pluk

It's a HUGE deal in mine. Getting night rides and getting mazes done is already an either/or affair, this just makes it worse. 
 
If they really really must lop an hour off then open an hour later. 

I'd have exactly the same attitude. I wouldn't hold the park at fault regardless of who got hurt, even if it was me let alone family or friends, not unless they gave them the knife or set up the fight. This is one of the major things wrong with the world in my eyes; everything is always someone else fault. Someone should have prevented, someone should have intervened, someone should have seen the future. The suspect is the suspect.
 
You can mitigate against a risk, but you can not eliminate all danger. The security as it is is a reasonable response to the risk presented. With this being the first incident of this type in 40 years, how many issues have they prevented with their actions in this time? Loads I expect. Considering your opinion of their clientele you'd be hard pressed to argue against that having been the case, but you can't prove the effectiveness of a preventative measure.
 
You can learn from incidents, you can see how something happened and amend your processes for the future, but that does not prove an ability to have foreseen.

Are Intamin the new Golden Horse LOL?
I'm sure parks will trust them over Mack to build their water rides, it isn't like any of their large scale water rides have failed hard in the past..
 

I went to Thorpe park on Monday. Got there at about 9:45 and was in by 10:10. Security has been stepped up somewhat. Metal detector wands, bag searches and a pat down. It all went very smoothly and without issue.
 
I kinda fee bad for the people who went on Sunday as having worked in public events I know it’s almost impossible to spin up a security team over night. Monday was great, no worse than going to a gig or a festival.
 
good vibes all round. 

I'd have exactly the same attitude. I wouldn't hold the park at fault regardless of who got hurt, even if it was me let alone family or friends, not unless they gave them the knife or set up the fight. This is one of the major things wrong with the world in my eyes; everything is always someone else fault. Someone should have prevented, someone should have intervened, someone should have seen the future. The suspect is the suspect.
 
You can mitigate against a risk, but you can not eliminate all danger. The security as it is is a reasonable response to the risk presented. With this being the first incident of this type in 40 years, how many issues have they prevented with their actions in this time? Loads I expect. Considering your opinion of their clientele you'd be hard pressed to argue against that having been the case, but you can't prove the effectiveness of a preventative measure.
 
You can learn from incidents, you can see how something happened and amend your processes for the future, but that does not prove an ability to have foreseen.

So here's the Thorpe problem in a nutshell. Their investment in the 2000's was big. it was exciting, it was dynamic, it was a dream to be a Uk theme park fan with rides left right and centre. But the Thorpe problem comes down to a lack of space and a lack of diversity. They've got themselves into a rut when The Swarm kind of failed. Their target audience demands the newest, most exciting attractions. Who cares about Colossus and its measly ten inversions when The Smiler has fourteen.So then when they fail to grow, they start to downsize. The problems start to increase. The lack of investment means a lack of return which just spirals until we get to now. Thorpe doesn't have the advantages of the family market. Chessington went through a similar slump when it left the thrill market altogether and turned to family. The difference there though is that the family market spends money. Kids demand toys and treats. Ap family holders are all too happy to grab a nice meal and a pint with their family. They like staying in an over-priced hotel. Kerching. 
 
Thorpe's target audience doesn't. Thorpe AP holders are happy to only spend a pound in the park all day. It starts to cost too much money to remove the SBNO attractions. Just build a wall. Who do you target at now when the bulk of your attractions are thrill heavy. 
 
Really there is absolutely no reason why the park couldn't build a family rollercoaster or some entry level flat rides (give me a breakdance you cowards). But they won't because all they want are headlines and aren't interested in sustaining the park beyond the end of the financial year. So we get short term rubbish like I'm a Celeb or Black Mirror instead of attractions that stand the test of time. I'm amazed that Chessington actually replaced Black Bucaneer and are replacing Rameses with a generic drop tower AND redid Tomb Blaster AND built a Rainforest area, refurbishing Toadies and building a Log Flume at the same time. This stuff never happens at Merlin, it will certainly never happen at Thorpe because the idea of cookie-cutter attractions would never fly. So instead the current attractions just age away and nothing gets built or done. 
 
