JoshC.

So it was around this time in 2011 that Thorpe put in plans for Swarm. Thanks to the MTDP, planning permission was all but guaranteed, and the ride had long been rumoured. Aside from that, plans for major investments were going in about 18 months before the ride opened (DBGT in Oct14, Saw in Nov08, Stealth in Oct04..). So, that, coupled with no rumours really floating around about a new addition in 2020 - the expected year of a major investment - do we think we can now safely say that there won't be a new big thing any time soon? As it certainly feels that way.. Can Thorpe really go 8 years (or more) without adding a new coaster? In a time when Legoland are adding more well rounded, substantial family rides, Chessington seem to actually be crafting new attractions again, albeit rethemes, and Towers are on the up, can Thorpe really make do with their poor quiet season investments for another 2 years?

It's worth it. I might actually get round to finishing my Poland TR this month to give a bit more insight... It might be worth holding off till 2020 to get the water ride at Legendia and the kiddie cred and multi launch Vekoma at Energylandia mind. Especially since 2021 is meant to be a quiet year for Poland..

I realise reading back now I didn't quite word it how I wanted to. So, just to change it up a bit: My point more was they know what the public want. Or, possibly more accurately, they know how to tell the public what they want. They've monopolised the market, which means they can go 'look, all your options do this, so that means this is what you want'. That's why some things which work abroad don't work in the UK - the public don't want them. But I'm sure if Merlin wanted them to want it, they would eventually want. Wicker Man / a wooden roller coaster is a good example I think. Merlin didn't want to invest in one, so they found a way to show that (of course, there were people who did want one, and there were plenty of plans for wooden coasters in Merlin parks before Wicker Man). More importantly, I don't think the masses were clambering for a wooden coaster. People wanted pure thrill more for Towers, hence why Smiler came about. But when whatever level of Merlin thinking wooden coasters were a bad changed their mind, the public loved it. I think that's in part down to Merlin being clever enough to know how to get the most of the UK audience and get them to want what they're giving. I'm not sure I've explained that very well either, mind. But, speaking purely from a business sense, I think Merlin have got it pretty well nailed down. They can herd the masses like sheep, telling them to like what they're doing. It means they can get the most money out of them in the cheapest way possible. That doesn't mean what Merlin is doing is good - they don't always make the best decisions, and you could say they rarely do. I don't like how it affects the parks, but I can still see it as something that they've done really well, even if I don't like it. I do genuinely think that a large proportion of the public enjoy Merlin's offerings. Merlin can, of course, significantly improve, and I think if they weren't trying to herd the masses like sheep and instead genuinely listen to them, they would be more in touch with the public more organically.

MORE HYPE Track is al-red-y on site https://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?p=156431354#post156431354 Proper dense structure. Going to look brilliant once it's up I reckon.

4 post solo conversation ahead... The new kiddie coaster has a name... And also a look at the layout and theme... This is of course also opening this year, with a retheme of the kids area 'Playland' to 'Fun World'. On top of, of course, Karma World and Popcorn Revenge...

Funny British parks there The British audience respond to theme parks (and entertainment in general) very differently to those across Europe, for example. What works in Europe doesn't necessarily work in the UK; it is partially down to the culture we have here I reckon. I do think that people in the UK do gravitate towards IP-mascots and I think any attempt to try and create a mascot for a park (especially nowadays) would be seen as nothing more than a Mickey Mouse rip off. It's one of the things which I think Merlin have done really well. They know how to get the most out of the UK audience. I reckon that's in a good part down to the fact they've monopolised the market, but heyho, that's business. They don't always make the best decisions, but they still get the most out of the UK that they can - from a business perspective, that's perfect. Of course, just my views on things. Maybe the right character completely taking over a park would work and the public will respond well. But I personally don't think it will

I wonder if the British audience just lost interest in place-specifc mascots? With the rise in popularity of Disney parks, maybe people just saw any other attempts as a cheap version of Mickey Mouse. Or maybe they prefer IP-related costume characters (yet another reason why Peppa Pig Land worked so well for Paulton's).

The idea of the BounceBacks was that when you were on park, if you enjoyed the park, you could get a ticket to come back for a significantly reduced rate. At it's heights, prices were £1 to return the day after, £6-8 to return on a non-FN date and £15 to return on a FN date. I believe you could pick it up from a Fastrack place.

Also no 10-4 days planned!

hmmm, interesting Two day tickets were rarely advertised, you always had to hunt round for them (even on Chessington and Legoland's sites, it's not exactly easy to find them!). So I assume this is something they've slowly worked towards - "oh look, we are barely selling 2 day tickets, why bother offering them at all. Especially when the APs are so cheap" I don't think removing the option is the best way to go. I don't know what the prices were for Thorpe - presumably the £40 number you say is when booked in advance, choosing the specific days, etc etc? Maybe the better way to go would have been to just increase the price to make the season pass a more lucrative deal than making it the only deal?

