JoshC.

Was expecting someone to play the "Slammer is unique" card.The thing is, if Thorpe are pumping money into Slammer because it's unique, why aren't they advertising it so? If its uniqueness is such a good thing, tell people about it and make them want to ride it!

Love how they've already got benches and bins ready; made me chuckle for some reason! Remember Chiapas opened a year late though! I assume that's why they're doing everything so early though; not wanting to take any chances and whatnot.

If Thorpe can spend the time and effort on doing Slammer up every year, even with it being closed for several months each season, then I don't see why they can't do the same for Samurai to be perfectly honest, even if it means just taking the hit and getting an entirely new model.

SRQs are a good move so long as they can be handled properly. The trouble with many of Thorpe's queues is that it makes it difficult to have a SRQ that works efficiently and doesn't hamper operations. Having SRQ on filler rides is fine (especially if they're testing popularity for them to be installed on future additions), but I can't see SRQ going onto any of the major coasters any time soon without some relatively big queue line changes.

Absolutely no chance of any outdoor section to the ride. The plans show it to be totally indoors, and Thorpe have to stick to those plans pretty much by the letter. Do remember that this is still one of the largest dark rides in the UK in terms of floorspace, and it's got a pretty decent volume to it as well! This is by no means a small building. No; there's real details about the sizes of anything inside the building really. Given the size of the building though, they could quite easily put it into a small section of the building (possibly even over two floors) and it not have any real effect. I'm sure they'll have used the space cleverly enough though!

Yes

Like what? You can't just say something like that and leave us hanging, surely!

It's been a while since there was a silly Merlin PR stunt, so here's one for you... (From Chessington's Facebook)

Double post, but t'is important. Another photo, from the same source as Chaz... It's going up quick!

With regards to construction and secrecy, I guess it depends on the ride system and just how secret the park want to keep the project. Since the site is easily viewed from the likes of Inferno and Storm Surge, they'd have to cover the top of the building as well if they wanted to keep the inside of the building totally secret. But then again, if the ride hardware doesn't give away anything in particular, then I guess construction of the inside can easily go ahead.

Where have Alton / Merlin criticised Paramount over their hotel space, just out of interest?

Ooh, nice updates guys! It's interesting that you feel like this the most drawn-out construction at Thorpe. Maybe it's because I haven't visited as often this year compared to other years when major construction was happening at Thorpe, but this feels a lot more pacey to me! Being able to look at it from pretty much every angle, see deconstruction and groundwork take place quite up close has made it feel less drawn-out, especially compared to recent major projects. in saying that though, I'm not so sure we'll see a March launch. I just feel like if Thorpe really do want to keep this a secret (which does seem to be the case), they're not going to be able to do anything substantial of the inside until after the park closes. And I'm not entirely sure if the closed season could be long enough to construct, theme, test and finish off that much of a ride!

Oh God, don't let the papers find out, please don't let the papers find out.

Was also like it today - apparently someone damaged the slide or something? Would explain why it was closed a couple of days ago, and the park have seemingly taken the decision that it's better to have the attraction with no cyclone finale instead of not having it open at all. Must make the attraction feel quite incomplete though!

You've NEVER seen Swarm get an hour queue in the afternoon?

With all due respect, a graph - presumably - showing average wait times of all rides is ludicrous. Alton Towers has many more rides and attractions than Thorpe (almost double), of which many have shorter wait times anyway. Thorpe have less rides and they tend to have longer queues. The average wait time for queues at a park is no indication of how busy a park. To use it to compare two different parks is even worse and doesn't make any sense to be honest. EDIT: Thinking about it, how exactly do you calculate an average queue time for a week?

Mark literally just said what I was going to say - first week or two of summer holidays are the quietest and usually the best time to go between June-August. The park has been busier in the past couple of months, and will no doubt get busier. If anything, articles like this could hopefully act as a bit of free advertising for the park.

Construction update... Source: http://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=20496&sid=d70610596eb640b42105873008031fe1&start=1060(warning: TPR) Flying Aces is making progress, and it's making progress quick. It's rumoured to have trains like Skyrush at Hersheypark, which gets pretty decent reviews across the board. Haven't seen anything much about Mission Ferrari, their SFX coaster (all the details in SCB's post seem to be all that I can find on the ride still...)

My hair has grown approximately 0.2cm? I'm sure that's just as exciting as the changes that have happened in the past 5 or so days; feel free to prove me wrong though...

The Krypt was located in the hospitality marquee I believe, which is behind the shops and such in Wild Asia I think. Then again, Krypt was Kobra themed, so it made perfect sense for it to go there!

Thorpe's Twitter said it was down to "technical difficulties", and it wasn't planned to be closed today. So I guess it was some fault with some of the effects or something which prevented it from being open!

Maybe I've misunderstood you here, but are you suggesting that Merlin's cost cutting is a potential reason for Smiler crashing? Because if so, that's a very bold and extreme thing to say with no findings as to the cause of the incident!

Given there's going to be a green screen photo op point in the queue line, I'm expecting a retheme. Air's current theme doesn't lend itself to having a worthwhile photo point like that in my opinion, so a photo point like that must be tied into a new theme / a sponsor for the ride. The half price sale has been going on for a while on Air merch (it was at the AT meet last month), so has been on sale longer than Rita QoS merch was in 2009. The theming and station enhancements don't excite me that much. The one of the lift hill is essentially just a large, very thin, hole that you go through (potential sponsor point?!), and the other seems too small to be of anything of note. Still nice to see things happening though of course. Station enhancements should at least give it a bit more atmosphere for whatever they've got planned.

Construction update: https://paultonspark.co.uk/lost-kingdom/2015/07/3114/delivery-on-track We have track people!

Didn't even realise it was still closed; thought it was only down for a short period and reopened at the same time as Fury. Probably hasn't helped Chessington much, especially with the the slightly older guests.