not much was open.

[Zack44]

^ Um... did you by chance go Saturday, not yesterday (Sunday) because I got there yesterday at 4 and we weren't hit with any rain and everything was open. I know earlier in the day not much was open.

 

OOPS! You're right. I DID go Saturday, but wrote Sunday by mistake. I edited my TR to fix that. Thanks!

[bluestreak]

^ Um... did you by chance go Saturday, not yesterday (Sunday) because I got there yesterday at 4 and we weren't hit with any rain and everything was open. I know earlier in the day not much was open.

 

OOPS! You're right. I DID go Saturday, but wrote Sunday by mistake. I edited my TR to fix that. Thanks!

 

Haha no problem! I thought Saturday made more sense with the weather that you described. Gotta love the weather at Cedar Point

[coasterfreak101]

Yeah Phoenix is the only standup coaster I actually enjoy.

[DirkFunk]

I agree but I personally put Phoenix in there because no other coaster has basically made me stand up from my seat during the ride.

 

Yeah Phoenix is the only standup coaster I actually enjoy. That return run of bunny hills might be my favorite thing on any coaster ever. I see DirkFunk's point though even though I don't entirely agree with it. Phoenix does provide a different type of airtime than say El Toro or Maverick does.

 

More coasters would have airtime like it if the whole of the theme park world hadn't gone to ratcheting bars from the old single positions and put trims all over the goddamn place. Thunderhawk at Dorney used to be so good even with the trim at the end on. We can dump on Skyliner but man, that first turnaround in the front 3 rows is ridiculous. And actually, once upon a time, parks used to basically encourage the coaster nerd manchildren (myself included) to not even bother putting the bars down during ERTs. I get why that's all changed and will never come back, but when you know what it used to be and lived it, you can't go pretending it never happened. I'd hand over a chunk of change to get in that time machine for a day and go get back to two click prime era CCI ERT sessions. But, alas....

[coasternut]

Today was probably the worst day I've ever had at Cedar Point. I've been there 5 days out of the past week or so. First of all their ride maintenance is really POOR. During these 5 days just about all of their coasters have been down at one time or another. These were not weather related. Sure certain rides (Dragster, Maverick, for example) have constant down time. I accept that. The Intamin's seem to be problematic. My complaint was all the other coasters were down frequently or opened late (Gemini, Valravn, Magnum, Millennium Force). What has changed there with ride maintenance??

 

Today's issue was their STUPID RAIN POLICY! All coasters need to have one of their trains removed. Today's rain was very light and lasted less then 90 minutes. All rides shut down to off load 1 train, then the ride gets tested and then reopened at a lower capacity. Because there were clouds in the sky, none of the coasters returned to full operation. This is a Cedar Point "thing." King's Island doesn't work this way with rain.

 

They really need to step up their ride maintenance and make them more reliable. A major change to their rain policy need to be implemented. These days they seem to have no focus on guest satisfaction. This park can be so much more!

[SFMMGeek27]

^wow. I don't think it's the maintenance department. They've had most of these rides for many years and most likely have maintenance down to a science. Something can always throw a sensor. These rides are very fragile and delicate. It's amazing that they can diagnose the issue and usually have the rides back up and running in a couple hours at most. That's actually really impressive! They aren't slacking.

 

 

Having a ride running at a lower capacity is better than not having it run at all, and if it's for safety, than that's the most important! I'm from SFMM where they only run 2 trains max on all coasters except TC, so I can say rides can still be efficient with only 2 trains. And when the weather is "iffy" I guess it's better to err on the side of caution than to have to close every half hour just to put a train off then take it off, etc.

[DoinItForTheFame]

Today was probably the worst day I've ever had at Cedar Point. I've been there 5 days out of the past week or so. First of all their ride maintenance is really POOR. During these 5 days just about all of their coasters have been down at one time or another. These were not weather related. Sure certain rides (Dragster, Maverick, for example) have constant down time. I accept that. The Intamin's seem to be problematic. My complaint was all the other coasters were down frequently or opened late (Gemini, Valravn, Magnum, Millennium Force). What has changed there with ride maintenance??

 

Last year when we were at the park during our lunch break every single ride broke down. Even rides I usually don't hear of breaking down still broke down. Every coaster was closed for about an hour, and then they were all back up and running. The only coaster that didn't break down during that hour was Mean Streak.

