Cal

Okay let me break your post down just a little.
 
You will never be stuck on a ride for that amount of time UNLESS you are being evacuated. Too which, there are only a couple of rides which take an extended period of time to evacuate (Colossus, Saw & The SWARM). Stealth is a ride where you will not be sat on the train longer than 20/25 minutes (unless the engineer is 100% on the situation and can give an exact time on when the train can be moved, even disregarding that the first priority is to get the guests off as quickly as possible) without it being called for an evacuation, which only takes about 5 minutes.
 
IF the wheels fail to grip the train, the train is backed into the offloading position where you are offloaded there. So your statement of being stuck on the train for an hour is sensationally doubtful.
 
You clearly have poor planning skills, as has already been said by another member. Who on EARTH goes to a 3 hour event when they have to do a total of 6 hours of travelling to get there! That is like me taking a flight to Spain to get go to a Spanish shop then flying back home.  Complete waste of time and energy. Why the hell did you not even think about going for the entire day and eliminating the chance of 'queueing for an hour to get in'.
 
Another: Modern technology allows us to plan our routes avoiding any 'traffic' which occurs, (and you will be happy to know this was available in 2013) and therefore an alternative route could have been taken in the event traffic does occur. 
E.G - You are travelling on the M25 towards JCT 13 and you have just passed JCT 9, your sat-nav or your phone or the road signs tell you 'traffic ahead slow down' or ' replanning route' or whatever, you would clearly come off at JCT 10 and seek an alternative route. 
 
 
I'm going to be brutally honest here, you are picking for no actual reason. 

The 'crew' will the be same people, as working through the operational day.
 
 
 I believe that events such as these (as they have in the past) entitles guests attending the event to use the 'fastrack' queue until such time the main queue has gone. In order to use this queue you would obviously need 'Summer Nights' Ticket which the daytime guests would not have.
 
15 minutes?! Whatever will you do with your life. Maybe you should go on a day where the park reaches capacity and you are waiting on average 120-180 minutes for the main attractions. Then tell me that measly 15 minutes is long.

I'd like to revert back to a point I made earlier and as to why this years summer nights are going to fail:
Exclusive ride time between 7PM AND 10PM:
Seeing as the gates close at 7, and the park is going to be busy during summer, you still have at least 30 minute queues waiting to get on the rides, this means that summer nights holders will have to queue behind these people and wait to ride. It won't work.

http://www.mynews13.com/content/news/cfnews13/video.html?clip=http://static.cfnews13.com/newsvideo/cfn/FALCONS%20WEB%203.f4v&vtitle=Painting%20Falcon%27s%20Fury%20--%20Extended
 
The tower is now getting painted for aesthetic purposes and it looks great from the video!

I did prefer X's old music to be honest. With this years, you can get good music but you can also get bad music when you're on the ride. The lighting is so much better this year though which is good.

I did prefer X's old music to be honest. With this years, you can get good music but you can also get bad music when you're on the ride. The lighting is so much better this year though which is good.

Those first 500 better all actually go!

I would love them to keep the Director bit going but in between still play the Normal Fright Night themes. I love Detonator/Samurai Music. 

I have just returned from Port Aventura for 10 days (7 day ticket)
 
I have many complaints this year, however I will first mention the positives, we visited during the week in Which the park transitioned from a 10 - 20:00 closing time, to the White Night 'Noche Blana' 10:00 - 04:00, and then 10:00 - 00:00. So I had a good feel for the variety on offer and got to experience White Night and Fiesta Aventura. 
 
Angkor was a fun ride, however it is nonetheless simply a large Battle Galleons. 
 
I will simply exemplify previous comments, I have been an avid fan of Port Aventura for years and have gone almost every year, however this was possibly one of my worst experiences, (this is not to say I did not have a fantastic time about 75% of the time). 
 
My first major issue is the continued problem with the Spanish to know anything called 'Customer Service', generally they lack the basic concepts of a simple smile and acknowledgement (this is a gross exaggeration of Stereotype). Numerous times throughout my visit I had blunt staff, who did little but point and not even offer me eye contact. This is something I at least expect when I am paying over 4 Euro's for a Coco Cola. Nevertheless there was a significant minority that were helpful and offered the basic level of service I expect. 
 
