Horrible Park Operations

[ilrider]

^Goliath has slow ops, a lot of it because they don't let riders pull down their own lap bars after buckling the belt, so it takes over twice as long as other coasters at the park. Sounds like it was extra slow for you though. That is horrible to stack that long.

[Physical]

Worst overall operations is probably going to SFGAdv. Terrible stacking, extremely rude operators, ("You have to take your hat with you on Kingda Ka." then replying with "Oh cry about it" when I asked them to just throw the hat out because I'm not taking something that will do damage if it hits somebody.) and horrible stacking.

 

Bonus points: An op on Superman tried to pick a fight with me when I was wearing a Dorney Park crew hat. Stating that Dorney is "an inferior park" and if I didn't agree I should "Do something about it." He then proceeded to throw his entire bodyweight at my restraint instead of doing the firm push that he did for everyone else in my row.

 

Worst operations on a specific ride: Afterburn at Carowinds. Literally only the head attendant on the loading side was doing their job. The operator made the all clear call, and people in the back half of the train were screaming "WAIT WAIT NOBODY CHECKED OUR HARNESSES." Curious as to what was going on, we hopped back in line and got on the back. Turns out the rear unloading was talking to guests, when the operator called over the PA to "Check rear." "Rear unloading, check your cars." "{Name} Check the back half of the train." the rear unloading just walked down the exit and didn't come back. The head attendant checked his rows after that. When the rear unloading was actually in the station, not only did he not check his rows, but he shot an all clear implying that he did check it. Luckily the operator was paying attention and didn't dispatch it.

 

however, I must say the crew Carowinds had on Fury 325 on the day we went, was absolutely phenomenal, the best crew I've ever seen. Literally dispatching trains on a 20 second interval. As soon as you sat down there was an attendant there to check your restraint. Very friendly, very focused, and they made up for the Afterburn crew (and the crew on all the other rides, for that matter, as operations were overall pretty bad there. At least nobody was excessively rude like they are at SFGadv)

[TheoB]

In the UK one of the worst parks is definitely Flamingoland (I'll cut G-Force at Drayton Manor some slack as it only has one train) All of their new coasters have no capacity they were running 3 trains on Hero the Zamperla flyer and it had a 1 hour plus queue with two perfectly fine ones sitting on the transfer track. Kumali only ran one train and the staff were having a lovely chat between each dispatch and the operator was sitting on a plastic chair with her feet up reading a magazine. (It was my first SLC so don't hate) But worst of all was this large log flume ride. They waited about 5 minutes before dispatching it and we queued for an hour and a half. After getting on the ride straight after the station there were hold sections to bview the animals - at the complete opposite side of the field and you waited there for about a minute each and there were 3 of them. Although one good thing was they vacuumed the seats while you waited.

[Rill'o'beily]

Any park with a damn fast pass possibility has horrible park operations.

When i went to Thorpe Park, i spent 45min queuing on Colossus, which was fine because i loved the coaster and that's not TOO long.

But when i got to the airgates they told me and my friend to go back three times so that other people could get in, and it took them forever to check the belts and all that because they were too busy talking to people that were coming through the EXIT.

[ytterbiumanalyst]

Magic Springs is the worst I've been to, by a wide margin.

[KBrylczyk]

Any park with a damn fast pass possibility has horrible park operations.

 

Disney would like a word with you.

[coasterbill]

A lot of parks have awful operations but Great Escape out-sucks them all.

 

Except on Comet where they're actually mediocre.

[Loco]

The last time I was at SFOT, which was about a month ago, they were dispatching NTAG every 7 minutes or so. While the employees chatted away and generally didn't care to be there. There was no sense of urgency whatsoever.

[LiftThrill]

The last time I was at SFOT, which was about a month ago, they were dispatching NTAG every 7 minutes or so. While the employees chatted away and generally didn't care to be there. There was no sense of urgency whatsoever.

I've heard awful things about SFOT ride ops but when I go they're great. Not as good as SFFT (90-second dispatches average everytime I go) but dispatch times rarely exceeded 2 minutes. Their weather policies suck, I'll give you that.

[JFrombaugh]

Even with the sporadic rain policy notwithstanding, Cedar Point in general seems to be pretty hit-or-miss from what I've seen. I've had some really enthusiastic crews that were hauling butt and having a great time with the guests, and I've been stapled to death. It depends on who you get.

 

And I'll have to second SFOT in recent years too.

 

1. Slow Dispatches: To me, there is no excuse for continuously slow dispatches. I work on a flying coaster, and they're a bitch to check and clear. Yet we still get a train out within 3 minutes of dispatching the last train.

