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Coaster Polls


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MOD EDIT: Moved to new topic for polls in general as they come round frequently and generate a bit of discussion...

So In the Mitch Hawker Polls Nemesis and The Smiler were voted the UK's best coasters rating at #9 and #38 respectively, here was the rest of the UK chart... see if you agree!

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The Mitch Hawker poll should be taken with a pinch of salt to be honest. It's good for seeing general trends but never good to any individual roller coaster. In fact the only reliable data will be rides like Nemesis, Bizarro and Expedition Ge Force which manage to stay in similar positions every year. Take the wing riders for example, Raptor has managed to stay pretty consistent in its ranking but Swarm, X Flight and Wild Eagle have all dropped 30-60 places. Even Gatekeeper (which as a Cedar Point ride, has particular fanboy relevance) couldn't over-take Raptor on the poll.

Another fact is Theme Park Review. Last year Sky Scrapper wasn't even included but thanks to 11 riders, is apparently 19th best roller coaster in the world. No matter how good it is, that is way too small a sample to be accurate. The same stands for Kawasemi with its 19 riders.

So in conclusion, yay for Nemesis. Oldest rollercoaster in the top twenty. Merlin need to get some air time rides in as that is clearly a trend from an enthusiast point of view and a public one.

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I agree, The Smiler is obviously benefitting from the "newness" factor, and will no doubt drop off next year, I don't think it's a bad ride at all, but it's definitely ranked higher in the poll than I would've expected. It's fantastic to see Nemesis back in the top ten where it belongs, but I would've liked to see Nemesis Inferno, The Ultimate and Thirteen place higher than they did.

I think the poll itself is about as fair a poll as you'll ever get, yes there are some anomalies where the ridership is low, but compared to the likes of the Golden Ticket Awards it's much more of a balanced result. Looking at the latest Golden Ticket Awards, which are majorly voted for by select persons in the US, the results show only 6 coasters from outside North America appearing in the top 50, compared with 23 in the Mitch Hawker poll.

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It's all down to opinion. If everyone agreed on what the best ride in the world is then what would be the point of other rides? The great thing is everyone likes different things and types of ride. See in my opinion Colossus should be above Saw, Vampire below Kumali and X higher up (although it would be interesting to see how many people had been on the new X when they did the poll). Big One is quite high up, I wouldn't rate it that highly because after the first drop it is pretty boring and rough.

But woo! Go Nemesis for getting back in the top 10 and fighting of TPR's stupidly loved Chinese coasters ridden by like 20 people.

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So it seems only only two uk coasters made the top 100.

Shame inferno, Swarm and a Fury got so low. I remember a few years back when fury was in the top 50.

The uk definitely needs some new groundbreaking coasters now. I wish Merlin would knock this world first thing on the head and just plan on making a decent coaster with a great exciting layout.

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and X higher up (although it would be interesting to see how many people had been on the new X when they did the poll). .

There is the '2013 only' poll - http://www.ushsho.com/riddenthisyearsteelpoll2013.htm

X ranks 215th. Of course, this is out of all coasters ridden in 2013 by those who voted, which skews it a fair bit I assume. Would be interesting to see how it would have faired had it only been based on people who rode it 2013 though, I agree.

It's always pretty difficult to know how serious to take this poll, simply because of how varied rider numbers are, people's own preferences, etc. etc. However, it's always interesting to see general trends like Mark says, as well as how consistently good (or bad) some rides or ride types of viewed.

On the other hand, it's nice to see your favourite coaster(s) rate highly and see how many people agree with you. :P

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I'd say Cobra is the one ride standing out as grossly under rated among all that, it's not amazing but it is solid enough compared to other things above it. Based on how it is running right now maybe I would move Swarm up a bit too, as well as X, but for the most part the order seems about fair to me.

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I'd say Cobra is the one ride standing out as grossly under rated among all that, it's not amazing but it is solid enough compared to other things above it. Based on how it is running right now maybe I would move Swarm up a bit too, as well as X, but for the most part the order seems about fair to me.

All four of the Gerstlauer bobsleigh rides I've been on ranked lowly in the poll. Very unfair as they are cracking rides

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Where is Megaphobia on the list? Seems odd, if Speed had enough riders, that Megaphobia wouldn't. Especially as Megaphobia is generally considered to be the better ride (not ridden either myself).

I think the list is a fairly depressing reflection of UK coasters in general. The Smiler is riding on a newness bubble, it won't stick around that high for long. That means that in the TWENTY years since Nemesis we're still yet to see another coaster of world class quality. Of course, this is a little unfair, since rides like Oblivion and Stealth are pretty awesome, it's just that because they're standard layouts they're obviously going to suffer in comparison to bigger US equivalents.

It's such a shame that the overriding concern with UK parks seems to be USPs, rather than overall quality. We can't compete on height or size, but we absolutely could on quality of overall ride experience, and especially theming. If you look back to the early days of Chessington and Nemesis era AT, there was a time when UK parks were producing some of the most unique and impressive theming with a much smaller budget than the Disneys and Universals. We could easily return to this, with wealthy parks and free from the US mindset of 'build bigger and bigger' (I'm thinking stuff like Banshee). Won't happen though.

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(It's a steel coaster poll, they do a separate wooden one)

Haha. Oh yeah! Forgot about that, which is weird because I've been following this poll for years!

Why do they bother splitting it up? Would be interested to see how people rate top wooden coasters against top steel ones.

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