If you were to ask me what Thorpe should do, I'd go with refurbish attractions, build rides that attract a wider audience and beef up that awful entrance with a new look and better security stations. Inferno shouldn't be turning green, family rollercoasters are awesome additions and  a stabbing should never be able to happen again. There is absolutely no point in building an RMC or B&M Hyper if the rest of the park looks like a rubbish dump. Putting a bow on trash is still trash. 
 
And that for me is the Thorpe problem.

I'd have exactly the same attitude. I wouldn't hold the park at fault regardless of who got hurt, even if it was me let alone family or friends, not unless they gave them the knife or set up the fight. This is one of the major things wrong with the world in my eyes; everything is always someone else fault. Someone should have prevented, someone should have intervened, someone should have seen the future. The suspect is the suspect.
 
You can mitigate against a risk, but you can not eliminate all danger. The security as it is is a reasonable response to the risk presented. With this being the first incident of this type in 40 years, how many issues have they prevented with their actions in this time? Loads I expect. Considering your opinion of their clientele you'd be hard pressed to argue against that having been the case, but you can't prove the effectiveness of a preventative measure.
 
You can learn from incidents, you can see how something happened and amend your processes for the future, but that does not prove an ability to have foreseen.

Whilst Energylandia does benefit hugely from EU funds, they would not necessarily struggle if it was lost. 
 
The original grant was only for investments up to this year (including the Vekoma Mine Train, which is on site but hasn't started construction yet, and I personally doubt would open this year, especially with Covid). However, they did successfully apply for more funds, which is helping them "accelerate" plans they had for the next few years, which has included the building more accommodation, and further expansions. Should those EU funds no longer be made available, their investment would likely still be large, but just more spread out.
 
If the country's homophobia increases further, it would be interesting to see how badly tourism is hit, and how it would affect the park. I don't know how many of their visitors are international, but they certainly have got the attention of the enthusiast community, which no doubt helps in drawing more people in. This is particularly prevalent with Zator being just inside a region that's declared itself LGBT-free. A drop in visitors could hit the park harder than them not having access to EU funds.
 
Obviously what happens to Energylandia pales in comparison to LGBT rights in Poland. 

I'd have exactly the same attitude. I wouldn't hold the park at fault regardless of who got hurt, even if it was me let alone family or friends, not unless they gave them the knife or set up the fight. This is one of the major things wrong with the world in my eyes; everything is always someone else fault. Someone should have prevented, someone should have intervened, someone should have seen the future. The suspect is the suspect.
 
You can mitigate against a risk, but you can not eliminate all danger. The security as it is is a reasonable response to the risk presented. With this being the first incident of this type in 40 years, how many issues have they prevented with their actions in this time? Loads I expect. Considering your opinion of their clientele you'd be hard pressed to argue against that having been the case, but you can't prove the effectiveness of a preventative measure.
 
You can learn from incidents, you can see how something happened and amend your processes for the future, but that does not prove an ability to have foreseen.

The problem with agendas is thats its very easy to see through them. No it isn't the parks fault that someone got attacked. Your equivalency with a terrorist attack is ridiculous or are you saying it's the airlines fault for 9/11 and the plane hijacking. 
 
That last sentence by the way, all park queue times across the board are up. I never used to queue more then 10 minutes for Nemesis (alton towers for all those that call Inferno the wrong name) and now queues sit at half an hour at minimum. Thats what happens when you social distance and clean the seats and restraints every half an hour. Thats something the park is doing for guest safety so to sit there and say the park doesn't care about care and experience is so wildly of the mark its in Brazil. 

Pluk summed up what I think.
The main thing that went wrong here is the person who did indeed bring the knife in the park. I am sure this could of happened at most parks. Thorpe actually have a fairly decent system in place. Some parks in mainland europe you can just walk into without even a search.. It is very easy to sit here in hindsight and list everything that the park has and hasn't done, though before this happened I swear nobody was complaining about security/searching at the park?
 
