Benin

It's a lot to get worked up considering it's a pair of Mack powered coasters. No idea if the ride area is soulless without being there. I mean Bob didn't have any presence beyond the station building because it was hidden in the trees (and I'm sure when it first opened it looked empty too). Given that this was an addition that was unexpected, and fills a gap for the park, and no one is particularly excited about it why we have to have such nonsense like "ThIs Is JuSt A bIgGeR fLyInG fIsH!" just confuses me.

It's weird though because Efteling never had a real entry coaster for a family park (the closest being Vogel Rok), so the logic behind this addition is sound. Think too many people are hung up over Bob being demolished for it. At least Efteling were open about it closing.

To be fair the smoking thing is stupid at the American Disneys as there are no smoking areas anywhere on park, meaning you have to leave the gates in order to do so. I might not like smoking but it is a daft method. Even Legoland has a smoking area.

Why not just delay until you have the new signs turn up? That's the logical thing. If you don't have the materials to complete the job, don't have arse it. I'd be crucified if this my project and the result even temporarily looked like that.

I doubt anyone wants to spend Christmas time at Blackpool willingly.

Good shout for the park, even if the bitter winter winds might be slightly off putting.

🚮 I mean what else is there to even say?

As long as someone is happy to never be critical about such a product (and presumably likes to SHOUT a lot as seems to be the trend on YouTube) then of course a company will use them for free PR. I just won't ever listen to their opinion.

I miss the days of the bad Thorpe Park ride names. Boretex, Zodicrap, Thrush, Colossus, Sore, etc.

Futuroscope's first ever cred appears to be on the verge of opening. Must say it does look cool. And a suitable level of ride for the park's first foray into the coaster side of things.

Coaster groups are very white male dominated. Especially the forums. Only about 1 or 2 forums actually have a half decent female presence, but that is down to a fair amount of work on the members part to become an established part of the community and then part of the site's team. A lot of the time the females at meets have been dragged into it by boyfriends or family members. Very rare to see girlfriends dragging their other halves along (does happen though). BAME is even lower in numbers. I might not even need additional hands to count how many I've seen or met on meets over the 17 (Jesus I've been in this game a while). At the end though you cannot flat out force people to join a forum on what is an incredibly niche interest. People like theme parks as a general visit thing but do they LIKE them? It's an incredibly difficult situation for many industries. Engineering has a very similar issue in terms of a lack of numbers in diversity as it was always seen as a bloke's thing to do (current company has 1 female in the engineering side, the rest are admin or finance). And with a lot of management at the companies being an old boy's club made it hard for any women involved to advance unless you had the right people in charge (this isn't a point at the running of this forum). But you've got to build the interest in it first before demanding that there be diversity, as you are then potentially promoting people to senior roles who aren't always best suited for them as a tick boxing exercise. If there's one thing I have noticed about the coaster community; it's the very prominent number of LGBTQ+ members. Which is a fantastic positive to consider.

To be fair no show is better than whatever they replaced Disney Dreams with (yes I am still annoyed). They've also cancelled the Parkrun event in September. But I'd wager people will visit anyway because desperation of things to do (not that we can go anywhere abroad anytime soon).

In TPMs side of things, who are prominent members of the forums who are either BAME or female AND are suitable candidates for working on the team? If the numbers aren't there then the representation won't be. And having a situation of putting someone on the team purely as a tick box exercise isn't the point of racial or sexual equality. It's precisely the same issue with football managers. Between the ridiculous amounts of money making teams believe they would be taking a risk with younger managers; how many BAME people are going through the coaching system in order to get those roles? Not enough.

Intamin have fixed the Maverick problem by never doing something so stupid again. Though Jesus that video in question is extremely geeky, and does worry me that Americans are obsessed with throughputs. This will probably run like Taron on 4 trains. They might try and squeeze a 5th in there somewhere. Once the initial hype dies down it'll probably be ok.

Least you're not the people who think bare coaster track has no place in a "world class theme park".

Can they theme it to make it fit into the park as well? Weird that it can't run 2 trains though. Maybe Vekoma can do some magic.

You really think that the McCann case is more important (the front page is THE most important story of the day after all) than the two MAJOR events currently going on?

Yesterday's front pages annoyed the hell out of me. Two massive worldwide issues going on atm. The UK Covid numbers are more than the rest of the EU combined, then we have the numerous protests in support of those across the pond. Our media ignores those and looks at a 12 year old case about a middle class white girl who died due to the neglect of her parents (even if they didn't kill her themselves, they left 3 children in a hotel room alone, but of course they don't get blamed for that either). And some say we're better than the Americans.

Have no trust in any government designed app full of my personal data. Especially one they've rushed out.

Judging by what other parks are doing groups are being kept together. So you'll be sitting with each other.

It'll be frustration more than anything. There are naturally bigger things but the inability to go outside and do SOMETHING (especially given the hoops one may have to jump through when things are cancelled) will be causing a lot of cabin fever. I'm worried that my wedding and honeymoon will be moved as a result of this. Does that make me a bad person? This country has been proven to be full of self centred people time and time again. Fortunately I've not seen any enthusiasts on my social media moaning like you describe. Might be worth an unfollow? Besides, it's been made clear by our government we can travel wherever we like even if we have the symptoms. So expect people to march on the parks and demand they open soon (even though when looking at the parks that have opened it'll be a nightmare, but what is an enthusiast without something to moan about?)

The spike section is so utterly pointless. Like, if you're gonna have a ride like this surely a more substantial backwards section such as Pegasus and Firechaser Express is the way to go? Strange ride for a strange park.

Half the information to the press is often deliberately leaked (hence always unnamed sources). Usually to guage public opinion on a particular idea/route. The main issue with this slogan is the change from something incredibly simple to something very vague (and weird, how does one stay alert from a virus?), with the added subtle caveat of the colour change to green that will make the public think things are safer. When really things haven't actually changed yet at all.

You should work from home BUT only if you can work BUT only if you can get there BUT only if you social distance on transport BUT only if you have to work. If Labour were making the same mistakes here then people would moan. But then again they've not been in charge for the past 9 years with austerity, public funding cuts and a completely divided country to show for it. Is it any wonder some people want the Tories out? Added to this is watching how other countries are approaching this situation. Have you seen the Irish roadmap compared to ours? Vastly more detailed to the UK one where 3 of the 4 countries it was meant to apply to have turned around and gone "nah mate that's nonsense"? Only the other day was the end of Cameron's 5 years. Preceded by his "Chaos with Ed Miliband" tweet. Strong and stable indeed.

It adds very little because of how far into the situation we are. What's the point in testing now when travel is limited? Why weren't we testing those who came over from Madrid for the Liverpool match when Spain were beginning their lockdown? Simply put we're closing the stable doors but the horses bolted 2 months ago. Look at how other European countries dealt with this and it's no wonder we've got the highest death rate.