 

Slow loading seems to be a constant problem with Flying Coasters in general. I first rode Tatsu in 2006 when it opened, and the line was in excess of 2.5 hours. At first I thought this was just due to rider demand, what with it being arguably THE star new coaster of the year in general, but when I got to the station I discovered the last three rows were roped off for Fastpass users, making the line go slower than it could. Not to mention the horrible dispatch times. Haven't ridden a S:UF yet, but from what I hear it's mch the same way, especially the one at SFOG. I've seen Air at Alton Towers operated with little-to-no stacking back in the days when I was lucky enough to live in the UK, so it should be possible to do the same on the Six Flags B&M Flyers.

 

Also, when I last visited Kings Island in the summer on a weekday Firehawk was the only coaster that had a wait time of over 1 hour. Even Diamondback and Beast were ~45 minutes.

[jray21]

Mt Olympus easily gets the top spot for me. Absolutely horrendous.

[gerstlaueringvar]

Thunder Dolphin is the worst I've ever seen in my whole life. The line was 4 train long and they dispatch every 15 minutes. It was doing one train operation, they make you put down any potential loose article including watch and bracelet. We wanted to take front row so it was an extra half an hour wait for two trains.

[KarlaKoaster]

For me it's Parc de Attractions in Madrid. They will not dispatch trains until they are full, even when the park is deserted. I had to wait an hour to ride their Intamin inverter because of this, and I had to go around the park rounding people up to ride with us! What was worse was that the station was full of water dummies, so why they couldn't have filled up most of the middle seats on the train I do not know.

[snapfordakids]

The constant 3 train stacking with Bizarro at SFgadv. SUF: The worst is when you have to sit in fly mode on the break run for 20 minutes. So uncomfortable! And El Toro is always a mess every time with the non-stop walk of shames. (although that isn't really an operation issue more like an obese American society issue)

[ShaneH]

The worst operations I've experienced were on Justice League at SFStL where the sign said it was a 75 minute wait and it took 3 hours. The capacity was about 100 peopl a hour. The que line isn't big at all but it took forever

[rcjp]

For me it's Parc de Attractions in Madrid. They will not dispatch trains until they are full, even when the park is deserted. I had to wait an hour to ride their Intamin inverter because of this, and I had to go around the park rounding people up to ride with us! What was worse was that the station was full of water dummies, so why they couldn't have filled up most of the middle seats on the train I do not know.

I went there a year ago and I actually thought the intamin was down until I entered the station and asked what was going on to which they said: We're just waiting for enough riders to fill a train"

They didn't seem very "professional" overall, at least when compared to bigger parks. But I sill had fun, nonetheless.

[azza29]

Dreamworld ropes off a row on Buzzsaw (Maurer Skyloop) so they can run the ride with just one operator. Kind of poor on a ride that doesn't have great capacity to begin with.

[Nrthwnd]

I don't consider everybody's take on in-station in-the-car photos "horrible park operations," but it can be a mental nuisance, if you're up and ready

to ride the thing, and time - keeps -- ticking --- away. And they're taking photos, down the train.... Grrrrrrr.

 

I remembered on every tour we took to Sea Paradise Park in Japan, the ops on the Surf Coaster would do the same thing. Take the in-station photo! They used to have an on-ride photo machine in the last helixes of the ride. But I remember seeing the results in their on-ride photo booth...and every bloody photo of everybody who rode it, was blurred, out of focus, and missed faces. They definitely got a bum deal on the on-ride photo machine, heh.

 

The saddest of On-Ride Photos I had ever seen in any park in the world.

And I think Sea Paradise Park took a look too, and changed it to the now in-station photo taking.

Here we are, on Surf Coaster IN the station - TPR 2011 Japan Tour. Sure better than the on-ride one.

And yes that was a fun on-ride in-station photo of us. Not imagining what was in (PAIN) store for us, ha!

Why Michael, you definitely look like you're bracing yourself. You know something we don't know? TPR 2013 Mexico Tour.

And here's David and me on Surf Coaster during the TPR 2013 Japan Tour. Times don't change, much.

We decided to get a fridge magnet of the shot, instead of the photo.

[KarlaKoaster]

For me it's Parc de Attractions in Madrid. They will not dispatch trains until they are full, even when the park is deserted. I had to wait an hour to ride their Intamin inverter because of this, and I had to go around the park rounding people up to ride with us! What was worse was that the station was full of water dummies, so why they couldn't have filled up most of the middle seats on the train I do not know.

I went there a year ago and I actually thought the intamin was down until I entered the station and asked what was going on to which they said: We're just waiting for enough riders to fill a train"

They didn't seem very "professional" overall, at least when compared to bigger parks. But I sill had fun, nonetheless.

Oh wow, they still do this then? I went probably 4 years ago and hoped someone would say 'oh no, they don't do that any more!' It was a strange park, and definitely agree they seemed pretty laid back and like they didn't care. For me no other park I've visited has come close in terms of poor operation so I guess I have been very lucky.

[rcjp]

^Yeah and it's not like they have the excuse they're a relatively small park as this summer I went to Tayto Park in Ireland (the smallest one I've been on) and they were far more competent.