Nasty things happen everywhere all the time. Theme parks are not exempt from this.
^^^ This
 
There is many things Thorpe do wrong, but I find some of this hate thrown at them for this to be a bit uncalled for. 
 
 

The only person who's fault this was was the person carrying the knife. To try to deflect any blame on to Thorpe is plain wrong. 
 
It doesn't matter what measures they put in place, if someone wants to get something in they shouldn't get in they will. The best way to reduce the risk of someone trying is random searches of a differing nature, and that's exactly what Thorpe do. I'm sure there'll be a short term reassurance effort where they cause hours of queues going OTT with searches but it'll be back to normal soon enough, just as it should be.

The only person who's fault this was was the person carrying the knife. To try to deflect any blame on to Thorpe is plain wrong. 
 
It doesn't matter what measures they put in place, if someone wants to get something in they shouldn't get in they will. The best way to reduce the risk of someone trying is random searches of a differing nature, and that's exactly what Thorpe do. I'm sure there'll be a short term reassurance effort where they cause hours of queues going OTT with searches but it'll be back to normal soon enough, just as it should be.

I'm not sure it does show a failure on thorpes part? Thorpe Park's security procedure (the parts which we see anyway) is IMO probably the most stringent out of all the Merlin theme parks already and will no doubt evolve again after this incident. I agree that I haven't had to walk through a scanner at thorpe other than on some special events, but the same can be said for any entertainment venue I've visited in the UK over the past couple of years.
 
The bag search was bought in after a number of terrorist incidents. I agree if they want to search every guest to a higher standard it will take investment in more equipment and infrastructure, and that 2 hour queues to get in are not a long term solution, but to say the park don't have proper security measures is a ridiculous statement.  
 
I don't agree Thorpe Park is not a safe environment, "Behaviours" you mention can and do happen in all sorts of places, when you manage thousands of people a day your bound to have trouble at some points, Fright Nights are typically busier and therefore your probably more likely to have someone out to cause trouble. And as far as I know this is the first instance of knife crime at TP - how would a "properly secure entrance" stop someone picking a fight in the park? 
 
Holding Merlin or Thorpe accountable for the knife crime problem in the UK is abit OTT - Thorpe Park's checks were always simply Bag Checks - The park no doubt work with local police forces to plan and execute things such as security / bag searches etc.
 
To enter the park you need to have a ticket scanned at a turnstile or manually by staff, they of course know how many people are in the park at any given time, as far as i know there are no "legal limits" for Covid 19 - they simply have to ensure social distancing measures are in place which they are, park capacity is significantly reduced from normal.

Odd to hear. I was also on park yesterday and joined a long compulsory queue to get in where bags were thoroughly checked. I believe they do take security seriously and have done more than is usually needed. Only exception was no bags meant you walked down the middle, but even then there was a security member with a table set up doing random searching. Whenever I have been to Chessington or Towers the system was the same with only bags being checked. 
 
I think it always seems busier as more turn up at once in Thorpe. Chessington it seems people's arrival is more spread out and the gates usually open very early, whereas Towers have the monorail usually to space out guests arriving at entrance. 
 
Would you be searched going bowling, to the cinema or shopping? No and the same thing could happen there. 
 
I don't think it's fair to blame thorpe for this personally. 
 
 
 
 

Top ten Intamins
1. Taron - Top class ride. A rare ride where it's more than the sum of its parts.
2. Maverick - Awesome ride with so many different elements that work well in unison. The most un-American ride in Cedar Point and yet one of its best.
3. Juvelen - Always a firm favourite with me. Despite being a family ride is very very good.
4. Piraten - Djurs Sommerlands second ride in a row. Really excellent air-time and a good long layout.
5. Millennium Force - Maybe overhyped but I love the speed of this thing. The restraints really enhance how exposed you are at 300 feet. Unlike Dragster you can appreciate it.
6. Goliath - Under-rated gem. I much prefer this to its German brother as this has a much nicer setting and a faster ride crew. 
7. California Screamin' - An odd one but full of great little elements. Yet to ride it's refurbished version.
8. iSpeed - Excellent speeder at the great Miribiliandia. Really intense and snappy layout.
9. Xcelerator - The first. The launch out of the station really sets up a ride that is only better then the next one as its longer.
10. Stealth - Addictive ride. Last year I enjoyed it more than I ever have before. 
 
