Return of Reserve N Ride?

[TPJames]

Hi all,

I was just having a look at the thorpe website and I've noticed a feature on it.

https://www.thorpepark.com/tickets-passes/ticket-information/

When you click on tickets the options come up, RESERVE N RIDE, is the last on the list however risk still there. However, when you click on it, it comes up with an error message! My question is mainly aimed at thorpe however it takes a while to do a direct message to them so I was wondering if anyone knew if they had plans to bring back the system?

Many thanks.

[Mitchada04]

The flats weren't meant to be on the trial. Only the big 5 coasters are, everything else is on the system for you to buy fastrack for if you want. They're trialling it to trial it and see if it works! Now the main issues have been resolved and people heavily complained about not being able to queue normally it works quite well. It's updating quickly with ride closures and so on, hasn't crashed so far today. 

[Project LC]

A few weeks ago the RnR page displayed the flats as an option to queue and Thorpe parks twitter did mention the plan was to have it on all rides. Also what is the case with queueing normally. It was there for a bit then disappeared again so what is it now?

[Marc]

You can still queue normally if you want - but it works in your favor to use reserve n ride. After looking over social media it looks to have got nothing but good feedback today!

[Project LC]

There is nothing from stopping people from queuing normally and reserve and ride at the same time. Surely if people had any sense at all that is what they would do.

[Olistjj]

I did it yesterday and I must say the system worked extremely well! Loved standing in the queue for rush whilst still "virtually queueing" for Nemesis Inferno also loved the fact that you joined from the fastrack rather than thw beginning of the standing queue. Only problems I noticed were Colossus had its r&R queue by where the queue for the cabin in the woods joins the main path and most people couldn't see the r&R person at the other end and so didn't know what it was for. Also the swarm had no person controlling the ratio of r&R, fastrack & normal queue so by the bag drop off it was chaos. Sadly for the people that don't like the system I was talking to my VIP host who said that THORPE is aiming to make the r&R system the only way to queue for the top 5 coasters next season. After using thw system I must say I have been converted and I would like to see it implemented once it has been tweaked slightly

[Project LC]

How long did you wait for rush? I struggle to believe that I am the only one seeing this massive massive problem with the system. You cant just make the 5000 to 10,000 people go else where when they are in a THEME PARK! Thorpe park is a THEME PARK NOT A SHOPPING CENTRE. What do they think will happen to that lot if you close the main queue, they wont suddenly stop existing. If anyone at Thorpe can answer where do those people go from ride host to the creator of this stupid system themselves it would be greatly appreciated. On a side note does anyone have merlin entertainments complaint email place because ive had enough of this stupid idea. You would think having an annual pass since 2005 would get you some sort of value but apparently not. The entire idea of RnR is a stupid gimmick which doesn't solve anything at all. You have 15,000 people in the park either have a large majority in the high throughput rides or offload them all to low throughput flats. Great idea Thorpe, truly an original idea of ignoring physics and thinking that your park can be queue less. Look at all the other massive theme parks which are already doing this where it works so well, oh wait none of them are! Disney tried and failed. Cedar fair and six flags never tried because they know it is impossible. Merlin know its impossible and wont work hence why its being done to Thorpe and not its flagship park of Alton. In case you cant tell the entire idea makes me very very angry and I highly doubt I'm the only one. Yes at least they are trying. WRONG. Any normal park would have seen queues were getting bad and invested in high throughput flats to bring down the queues. Instead they buy stormsurge and redecorated a thearter. So to combat the problem you develop a system which will never work because the throughput of the entire park is still the same. It has a fixed number of people it can deal with and until that rises Thorpe park will be forever plagued with its queues. Go ahead and argue with what ever point you like but my mind is fixed on this entire stupid gimmicky waste of time and money system known as Reserve and ride.