Now our most popular topic on this forum...Queue Jumpers and Express Passes (I feel they belong in the same category because they are both ruining 70% of the customer's day). Where do I begin...Queue Jumpers, I acknowledged one sign at the entrance stating no queue jumping however beyond this, there are no signs to warn queue jumpers, nor would that matter because staff do not enforce this. And as has been stated on here, Spanish School Children especially like to jump the queue's to join their friends, irrelevant whether there are only 2 in the line and there are 10 of their 'mates'. 
 
I would put most of the queue jumping issues down to the layout of the queue line, the most prominent ones are Dragon Khan with its rectangle 100 meter hurdle fences, and Furius Baco with its amazing ability to cut a queue by 3 hours divided by one single metal bar easy enough for an 8 year old to climb over. 
 
I can agree with all when everyone's day is ruined no thanks to these...(I cannot use the words)...however numerous times my group failed to stop Queue Jumpers, and the staff do nothing to stop it even when you inform them. I did complain to Customer Services over this major issue, combined with the lack of enforcing a no smoking policy in queue lines, which really grinds my gears. 
 
As for Express Passes - well, all I can say is that if you are there for only 1 - 2 days, they are the greatest value for money ticket you could possibly ever buy if you come during peak season (10:00 - 00:00). I realised they are far more attractive than the UK Theme Park Fastpass offerings, because for only 25 Euro's you can skip the queues and for an extra 5 Euro's on top you can ride the top 3 Roller Coasters in the front row as well! That's 30 Euro's to get on everything...that's 50 Euro's per person including your entry ticket to get on everything and some more! No wonder it is so popular...ah...there is the problem...Now, do they limit this Express Pass System...NO, NO, NO...NO! Are queue times increased by double if not by three....YES! 
 
Numerous times coasters had full trains of Express Pass, with a notable incident with Furius Baco with 4 full trains of Express Pass without letting a single main queue get on...that is not fair, that is unprofessional, and just disrespectful...I did complain to customer service...guess what I got One Express Pass for Shambhala...defeats the object of my complaint...but hay, if you can't beat them you may as well join them! 
 
My main issue with Express Pass was, I did not see the value in spending extra for Express Pass when I had bought a 7 day ticket, and I was not able to use it over the 7 days...or at least I did not think I could do that. Therefore I had to stand in the long queues, however I in the end chose to do all of the shows and did the rides as and when they were under 90 minuets (albeit it could have been 45 minuets without Express Pass hogging most of the trains). 
The solution for Port Aventura for this simple problem, either restrict sales...but they will never ever do this because its a licence to print money, the only other option is to introduce time slots for the rides, too many times too many Express Passer's wished to use their Pass at the same time on one single ride causing major issues in the queue for the regular guests. So I strongly suggest Time Slots. 
 
One issue on my first day was the weather, Spanish Thunderstorm...obviously shut the rides until the storm was over, however I was amazed to see almost all rides shut 45 minuets after the rain had stopped and the sun had come out...if someone could explain to me why they did not operate way after any rain or wind please tell me! 
 
If you wish to do Angkor remember with Express Pass it runs at the capacity of Sonic Spinball. 
 
 
Fiestaventura - was a poor display, it has not changed in about 4 years, and where others have progressed Port Aventura has simply kept it the same.
 
Generation Forever was simply spectacular however - worth every moment, what a show, worth going to watch!
 
If you wish to know about White Night, you can either have a normal ticket for the whole day (normal gate price, or with your multi day ticket, etc), or buy an evening ticket from 8PM and rides run until 04:00 in the morning! There were a few incidents with my group which caused tensions and upsets, however once in the park, the event itself is fantastic and well worth a visit.
 
The park does not shut and reopen it simply stays open for the whole day and evening. It was a Brazilian Theme so there were parades of Dancers and Brazillian Drummers entertaining the busy crowds. They even raided Generation Forevever for a performance.
 