Bottom five 
 
5. Vertical Velocity/V2/Wicked Twister - Essentially the same ride. Pretty boring rides to be honest. Quite often in parks with other launches so they are redundant. 
4. Top Thrill Dragster. If you're lucky to ride its fine. most of the times its closed.
3. Superman Escape from Kryptonite. impressive in '96. Not so much now.
2. Green Lantern. Gone but not forgotten. DIlge.
1. Tornado at Bakken. Awful awful ride. So painful and full of vibration. Speeding through a shed is not fun.
 

They're not adjustable, but they can be on or off. 
 
On test runs with empty trains they're off to prevent stalling, with riders they're on to prevent fun overspeeding.

Nemesis made me feel alive after months and months of constant depressing news. 
 
It is unlike any other ride for me. It's the small things. I love how the top of the lift hill is at ground level which is just pure uniqueness, I love how its first drop is so gradual and then it just throws you into the tour de force of element and element, getting faster and faster until the vertical loop. I love the terrain, the way you explore every element of the ride and are up close and personal with the trains. I love how this is a B&M that they will never even attempt to build anything like again because of the difficulties with the ride and it's shifting environment. I love its unique theme, how the station is the monster itself or how its just a capacity machine with a queue that never stops moving. I love how 26 years later it is considered to be one of the very best rides B&M have ever built and one of the best rollercoasters ever made.
 
I love how it can be endlessly compared to its younger brother at Thorpe and how we have two rides with the same elements in a completely different order. I love how it only came about because of two cancelled projects and the launch of Batman: The Ride in Great America, without all these things coming together, we may have never got Nemesis and Alton Towers would be a vastly different place.
 
When I think of perfect rides, only Nemesis can ever fit the target. For me its what rides are supposed to represent and be all about, the passion, the drama, the soul of creativity.
 
Long live the queen, the Jurassic Park of 1994.

They're not adjustable, but they can be on or off. 
 
On test runs with empty trains they're off to prevent stalling, with riders they're on to prevent fun overspeeding.

Can confirm, one green light still not working on Stealth. Hoping it'll be sorted by 2021.

Some updates from today:
 
-You no longer need to queue in the main cattlepen for Nemesis Inferno. They have removed the fence so you bypass it, and the first extension is now going to remain open.
(This does open up the problem where people will end up queueing in the cattlepen in the first extension, but you know, baby steps)
 
-Inferno is no longer loading every other row. When I was there, Row 4 was left empty for some reason. Also saw Row 3 left empty too. Not sure why.
 
-Colossus is now loading a group, then leaving a row, then loading another group, rather than every other car (as is Stealth).
 
-Since Saw is basically running as normal (both rows loaded, since I believe it requires a minimum of 4 people to ride), it makes you wonder what the point of social distancing on rides even is. Does coronavirus not exist at Saw?
 
-Most people were obeying social distancing in fairness. I never saw a person not wearing a mask.
 
-The park was very quiet. And it felt very lifeless too. I've been on quiet days in the past. I've been on days where things go terribly wrong and loads of rides are closed. But this felt different. It still very much felt like you were living in a world where a pandemic was going on. There was no escapism. (Be interesting to see if I think that about other parks or if this is Thorpe-specifc).
This further isn't helped when areas like Derren, the walkway by Fish, etc feel so dead, with no music or...anything really. 
 
-All water rides were testing today. I believe some of them are hoped to be opening within the next few days if all goes the park's way.
 
-Timber Tug Boat opened today. I believe Lumber Jump is due to open tomorrow now too.
 