A glimpse at the probable logo for F.L.Y.... Slight Steampunk vibe with a hint of dragon (cos Phantasialand loves it's dragons). Also very similar to the style of badges military pilots receive.

Well that's embarrassing. Thanks!

Meanwhile, a bit closer to home, Linnanmäki's double launch looks very pretty in the snow...

There's an interesting article from around the same time: http://www.attractionsmanagement.com/index.cfm?pagetype=features&codeID=33238&fbclid=IwAR3C6Mzr4fAfBT_8txXPcIUw7tLnL-4HFgodWcvBO0f8ryr-PuAbM5GmOi8 There's a lot to pick out from it which I think gives some very interesting insight... It's obvious of course that a park wants fans on its side. Of course, 'fans' can mean much more than 'enthusiasts' - anyone who's a passholder is technically a fan. Hence the silly "Annual Passholder facts", which say passholders are more intelligent, more polite and whatever else. Anything to try and make a passholder smile and go 'heh, cool' or something like that. In turn, it sets a tone that the account has this 'banterous' side to them, making people more inclined to share in that banter and post positively. Except, that's not how it's worked. It comes across as the park trying to hard. Like that uncle at parties who says buzzwords like "yolo" and "yeet" and thinks he's cool. It'll make some people smile, but it's not what people want from a theme park account. They want an upbeat tone, information and interesting facts. 99% of the time a 15-minutes of fame meme won't do the job with getting people on board in supporting the brand. And it's not like there's people being clueless that the social media reflects the brand - the park are well aware it affects the perception of the brand. But either they don't realise it's not enriching the brand, or they're too stubborn to change their mind. Maybe they'll argue it is working, but enthusiasts in their ivory towers of wisdom are too narrow-minded to see. Maybe it's like a Trump/Brexit thing, where we're just surrounded by so many people who share the same opinion that we're blind to the strength of those who think the social media presence is brilliant. But it's not. Crudely speaking, social media ultimately comes down to interactions and getting people talking. You look at the numbers the park's posts are getting - they're not good. And the majority of people aren't going to be talking about it like enthusiasts are.. You only have to look at how they've handled the Logger's Leap to see that this is a theory they do not follow. They shut the ride quietly, gave a vague, non-committing statement, and just swept it aside ever since. People hound the park constantly, both during on and off season, and go nowhere. They've dug themselves into a hole that they can't get out of. And yes, Loggers is a weird one. I'm very much under the impression to closure of it was a decision they didn't want to make, and was only planned to be temporary. There had been plenty of plans and ideas for its reopening. I don't think the park lied when they were saying 'they hope it returns soon' - I genuinely believe that was their plan at one stage or another, but plans changed. But this is the issue when you hide behind vague buzzwords and try to be clever about it, you lose all integrity when something goes wrong behind the scenes, since you have nothing to fall back on for a public statement. Is this what social media should be about though? Do I really care if Jack visited the park for the 15th time this season with a camera pointed at him the whole time, and he had a good day because he knows all the tricks of how to do the park and the rubbish rides to avoid? Do I care that Sally from Kent, with her 200 followers, visited the park for the first time and wrote a blog saying how wonderful Stealth is? Not really. It's good to do this sort of stuff, but sparingly. People want an upbeat tone, information and interesting facts - this is rarely achieved through influences. All well and good saying this, but Thorpe in particular are terrible for this. The amount of unanswered questions that fly past on a daily basis, the copy and paste responses make it feel like they don't care, don't read responses and just reflects badly on the brand. I know this is a distinction between the marketing team (who craft the original tweets) and the guest services team (who are in charge of responding to general queries), but if there's this disconnect in philosophies between the two teams (one saying that taking the time to respond to comments is important, the other not doing this effectively), then that speaks volumes about the park. The park's brand is just ruined at the moment. Can anyone answer, positively, what Thorpe Park is at the moment? Who do they target? How will I feel after a day out there? Why should I go there? So far, all the social media side of things is doing is making me think they're a park desperate for attention and wanting to be "down with the kids". And it really shows. And what's worse, is this has been done before. Thorpe went through the terrible meme phase in 2013/4, back when they were changing target market. The new island brand was working and masking the issues they had there, but the social media side felt desperate. But back then, social media wasn't as critical to a brand, and they managed to salvage it. But they haven't learnt from their mistakes, clearly. Admittedly, they're not doing everything wrong. The Thorpe Park blog, with weekly entries, is nice, and the winter updates have been good. Yet both of those things always seem to miss the mark a bit, and are only 'good', rather than 'great'. They can get the tone of voice and personality right, they've had some good funny moments in the past. But these are exceptions. More often than not, it feels like they're shooting themselves in the foot, really don't care or just trying to troll followers for the lolz. I want to make it clear I'm not trying to attack particular people. Yes, this post has been related to a particular article written by one particular person who works at Thorpe, and I'm being critical of it. But that's simply one person reflecting the ideals and value of the park and its brand. It's not something that one person has thought of, and it's gone through. This is a collection of people, making a collection of mistakes, and it's there for their whole following to see. The park is stagnating with investments, the brand is going round in circles and the social media accounts are slowly becoming a laughing stock. It needs sorting out. I'll finish off with a quote from the article, in case anyone tries the 'if you hate it so much, why are you here' line...

