Mark9

Ah, remember that season where Bash Street Bus spent about 75% of it closed and then Marc said Thorpe had better reliability because of this. Those were the days.

So. I was reading TTF and a member posted
Now, I'm not an alarmist and I'm going to take that with a pinch of salt so far. I know fastrack is going to be added to other rides in the park but if what this person has said is true then it's quite possibly the stupidest decision Chessington's managers could ever come up with and quite frankly I desperately hope they re-look at it before they and impliment it.The issue here is simple. Fastrack can only work on rides if it has a throughput that can manage to still get through the main queue, a standby queue and any exit riders that may come to the ride at any point.I'm going to start with the ride that will be least effected, Toadies. That could just about get through the people and have no issues. It mostly has a 5 minute queue and the cars are big enough to be able to fill up seats and pair people up if need be.Jumbos is an issue. It's a very popular ride and realisitcally it struggles at the best of times. It's queue can spring up very quickly during summer and its not uncommon to see 40 minute queues.Toadies throughput is 260 an hour and Jumbos, if you're lucky, fast, reduce the ride time and are able to fill all seats has a throughput of 250 an hour.Truckers will not be able to take potentially three seperate queues. It's absolutely ludicrious that they can even be thinking that fastrack on a ride that you have to work bloody fast on to even achieve 200 people an hour is a good idea. The only possible way an operator on Truckers will be able to operate that ride in summer is for the trucks to only go round once. That is poor value for the amount people may have to queue. So yeah, Chessington, think of the sanity of your operators here. Trucks is a nightmare ride at the best of times...

Hope this is the right place, it is kind of a report on a trip :)So anyway, yesterday I was still feeling a bit ill and was really bored so I hopped on the train with my camera and spent the day going around the City of London. I went to a load of places I've never been before, such as the Gherkin, Lloyds building, Bank of England, and some more familiar places like Tower Bridge and St Pauls. It's the first time I've really used my new lens I got a while back in low light so don't expect too much but hopefully some of these have turned out okay. Resizing has reduced the quality in some of them but if anyone wants to see originals I'd be happy t PM or whatever. I'll stop typing and just leave it to the pictures I guess. Enjoy and feel free to critique!
Thanks for looking

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zb64y6Nvs0&feature=player_embedded

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zb64y6Nvs0&feature=player_embedded

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zb64y6Nvs0&feature=player_embedded

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zb64y6Nvs0&feature=player_embedded

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zb64y6Nvs0&feature=player_embedded

These trains are just cute...

This is the best topic EVER!

Benin is riding a flying Pig. Your arguement is invalid.

BEEP, BEEP BEEPAH HA, HOLD ON TIGHT TINY TRUCKERS, CAUSE HERE WE GO, AHOOO

Who is that handsome boy?

BEEP, BEEP BEEPAH HA, HOLD ON TIGHT TINY TRUCKERS, CAUSE HERE WE GO, AHOOO

Complete worldwide domination. Got to love Gaga =D

I take all that on board obviously. But the thing is the park is now relying on a 25 year old infrastructure. The theme park and the zoo, well ones been there for ages anyway and the zoo since the 1920's so the only recent addition is the hotel which Merlin didn't play any part of.I know that throwing money at a place and hoping it sticks is not the solution, however why would throwing money in making Runaway train and Safari Skyway look 100% better be a problem. Unless Runaway is about to get the chop of course. At which point I wonder, Chessington has been under Merlin control since 2007, whilst yeah there's a transition period, why hasn't something happened yet to all the rides at Chessington that are really starting to look delapidated. It may give Chessington a chance to breathe. It's competing with so much at the moment under the Merlin umbrella, so whilst Alton and Thorpe seem to be on this investment plan, Legoland getting a hotel and improvements and new rides every year, Gardaland and Heide with new Beemers, Chessington really does look like the poor relation. It probably would struglly with new owners. But at the moment the park is going on with one major ride at 21 years old, its second in command almost 10 years old and then what.. Kobra? Rattlesnake? IMHO it really needs a decent level of investment; and I'm not talking more new restaraunts either.

I think this is the most appropriate place. I'd actually like to see Chessington be sold off from the Merlin group and be completely independant, family owned. It's just my feeling of course but being part of a huge family of parks, competing with Legoland, Thorpe, Alton, Heide, Gardaland and all the little subsidaries can't be easy and every single year Chessie comes off as one of the poor cousins. Whilst the other parks get large rides and additions, Chessington gets a retheme and a cheap disko ride and is considered its "large investment year."Small parks such as Paultons, Drayton Manor, Flamingoland and Lightwater Valley prove it can be done, that you can be successful without being part of a brand. Chessington for me is at a point where it's older rides are looking well past their sell by dates. When the park opens next month Skyway will still have the old faded 90's look on its trains, the Runaway rocks will still look like they are falling apart and the Bubbleworks will look even more shambolic.

I think this is the most appropriate place. I'd actually like to see Chessington be sold off from the Merlin group and be completely independant, family owned. It's just my feeling of course but being part of a huge family of parks, competing with Legoland, Thorpe, Alton, Heide, Gardaland and all the little subsidaries can't be easy and every single year Chessie comes off as one of the poor cousins. Whilst the other parks get large rides and additions, Chessington gets a retheme and a cheap disko ride and is considered its "large investment year."Small parks such as Paultons, Drayton Manor, Flamingoland and Lightwater Valley prove it can be done, that you can be successful without being part of a brand. Chessington for me is at a point where it's older rides are looking well past their sell by dates. When the park opens next month Skyway will still have the old faded 90's look on its trains, the Runaway rocks will still look like they are falling apart and the Bubbleworks will look even more shambolic.