 

Today's issue was their STUPID RAIN POLICY!

 

Cedar Point has the WORST rain policy of any park I have been to, and I don't get why. BGW was running every single coaster with multiple trains during a down poor, yet when Cedar Point sense a little bit of mist everything shuts down. During our tour this year everything in the park closed for about an hour for rain. . . Which was frustrating. I really wish they would re-evaluate this unnecessary rain policy.

[coasterbill]

During these 5 days just about all of their coasters have been down at one time or another.

 

If I visited a park for 5 days out of a week I would expect to witness downtime on most of their coasters at some point or another, especially when more than half of their adult coasters are modern B&M and Intamin rides that all run anywhere from 3 and 6 trains simultaneously with the exception of Wicked Twister which has its own problems in the reliability department for obvious reasons.

 

Regarding the rain policy, yeah that's horrid. We've known that for years and I won't argue with you on that one. But it seems like a strange time to complain about their maintenance because of something that seems pretty typical of basically any park when a week ago everyone was singing their praises for replacing a cable snap and working through the night on back to back nights to get Dragster operational less than 48 hours after a major mechanical failure.

[ghostreconspart]

Hey guys, this is the first time I've posted here that I can remember. I plan on going to Cedar Point for the first time with my parents and brother. My mom doesn't ride anything and my dad has bad knees, so he has trouble getting down and out of some of the coaster cars. My brother has never ridden a coaster before, so I'm going to try to get him on something to see if he likes it. Anyway, I was hoping that you guys could help me out here with what I should ride and when, is the flashpass worth it for a Wednesday in mid August, and how should I expect crowds to be? Thanks!

[MidwestThemeParks]

The Intamin's seem to be problematic. My complaint was all the other coasters were down frequently or opened late (Gemini, Valravn, Magnum, Millennium Force).

 

Millenium Force is an Intamin coaster. Honestly, it doesn't make me mad when parks don't have their rides open RIGHT at opening. Especially the less popular rides (Rides at back of a park, old woodies) that won't even have many people wanting to ride them.

 

These days they seem to have no focus on guest satisfaction. This park can be so much more!

 

But they do seem to have a focus on guest safety, which should be more important. I don't think it's a bad idea to run less trains in rain. I've read about coaster trains running into each other because the brakes don't work properly in the rain. If they only run two trains instead of three, they will rarely stack, therefore there would be little chance of this happening.

[christianscoasters]

When it comes to maintenance, I think coasterbill brought up a good point. CP has excellent operations (although they've gone way downhill over the years, no pun intended), and when you're consistently running 3-6 trains on a ride all day, every day, it takes a toll on these machines. All 4 B&M's run 3 trains consistently, which is more than any other park. Usually, a train is dispatched every 60 seconds (or less!). That's a TON of use over the course of a 12+ hour day. The more you use something, the quicker that any part will need changed or fixed. At a small park that has maybe 1 B&M that runs 2 trains and has so-so operations, that ride isn't gonna break down as often because it's just not used that much.

[DILinator]

I go to Cedar Point multiple times a year every year since 2007. I've worked at the park prior to that and been riding MF with regularity since 2001. There has never been nor will be ejector airtime on Millennium Force.

 

Well, I've been going to Cedar Point multiple times a year, every year since the 90's, and have been riding MF with regularity since its opening month of operation. I may not have worked at the park, but that has nothing to do with knowing what I have experienced on a coaster. Sure, there is no airtime on MF like Maverick, or Magnum. However, the airtime on the hump by the queue and station is definitely much more than simple floater airtime, like you experience on the previous MF hills. It's stronger than you experience on most B&M coasters. In the back, where I typically ride the coaster, I'm ejected out of my seat with force, every time I ride it. It is not the same airtime as the firm airtime that you glide (or float, if you will) into over the previous hills on the coaster. Clearly, where the disagreement stems from, is differing ideas of what constitutes ejector airtime. If you want to say that you've never considered any of the airtime on MF to be ejector, based on your definition of what is needed to constitute that to you, that's fine. But you can't state so definitively something that is clearly not an absolute, that applies to every rider.

[DirkFunk]

I go to Cedar Point multiple times a year every year since 2007. I've worked at the park prior to that and been riding MF with regularity since 2001. There has never been nor will be ejector airtime on Millennium Force.