It was confirmed to a German theme park magazine by the park they intend to open it in the autumn. The park themselves haven't officially announced it via social media / their website, but then again, they haven't even mentioned it at all through those methods.

New photos! https://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=1557590&page=887&amp=1 It'll be interesting to see just how much and how ready the area is when the ride opens this year.

I agree it's a stupid post, doesn't do anything to help their reputation, etc. But saying they're treating customers with "contempt"? People on Facebook / Twitter calling this "offensive" and "insulting" (usually people with Annual Passes already who are trying to feel offended on behalf of others). Feels like a bit of an over-reaction, no? As I say, it's a ridiculous post, definitely not doing anything to help with their already damaged brand. But there are people genuinely trying to say it's offensive? Come on..

I'll be honest, the reaction to that Annual Passholder post is ridiculous. Anyone who's acting offended in any way needs to get a grip frankly. In saying that, it's not in any way a fun, funny or clever, and there's millions of better ways to advertise the Thorpe Annual Pass. Maybe even by, you know, advertising what you get with it?

If it's anything like Lost Gravity it'll be fantastic, so look forward to that.. Keeping with Mack, the newest Mack multi launch is looking mighty fine...

Despite being the Colossus project page, the information on that website, and leaflet linked are for the new version of the 10-looper (like Altair at Cinecetta World in Italy). I can't remember if it's the case or not, but I believe the track is slightly different between the two versions, with the newer version being slightly wider - hence the reference to track width. It's not that it's not possible to get new trains, but the cost involved is significant - it's not just buying the new trains, it's modifications to the station, maintenance area, etc. It all adds up, and at a time when Thorpe seem to spend minimal amounts. On top of that, as the trains are designed for new track and usually cable lift hills, Intamin would have to custom make them, meaning the cost is significantly more than 'just' buying new trains.

I'd say yes, the physical illusion is very impressive. The trouble is more the reveal of it - there's little build up aside from a small speech (which you may not even hear or notice at the back of the group). And there's also the fact you're rushed in and out of the room. Without the set up, you get no return. If you look at reviews of when it first opened, and people's first ride, you'll see how everyone raves about the hanging carriage. It's something which was hugely pushed in marketing and teasers, so it was at the forefront of everyone's minds. Now, it's either taken for granted by re-riders (because their attention isn't drawn to it) or not recognised by new riders (because they don't really know about it). It's a shame, because it is a good illusion in my opinion.

The Victorian carriage room is more or less exactly as planned. It's a large scale illusion which required a lot of planning and design to get right - and like a lot of illusions, is designed to work from certain angles. The illusion wouldn't work from different perspectives, amounts of light, etc. So basically, having people enter/leave on different sides of the train, or from different heights, wouldn't work due to the design. And it was designed with those parameters in mind.

Yes, the original way the ride operated was that you entered the hanging carriage room after the previous group had left. Due to throughputs being an issue though, that idea was abandoned. A part of that is down to the quoted theoretical throughput from the manufacturer being literally impossible to achieve. As the timings were largely based around that, it was pretty screwed from the word go. Yes and no. That does show an alternative to the 2016 version, that wasn't 'the' other ending. The other ending was totally different to what was shown. The above is more just a 'let's make multiple scenarios of this version and see which works better'. I don't know if the above was ever used after the ride had opened (maybe soft previews?), but that wasn't the intended other ending.

Not strictly true. These sorts of posts are crafted by the marketing team, all of whom are permanent members of staff on a salary (which works out as a lot more than any seasonal, hourly wage staff). It's usually the case that seasonal, hourly wage staff respond to social media posts (and those are usually guest services people). But during closed season they don't normally have those people employed. Equally these sorts of responses will from marketing. And being Merlin, the marketing department have some of the strongest says in the park.

Sadly I've forgotten how expensive student life can be so I will no longer be attending.