In terms of face covering. I was wearing a reusable one I bought from Lidl (2 for £2.99, 2 layers with space for a filter). It stayed on all rides fine, except for my back row ride on Stealth, where it came off my nose (front row was fine though!).
 
 
As for non-Covid stuff...
 
-I had my worst ever ride on Saw today. Was very painful.
 
-Swarm felt very vibrate-y.
 
-The vegetarian place by Ghost Train is alright for what it is. Does diversify food choices a lot.
 
-There's some new music in Old Town. Well, kind of new - it's the Old Town-soundy excerpt from the bridge loop. But it fits.
 
All in all, an okay visit. The park are doing well enough with the Covid-restrictions. They're still learning and getting stuff wrong, but it seems they're ready to fix it. Hopefully as time goes on things will be better. The park itself is the same old same old really. Some of the branding refreshes are nice, others aren't. It's hard to judge the park under such weird circumstance, but it does just feel a bit...meh.

I heard the park's future additions have been leaked:
2022: Nothing
2023: Remove some theming
2024: Nothing, Again.
2025: New gamestall to replace Slammer
2026: Nothing.
2027: Remove a coaster
2028: Giant murder hornets take over and park is forced to close forever.

As a back alley frequenter I can confirm this is correct.
 

Marc, it’s great you are so positive and it’s always great to get a positive opinion and outlook on life!
 
Unfortunately I just cannot agree. Blackpool has had a really successful opening day (bar issues with the big one due to wind) whereas merlin parks have been a bit of a shambles across the board. I’m tempted to say there’s been more rides closed than open today, and when the closed rides aren’t advertised on the website in advance, that’s pretty unprofessional in my opinion. Chessington and Legoland posted a list of what’s going to be open and closed, whereas Alton and Thorpe left their customers in the dark as to what would be operating, then Thorpe had all water rides shut, and towers had 2 major coasters closed. We can argue indoor rides are closed due to social distancing but at the end of the day I think indoor rides being closed is just down to budget cuts- out in Europe parks have indoor rides open so I don’t see why it should be any different over here. 
 
In terms of covid mitigation, which is really important right now, merlin have done a pretty good job from what I’ve seen. But it doesn’t cover up the fact that parts of towers and Thorpe have been neglected and just not maintained, this was an issue pre-covid but is surely not going to be helped by the pandemic as any budgets left for park upkeep and refurbishment have probably been lost in the 3 months of the parks not being open. And to combine the abundance of SBNO rides today across all the merlin parks, it’s pretty poor.
 
When I checked the Thorpe park queue times at one point today there was only 10 rides open and 14 closed, and because of this queue times are elevated too which means people are in close proximity for longer.
 
I also struggle to see how chessington is operating on a 10am-4pm opening hours, that’s just shocking to be honest I can’t believe they can get away with that- not related to Thorpe though.
 
So yeah in terms of covid measures, they’ve done a good job but there’s been way too many unadvertised ride closures today across Thorpe and towers and the parks are just looking really neglected. The pandemic isn’t going to help with this as merlin now will be struggling financially along with every other business out there. 
 
I just wish we had some more competition in terms of uk parks to give merlin that extra push in terms of investing in park maintenance, theming and upkeep.

Please forgive the terrible quality screenshots taken from my phone. I'm too lazy to watch the video again.
 
Jack's video shows some more new signage, which compliments the new entrance signage (which looks good):
 


I like it! Fresh, vibrant and quite reflective of what Thorpe is really (and the sort of brand they should stick to).
 
And then there's this:

One of the blandest, dullest entrance ways I've ever seen.
 
The removal of the rockwork and other Atlantis-esque, no matter how decaying it really was, creates such a boring, flat look. The poles holding up the Dome sign feel in the way and yet invisible at the same time.
 
I don't know how common an opinion it is, but I liked the Atlantis theme and still think it worked with the park today (what with the Port / Basecamp / Shark vibe). Sure, it was dated and falling apart, but it had some life and soul in it. After this and the black panels of blackness on the inside, it now feels like a run-down Butlins...
 
Shame, as the other signage we've seen so far is good.