Matt N

Couldn’t they just aim the high points of the ride away from Staines and towards the back corner of the park? If they did that, surely that might overcome some of the problems? I’ve often heard it said that Thorpe could run a hyper around the back of the park from Old Town/the Logger’s Leap site, with the main body of the ride itself running along the service road around the back of the park. For what it’s worth, John Wardley even said that a hyper would be doable within Thorpe’s planning restrictions. In terms of where Wardley said this, it was a comment made within Making Thorpe Park regarding a B&M Hyper that Wardley and B&M had strategised for a 2012 coaster instead of The Swarm. The source was cited as an interview with John Wardley himself conducted as part of the research for the book (the source is cited as “Interview with John Wardley, 20 July 2020” in the book’s bibliography). Here’s the exact comment; the relevant part is in bold: “When [B&M] was approached to suggest ideas for the first of the new development islands, they were strongly against using the new Wing model. The flat piece of land didn’t really play to the strengths of the concept, and Wardley felt that a different B&M option should be used instead. His preference was a Hyper Coaster, a tall ride that offers high speeds and massive airtime. Having good knowledge of local planning restrictions, he was confident that permission would be agreed and it would be the perfect complement to the four major rollercoasters already in operation at Thorpe Park.” For context, this would have been a few years after Stealth, perhaps around 2009-2010. Thorpe’s height ceiling is 500ft, apparently, with structures over 200ft needing to apply to the CAA for approval (due to Heathrow being close by). While I’ll admit that a 500ft coaster seems like a long shot in terms of approval, I don’t see them struggling too much with a hyper in the 200-250ft range, personally. As much as Stealth may have required special permission at the time, I’d argue that it may well have set a precedent for the minimum height that Thorpe would be allowed to build a coaster to; if a coaster of Stealth’s size or a little bit taller encountered issues, then the park could quite feasibly say “We’ve operated Stealth at 205ft for 15 years with no issues” to defend themselves and make a case for the approval of a hyper coaster.

Hi guys. Since Tussauds' purchase of Thorpe Park in 1998, Chessington & Thorpe Park, two of the UK's largest theme parks, have operated under the same corporate umbrella (Tussauds from 1998 through to 2007, Merlin since 2007) within very little distance of each other; both parks serve the London area, and they are only a very short drive away from each other. Tussauds' initial reasoning for purchasing Thorpe Park was in order to eliminate Chessington's closest competition within the South (Thorpe was a family park to the same, if not a greater, extent than Chessington at the time, and as John Wardley put it, Tussauds' mentality was one of "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em"). While acquiring Thorpe did clear this particular roadblock for Tussauds in the short term, I believe it created them a rather different dilemma to grapple with in the long term; both Tussauds and Merlin seem to have had real trouble getting the two parks to coexist happily alongside one another. Now given that both have operated alongside one another within Tussauds/Merlin for 23 years, that might seem like an odd thing to say. But what I mean is; whenever one park in the duo succeeds from a business perspective, it seems to have the unwanted side effect of sending the other into a downward spiral. For evidence of what I mean, let me cite the UK Merlin park attendance graph shown during the Project Amazon consultation: (For reference, Chessington is the blue line and Thorpe Park is the red line; if you want a clearer image of this graph, here's a link to another thread on TowersStreet: https://towersstreet.com/talk/threads/uk-merlin-park-guest-figures-through-the-years.5778/) If we take a look at this graph between 1998 and the present day (well, 2020), I think it unveils some extremely interesting trends, and implies that a rather odd dynamic is at play among Merlin's southern RTPs. For instance, the first period where Thorpe's attendance really skyrockets on the chart is 2001/2002... which is exactly where Chessington's attendance starts to sharply decline. By the Merlin buyout in 2007, both parks had gone in vastly opposite directions attendance-wise, with Chessington having dropped right down to 1 million flat (from a solid 1.5-2 million prior to this period and very close to 2 million in the late 90s) and Thorpe having skyrocketed to nearly 2 million (from slightly below 1 million prior to this period). However, the tables began to turn in the late 2000s and early 2010s. Chessington's attendance began to steadily rise again during this period... while Thorpe's substantial growth began to level off and eventually turn back to decline. By 2019, Chessington was on an upward trajectory and had offset the losses of the 2000s entirely, reaching an attendance level of slightly above 1.5 million; this is roughly on par with 2000, the year prior to this cycle starting. Thorpe, on the other hand, was on a downward trajectory and had offset the bulk of what they gained during the 2000s; 2019 attendance was 1.5 million or a touch below, which is around on par with 2002, one of the very first years of the cycle. Chessington actually overtook Thorpe Park again in 2019, for the first time since the cycle began in 2001/2002. I don't know about you, but I personally think that this shows that a vicious cycle is at play within Merlin's two London area Resort Theme Parks; whenever one park prospers, it seems to be at the expense of the other. While Thorpe initially prospered in the 2000s, Chessington really struggled. While Chessington prospered in the 2010s, Thorpe really struggled. The two parks seem to cannibalise each other's attendance to an extent, and I can't think of any other situation in the world quite like it (in the sphere of theme parks, at least). So my question to you today is; can you think of any ways that Merlin could make this duo of parks coexist happily, and kick the cycle of attendance cannibalisation to the curb? Are there any other similarly situated groups of parks that have made it work? Why did this cycle begin in the first place? I'll admit I'm struggling to think of things myself, so I'd be really intrigued to hear some of your thoughts.