[rollin_n_coastin]

Wow, it's cool re-visiting this thread to see what's changed since '08. Having had the opportunity to visit a bunch of great and not so great places with TPR since then, I think my top most frustrating parks are clearer now.

 

Top spot so far is Fuji Q. I mean, WTF....and I went on a good day when we got every ride in. The park is so nice and has great rides but when I had to lock up my paper ticket and then try to strap a lose key to my wrist, I thought, ok, maybe this is a one off since it's a new ride and they're "figuring it out?". Nope, wrong. Everything was, "Why? Just, why??". The ride ops were actually friendly but were completely handcuffed by the beyond strange operational policies.

 

An extremely close runner up is Mount Olympus. I think I'm a generally patient, happy and easy going guy. Mount Olympus managed to suck every ounce of joy and happiness out of me over one afternoon. This place is classic bad operations leading to low staff morale.

 

In third place is Indiana Beach, but only for the extremely slow operations on the coasters. Staff was great when I was there last in 2014 and we had a really good time overall.

[jray21]

An extremely close runner up is Mount Olympus. I think I'm a generally patient, happy and easy going guy. Mount Olympus managed to suck every ounce of joy and happiness out of me over one afternoon. This place is classic bad operations leading to low staff morale.

 

I couldn't have said it better.

[I305forever]

All the employees at Mount Olympus act like workig at an amusement park is the worst thing on earth. They're always giving me these looks of utter comtempt.

[prozach626]

I'll leave this here. August 08, 2014. Six Flags (not so) Great America.

So I went to the park yesterday and had the worst single most worst customer service experience I've ever had at a park. It was possibly the worst customer service I've ever had anywhere. My friend and I went to buy a couple beers. I look young for 29, so I always have my ID out and I took my sunglasses off as a courtesy, so the staff could see my face and compare it to my D/L. I handed the girl at the counter my Illinois Driver's License and politely asked for two Miller Lites (classy, right?). Keep in mind, I make it a practice to always be polite to servers. She kept looking at my D/L and looking at me. After several seconds passed, I kind of raised my eyebrows in question and she flat out rudely told me "This doesn't look like you." Keep in mind I have my hair the exact same length in my ID and the picture was taken last year. I said "Excuse me?" She said again, "I don't think this is you." I was pretty pissed off at this point and told her "Well it's been me for 29 years." I spouted off my birthday and my address and she still just looked at me like she was going to deny me beer. She was trying to make it obvious to her co worker that at this point she just wanted to tell me no. After that, she was trying to be spiteful and she was on an evident power trip of her limited authority to deny me an adult beverage. She went over to another server and overly convincingly tried to say "I don't think this is him." It was clear that she was trying to get her buddy on board. I could tell she really wanted the other girl to say it wasn't me so she could deny me a beer. At that point, I was prepared to make a scene. There's a difference between doing your job and blatantly trying to disrespect someone, probably because she felt silly. I told her if she didn't think that was me than she needed to call the police, since I used my credit card under that name to buy our tickets, our parking, and our flash pass, because as a police officer I know that Unlawful Use of a Debit Card in the state of Illinois is a felony. The other employee looked at me for two seconds and said "Yeah, that's him... same eyes." I was extremely pissed at this point as the worst staff member ever continued to be a smart A$$ throughout the rest of the transaction and she held a smart A$$ grin on her face. When we went back for a second beer... HOURS LATER MIND YOU... I even tried to be nice and joke with her. I went out of my way to apologize to her if I did anything to upset her. I joked with her and asked her if she was going to give me a hard time. She smiled and laughed and told me she just didn't want to get in trouble. In reality she just wanted to go on a power trip. I played it off like nothing ever happened, smiled, thanked her for the beers, and told her that I understood, despite the fact that she never once apologized. At that time I still didn't know of anywhere else in the park that sold beer, so a after several passing hours, I reluctantly walked back to the beer lady for my third and final beer throughout the entire day. Again, I smiled, greeted her, and asked her for two more beers (one each...) for my friend and I. She grinned and with a huge smartass tone said "Well..... I'm sorry... I've served you two beers already (within several hours) and I don't think I should serve you anymore..." With two hours left at the park I was determined to not let it ruined my time, so I went to the JB grill after discovering its existence for my third and final beer, where the bar tender greeted us with kindness and served our beer.

 

I'm tempted to call and complain, but I didn't get her name. I can describe her pretty well if that would help. Would it be worth it to complain or would it even go anywhere? I can see her giving some BS account of the story and make it out like I was being the a$$hole, but I played it over and over again in my head. My friend said I was being nothing but nice... I even took the high road and apologized to her... for HER actions.

[coasterkid124]

For a park of its size, Hershey seems to have poor operations. Not exactly horrible, but most ops seem unhappy to be working and slowly mope around. It's really a problem on Skyrush when you're left sitting on the brake run.

 

Six Flags in general isn't pretty good however. Only a couple out of the handful of parks or so I have visited have had good operations.