 

Well, I've been going to Cedar Point multiple times a year, every year since the 90's, and have been riding MF with regularity since its opening month of operation. I may not have worked at the park, but that has nothing to do with knowing what I have experienced on a coaster. Sure, there is no airtime on MF like Maverick, or Magnum. However, the airtime on the hump by the queue and station is definitely much more than simple floater airtime, like you experience on the previous MF hills. It's stronger than you experience on most B&M coasters. In the back, where I typically ride the coaster, I'm ejected out of my seat with force, every time I ride it. It is not the same airtime as the firm airtime that you glide (or float, if you will) into over the previous hills on the coaster. Clearly, where the disagreement stems from, is differing ideas of what constitutes ejector airtime. If you want to say that you've never considered any of the airtime on MF to be ejector, based on your definition of what is needed to constitute that to you, that's fine. But you can't state so definitively something that is clearly not an absolute, that applies to every rider.

 

If we reframe "ejector air" to "airtime you really feel!" then 99% of coasters have ejector. MF could likely be ridden in any seat with no lapbars or seat belts and all the riders come back to the station assuming they're willing to not misbehave and hold the grab bar in front.

[DILinator]

I go to Cedar Point multiple times a year every year since 2007. I've worked at the park prior to that and been riding MF with regularity since 2001. There has never been nor will be ejector airtime on Millennium Force.

 

Well, I've been going to Cedar Point multiple times a year, every year since the 90's, and have been riding MF with regularity since its opening month of operation. I may not have worked at the park, but that has nothing to do with knowing what I have experienced on a coaster. Sure, there is no airtime on MF like Maverick, or Magnum. However, the airtime on the hump by the queue and station is definitely much more than simple floater airtime, like you experience on the previous MF hills. It's stronger than you experience on most B&M coasters. In the back, where I typically ride the coaster, I'm ejected out of my seat with force, every time I ride it. It is not the same airtime as the firm airtime that you glide (or float, if you will) into over the previous hills on the coaster. Clearly, where the disagreement stems from, is differing ideas of what constitutes ejector airtime. If you want to say that you've never considered any of the airtime on MF to be ejector, based on your definition of what is needed to constitute that to you, that's fine. But you can't state so definitively something that is clearly not an absolute, that applies to every rider.

 

If we reframe "ejector air" to "airtime you really feel!" then 99% of coasters have ejector. MF could likely be ridden in any seat with no lapbars or seat belts and all the riders come back to the station assuming they're willing to not misbehave and hold the grab bar in front.

 

I'm not "re-framing" anything... The definition of eject is force or throw (something) out, typically in a violent or sudden way. This is the type of air I routinely experience on MF, in that particular spot. I'm sorry that your experience on it is apparently not the same, but I can only speak from mine... *shrugs*

[coasternut]

^wow. I don't think it's the maintenance department. They've had most of these rides for many years and most likely have maintenance down to a science. Something can always throw a sensor. These rides are very fragile and delicate. It's amazing that they can diagnose the issue and usually have the rides back up and running in a couple hours at most. That's actually really impressive! They aren't slacking.

 

 

Having a ride running at a lower capacity is better than not having it run at all, and if it's for safety, than that's the most important! I'm from SFMM where they only run 2 trains max on all coasters except TC, so I can say rides can still be efficient with only 2 trains. And when the weather is "iffy" I guess it's better to err on the side of caution than to have to close every half hour just to put a train off then take it off, etc.

 

To clarify my point on the ride maintenance, their ride uptime WAS excellent. As I said all of their reliable rides are down frequently during the day.

 

Kings Island (I was there last week for 4 days) runs trains in the rain. This is a CP policy not Cedar Fair. I'm looking forward to another bad day at the park today. The forcast is for rain all day. I know all you "CP fanboys" love this park, but I knew it when it was great. They had great ride up time, rideops that liked their jobs, etc. I've seen it go straight downhill over the years. Something bad changed about 10 years ago making it mediocre at best. They could care less about their customers. They don't get it - It's sad.

[mpmbee]

I thought it was bizzare when I was there last week that they took a train off each of the coasters after it had stormed. Maverick they ended up taking two trains off while testing but then put them back on again as the queue was pretty long.