Mark9

Go. To. Chessington. (Or not as it isn't open, go to Alton Towers for Ripsaw)

Rule 1. Chessington Lies.

I was thinking more Vietnam personally.

Me to. Come on Thorpe, give us what we really want.

The majority of The Swarm and The Smilers costs comes to the construction process. The Swarm costs more in that figure because of the infilling of the lake. Arguably, The Swarm is much more of a quality product then The Smiler so whilst Smiler is already starting to age (not to mention its frequent bouts of closures), The Swarm feels as smooth as it did on open day and has never had a full day closed.

Colour scheme is the best part of this ride. And that is no criticism of the ride.

You mean that really warm part of America that regularly sees temperatures well into the 30's? Chessington would argue that air on on Tomb would be a waste of money but then upkeeping their rides would also be seen as a waste of money so you-know, va la voom.

My favourite part of that growth is the jump in attendance at Towers thanks to Nemesis

Less talk, MORE TRIP REPORT!

It's been that way for years.

Happy Birthday Big Dipper

That looks so awesome. I swear two days ago there was only the station and a bit of the immelman track and then suddenly, bam, its nearly finished. Very fast construction! Probably but lets not forget that The Swarm is still a great ride. The wing rider should evolve as more parks get their holds on one. I'm not sure it looks better, it certainly looks tidier though.

Fantastic video, thanks to Theme Park Worldwide for hosting the video. It's a rather telling video and there are a few points that really strike me from it. -His love for Megafobia and wooden rollercoasters in general. He quite rightly should be proud of Megafobia, one of the under-rated gems in the UK. It says a lot about him as a person that he prefers rides to be about adventures of experiences and not flash in the pan marketing speil. - His dissatisfaction working on the Smiler. It speaks volumes that a ride creator prefers his 19 year old rollercoaster because of the values it was built upon. Not to be the highest or the biggest but to be the best it could be. Merlin could learn a few lessons from that. - His respect for people like Candy Holland and the way the Smiler was marketed. Clearly, Merlin has some amazing staff that just aren't allowed to reach their limits because of silly rules from up above. - Marketing gets in the way of brilliance. When he describes Saw the ride as successful from IP more then ride, it really says a lot about the way the company is run. Especially when he talks fondly of Thirteen working (one remembers that rides open day very vividly), you can see that John Wardley thinks of a ride as more then just the ride hardware but every element that goes into it. I've so much respect for him. He speaks so candidly and honestly in that interview and you can't help but feel the what if's when you listen to him.

It used to be two adults maximum per car, so thats something Chessington has sorted out slightly. Does that rule still apply on Rattlesnake, as it did the last time I went to Chessington.

I wasn't mightily impressed with this project at first. Then you see track and you suddenly think "Heide Park visit 2014"

The problem is they are running rides on full capacity. How can Vampire run three trains for example if the third train no longer exists. The Toadies 3 car thing is a blinder though. Truckers crashes frequently, does that mean it should only run one Truck per cycle. Man, Chessington's gone to the dogs.

It's bollocks (Excuse my French). The ride runs perfectly safely on three trains and it's down to cost cutting (maintaining three trains costs more then maintaining two) that the third train has been canablized.

The difference being that without fastrack, the queue moves at a consistent rate so whilst it may be physically longer, psychologically it feels shorter.

Oh I know Ian, I'm just throwing it out there that if it was 50%, it's too high

They don't need your pity. The problems they have created are of their own making and people are within their rights to complain if the park isn't delivering because of its own errors. 2 hours and 40 minutes for Vampire? Get out of here there isn't a hells chance I would waste a third of my day waiting for an 'ok' family rollercoaster.

All I can think is if they are selling 50% of a rides throughput then they are over-selling the product massively. They could easily increase the price, reduce the amount sold and then please a lot more people. Why aim for 50% happy people when they can go for 100% of people?

Inferno by a country mile. Stealth second because I like seeing the pwetty lights all around the area from the top

I agree partially. It is the Summer Holidays so there will be queues. What is compounding the problem is with no Runaway Train or Rameses, the other rides with their lower capacities due to Chessington being incompetent/stupid/dumb mean whereas in 2008, they could cope, now they can't. So when they say, they only got on two rides I can see why. Especially if things like Monkey Swinger is getting 45 minute queues or Kobra at 2 hours (WHAT?!) then clearly there is massive issues going on at the park, something poor planning will make even worse. People shouldn't have to plan their days to military precision, some families do go just to chill out, something that is hard to do when you're queuing long for flipping diskos or trashed dark rides.

Count me amazed that people visit Chessington in the first place.

Thanks to Theme Park Review. So the new rollercoaster is a Gerstlauer family ride with forwards and backwards launch sections and will be called Firechaser Express. The park has also announced it is building the Dream More resort with hotel and other amenities.