It looks as though Paultons Park received an inadvertent publicity boost the other day when Boris Johnson praised his recent visit to the park in a speech to British business leaders: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-59373237 Let’s hope that this translates to some additional ticket sales for Paultons! If nothing else, it will certainly make the park quite an infamous place within political circles…

I definitely think that would be a good fit at some stage, and I do reckon that might happen at some point, but I’m unsure if it would be the right fit for Thorpe at this stage, personally. Despite Swarm and DBGT’s failures, they know that thrills have worked in the past (and I should add that both Swarm and DBGT had extenuating circumstances working against them that contributed substantially to said failures, particularly Swarm), so for an investment like this, which really needs to rejuvenate the park after a dry spell, why not go for something that they know has a fair chance of working?

I’ll admit I’m a little unsure what to think about Icon getting spinning cars, personally. On one hand, it’ll certainly be a unique feature for the ride to boast, and will hopefully give it that marketability that it perhaps lacked in its initial years. Time Traveler and Ride to Happiness have also received rave reviews, so hopefully this could boost the ride’s middling reputation among enthusiasts. (Although Time Traveler and RTH use slightly different tech) On the other hand, I personally absolutely love Icon as is, and I think the back row is my favourite row. I’m also not overly keen on spinning coasters, so I’ll admit that I would be quite sad to see my favourite seats go in favour of spinning seats. I’m not really the target audience for this, though, and the park shouldn’t care what I, a statistically insignificant enthusiast who hasn’t visited since 2019, thinks or whether I like spinning coasters or not; I hope it’s a success for them, even if it’s not an idea I’m necessarily sold on from a personal point of view.

Sorry to bump this thread, but I just wanted to ask; is it me, or has Wicker Man been riding a little better in 2021? From my experiences, the ride has felt a little bit faster than in previous years, and it has also been packing quite a few pops of surprisingly excellent airtime where there was previously none! Does anyone else agree with me, or am I just perceiving things? I’ve always really liked Wicker Man since first riding it on opening weekend in 2018 and having my expectations exceeded by a considerable margin (given that the forums were very pessimistic about how Wicker Man would ride and I had no prior GCI experience to compare with, I had pretty low expectations, but I was absolutely blown away!), but over the last year or so, it’s strongly grown on me! Since an excellent couple of rides in July 2020, I’ve been absolutely loving it, and it seems to have gone up by another level again for me in 2021! I just love the fast pace of it, as well as the fun turns, great pops of airtime and the relative smoothness and comfort compared to other wooden coasters! Overall, I do absolutely love it, and it really is a coaster I rank highly! I apologise if this is controversial, but as someone who rates fun and rerideable coasters highly over the out and out intense, I personally have it as my comfortable favourite at Alton Towers, and it’s only narrowly beaten by Icon within the UK for me! For me to rank a ride highly, it has to pack enough thrill for me to get a real kick out of riding, but it can’t be so intense or rough that it causes nausea or hurts me, and I personally think that even though I wouldn’t traditionally call myself a wooden coaster person, Wicker Man satisfies that brief for me more than the vast majority of coasters I’ve ridden! It’s certainly made me look forward to hopefully riding Wodan next year, anyway, as most seem to think it beats Wicker Man by a considerable margin…