There was a live stage, and a foam party/Disco area in China. It really was a fun evening. However my negatives included, the lack of security presence beyond the entrance...too much Cannabis and my major niggle was at the entrance...I had entered earlier in the day, and had my hand stamped (my partner had not she stayed at the hotel), however when I returned, the crowds to get in was incredible (they were holding them back because they had 8PM Evening tickets, we did not, we had 7 day tickets) Long story short, we got turned away from both entrances, were told to go to customer services, I refused, and explained through the language barrier, that caused major tensions with my group and they should really reassess this procedure in the future.

EXCLUSIVE: 2015 will see Rumba rethemed as Rusty Rapids, with numerous shipping containers and rusty metal scattered around the ride, and the dark section rethemed to a warehouse - who knows what rusty theming lies within! Dare you brave the orange waters of Rusty Rapids?

Well had my first rides on Nemy again this weekend after nearly a year and can certainly say, the rides fantastic, the way it flus through twists, turns and corners gaining speed and power through the amazing landscape too whilst still being very smooth 20 years later,
Whilsts it's a shame the blood waterfall won't be returning for the foreseeable future, it's easily the best uk ride and I love it and could easily spend all day riding it.

Think he is referring to the seat belts on the doors.

*Revives*
 
 
Like Pluk, I also have the unfathomable joy of living in Essex.
 
Although I don't really have an accent, and I own no tracksuits or fake tan; sorry to disappoint.

So was looking around old planning applications (I do have a life, promise...), and found this little thing in Slammer's original application...
 

 
So one of the old MTDPs proposed that an existing water ride could be moved to what is now Slammer's site (as, bare in mind, that MTDP would've been written in the early 2000s).  Given the water-based rides at the park during that time, the only feasible option would've been Depth Charge.  Unfortunately, the original MTDP plans aren't available (there seems to be a nice habit of removing them off the council's site after a couple of years!), so who knows.  But yeah, slightly interesting maybe.
 
 
Also, near the end of the application, there's a report written by someone from Thorpe about the Sky Swat prototype built in Utah:

 
How true it was that the world became familiar with the Sky Swat, but unfortunately for all the wrong reasons!

I do prefer the original piece but it's still really good, it's good that they actually did that, so it's still in time. Can't believe it now takes a minute for it to get to the top now through! Still a great ride though    

Since Slammer has opened this season, I've noticed that the ride's theme has been extended by another 1 and a half minutes, as this is probably because the ride takes a little longer to raise and lower than it originally used to years ago.
 
After I edited the original soundtrack and added the new segments in-between certain parts of the track, here is the result:
 
Slammer - Extended.
 
The added segments Slammer now plays are between 0:27 -> 0:56 and 2:29 -> the end of the track. Apart from that, the rest sounds exactly the same.
 
Hasn't been posted yet, so thought I'd share the ride's new one!

And on Rita, 1 min 45 to 1 mins 50 secs.  

Ooooo, fancy  

Obviously going to be rethemed around Saw next season then.

And on Rita, 1 min 45 to 1 mins 50 secs.  

The Halloween event at Universal is a separate ticket. Meaning on HHN the park closes at 5pm with it reopening for HHN at 6 till 11/12/1. Islands stays open till 8 ish though.
I believe it's the same for Busch Gardens Howl'O Scream. I'd expect it to be moderately busy with queues between 30 minutes and an hour (probably less). The main rides are very rarely closed for maintenence and although it may not be a particularly busy time of year it is one of the recognised time so they'll plan maintenance schedules around this.

It opened the day after you went Was only down for the one day and a bit the day before.

If you don't wanna get wet, don't go on a water ride surely

You can find the maintenance schedule for Busch on their website which shows a year in advance. Universal tend to show closures a month or so in advance under their opening times. Not to sure about Disney.
And it depends what time of October you go as the beginning half of the month I know to be quiet. Not sure on the later half.

Thorpe, not the word... look up 'Idiom' in your dictionary