I think the long and the short of this argument is do you prefer Alton Towers or Thorpe Park.Being a northern girl I practically spent my childhood in AT and had no wish to journey down south to TP. As I got older, and therefore more picky, I saw more and more problems with AT. Yes, the scenery is lovely. Yes, the majority of the rides are great. Yes, the reliability of rides are better. And yes, sometimes they get the theming right - this is important to me as I still call them theme parks. But the delightful spaces work against it. They let too many people in. This is a bad habit they do all year round and, in my opinion, has gotten worse in the last few years. These big spaces also take up more of your precious park time getting from ride to ride - Bolt or not - you have to admit that sometimes those walks are arduous - and even if you get you Sky Ride I object to queuing for what is, in essence, a transport device. (Don't get me started on the monorail and the crazy hike from the car park to the actual gates.) I have been at multiple times of year from crammed with school kids to random non school holiday weekends and the queue times have been getting more out of hand than ever. The answer is simple - stop being greedy and put a limit on the number of people you let in, Merlin! I am more than capable of planning my way around a park, but 7 rides has been my latest maximum - no ambling and with only 30 mins for lunch.Only in the past few years have I been to Thorpe Park and in all honesty, I found it a breath of fresh air. I was instantly hit with the theming of certain areas - I really enjoy Amity and wish this level could be taken around the rest of the park (I'm still confused by the idea of a volcano plonked in the middle of it all). The rides were a big contrast to AT - but that's a personal thing. The fact that it reasonably compact and you can get around it quickly is a huge plus to me. I was there on the first weekend of the school summer holidays and I was not crammed I was not pushed and there were still places to sit and have a moment of rest should I want it - oh, and the rides times weren't insane - the longest was an hour, which, again in my opinion, is long enough for any ride (my last visit to AT all the major rides had queue times of over 60 mins). Having said all this I was there on the AP holders day at the beginning of the season - it was pretty dire. Rides were out, the park was ridiculously packed and the whole thing just seemed inept. And no, Merlin, after driving down there staying in a premier inn the night before to make sure I wasn't shattered so I could actually have a good day there, a crummy money off voucher with a time limit on it was not an acceptable mea culpa.Both have their draw backs, for me, AT's biggest problem is the huge spaces filled with nothing. TP's is the reliability of the rides. I'm glad we have these two parks engaged in this fight because otherwise they would rest on their laurels and former glory.Right at this moment I'm in Thorpe's corner. visit for visit on the last 5 occasions TP has won hands down and even better - I've actually been able to feel my legs and feet at the end of the day!