Thanks for the info, but with regard to the bolded, what makes you think this will be a Mack, out of interest? I’m not saying you’re wrong by any stretch, as I certainly think it’s plausible, but it does seem like an interesting contrast to the other strong rumours I’ve heard. Many online, including some who I know are well connected within Merlin, seem to think that this will be a B&M Hyper Coaster, and I do think it’s a plausible conclusion; based on Chessington’s 2023 coaster and the family B&Ms planned for numerous Chinese Legolands, I think it can be inferred that Merlin is at very least in strong cahoots with B&M at the moment, and they may well have had some form of discount on numerous rides. As such, I could see Merlin wanting to utilise this for as many rides as they possibly can within the chain, which would make a B&M Hyper quite a good possibility for Thorpe, in my opinion. Merlin also has quite a strong history with B&M; of all the Merlin-built coasters listed “Extreme” on RCDB, all bar 2 of them were built by B&M, and the other 2 (Saw & Smiler) were built by Gerstlauer, who I don’t see Merlin going back to after the Smiler incident. For clarity, Thirteen, Wicker Man and Mammut are listed as “Thrill” on RCDB, but even if we look at all of the coasters Merlin has built in RTPs since the initial purchase of Gardaland in 2006, 5/13 of them were constructed by B&M, and that percentage grows substantially if you include the upcoming coaster at Chessington and exclude kiddie & family coasters. For one manufacturer, that’s a big percentage, and I do personally think it shows that Merlin has a rock solid relationship with B&M. Mack, on the other hand, haven’t done an awful lot for Merlin besides some clones for Legoland parks, and I did hear a rumour that Mack are not too fond of Merlin as a client based on past treatment, and would not be keen to enter into a bespoke, large-scale project with the company, although do take that with a pinch of salt. Besides, I think one would be a fantastic fit for Thorpe, and would satisfy many criteria that the management themselves previously cited as being required for any major investment. At an enthusiast event a few years ago, the park management themselves said that after the failures of DBGT, they wanted the next major investment to be marketable, reliable and to have high capacity. I don’t know if you’d agree, but I personally think a B&M Hyper would fulfil all of these criteria (“tallest coaster in the UK” would certainly be a good USP for marketing, and B&Ms are typically both reliable and high capacity), and I also think that it would provide a really rerideable coaster that’s just pure fun, which I personally feel is something that Thorpe presently lacks. So in essence; my personal money is on a B&M Hyper Coaster here, and I also think that it will break the UK height record. Regardless of what replaces Logger’s Leap, though, whether it’s a B&M or a Mack as you suggest, I certainly think it’ll be an exciting ride!

Hi there! I’ll probably be a familiar face if you’re a frequent reader of TowersStreet or CoasterForce, but for those of you who don’t know me; I’m Matt, I’m 18 years old and I’m a theme park enthusiast from the Forest of Dean! In terms of my own history with Thorpe; my first visit was back in 2014, when I was 11, and I’ll admit that even though I didn’t visit Thorpe at least once every year as a child in the same way that I did Alton Towers (the bulk of my Thorpe experiences have certainly been quite recent, unlike Towers where I have a plethora of childhood memories), I have grown a real soft spot for the park over all my visits since then, and I always enjoy a day there! My favourite Thorpe ride is The Swarm, but I’ll admit that Nemesis Inferno has really grown on me in recent years and comes a very close 2nd these days; it’s a smashing coaster, in my opinion! In terms of other theme parks and rides; my current coaster count is 79, my current favourite roller coaster is Mako at SeaWorld Orlando (I last rode it in August 2016, but my goodness do I remember the airtime being brilliant!), and my favourite theme park is Universal’s Islands of Adventure (the theming and general sense of immersion is just spell-binding, in my opinion, and the rides are excellent too; it really is the full package!)! So, that’s a brief introduction to me, for those of you who don’t already know me! I apologise if that’s a little more than you wanted to know (I’m not the best at concise writing…), but that’s some stuff I thought you might find interesting!