[Olistjj]

The queue for Rush was 40 minutes and the nemesis queue was 58 minutes so it worked out well, I do understand your point in theory completely however I stayed over & went on 2 very busy days and the queues for the flats were not excessive, however this might've been because of the normal queue on the 'top 5' still being used, however either way somehow on the two busy days I was there it worked

[Mitchada04]

It doesn't affect the other rides anywhere near that much! Today at one point on R'n'R: Saw had 3 hours, Swarm 1.5, Colossus Stealth and Nemesis just over 1 hour each. The standby queues weren't particularly busy for these coasters as in how many people were in them (just longer times because of the many systems operating). Flat ride times were as expected/usual.

[Project LC]

Sorry what? 3 hours!!! No ride should ever reach 3 hours regardless of if it is virtual or not. The flat rides will sky rocket come the closure of the main queue which I'm sure is what will happen. If the other coaster queues what on earth do you do in the 3 hours your waiting for saw. Oh I guess you could wait for rush which is what everyone would do which would give rush a 3 hour queue. Arh good problem solved. Love the logic thorpe, love it.

[TPJames]

I DO completely understand Prioject LC and as much as anyone wants to attack me for it, I understand where he is coming from. So everyone please hear me out...

I haven't tried RNR yet but I intend to at some point, and it is all very well using it with the main queue as well to make guests happy however they must use the system properly to make it any good! RNR is making the main queues ridiculous, the amount of complaints I've seen saying nemesis stated 50mins and they waited 2 hours due to reserve n ride. If thorpe want to implement the system, they MUST sort out the ratios. I know that's the reason the trials are here but the staff are only letting RNR guests through by the sounds of things, they aren't even trying to control the correct ratios.

Anyway, if thorpe only let the big rides be queued on RNR, the people would be moved. You would have 5000-10000 on a busy day all going to the flat rides. Thorpe do not have enough shows to suck up the people and they would all be moved to different rides in the park, meaning they would get massive queues. There is no such thing as a queue-free theme park. The British love to queue, when slammer was closed on Wednesday for checks, an hours queue formed outside the entrance even though it wasn't even open! My point is, you can't get rid of the queues in thorpe park, they will simply be moved making other rides have dreadful queues.

I'm sorry this has been stressy but if thorpe either don't sort out their ratios, or operate it with both main queue and RNR(unlike their plans)- with correct ratios, it simply will not work. I hate to be negative but there is no way of getting rid of queues, there is only a way of moving them to other places.

[Coaster]

Making R&R the only way to queue is never going to work.

[Project LC]

It will never work and yet I'm sure Thorpe park is perfectly happy to continue with this. I really do hope that Thorpe enjoy the title of the UK's worst theme park.

[pluk]

It's not necessarily the ratios that need to change, just the accuracy of the queue times. As long as the displayed times are accurate people can make an informed choice on whether to join a queue or not, at a certain point most will decide it's not worth while and get an r&r or go elsewhere instead; the system is then self regulating and will work just fine.

 

I don't know why Thorpe have always struggled to get an accurate queue time displayed, it's been quite a big problem for the last few years in my experience. For r&r to work it's one of the things simply have to get right.

[Project LC]

Displaying the actual queue times wont help. They will still exist and people will be forced into waiting as there is nothing else to do. I thought by now I would have calmed down about the idea of making it the only way to queue for the top 5 next year however I haven't. It really is the most stupid idea anyone has ever put money into. I hope it crashs and burns and costs thorpe a lot for even testing the idea. 

[Olistjj]

When I was in the STEALTH control booth yesterday on the backstage tour I could hear the ride controller talking to a manager and the manager was saying the queue was 50 minutes but the controller was saying it was 20 so even in the booth there is confusion as to how long it is, disregarding r&R for a second they need a way of accurately measuring queue times with a system that will constantly adapt to the actual throughput so as to give as much of a realistic time as possible and banish the stories of " it said 20 minutes but we actually waited an hour"

[Project LC]

Only realistic way of doing that would be to count the number of people entering the queue. Then combine that with the throughput being achieved and you may be able to work out the queue time to some level of accuracy. However that requires a person at the entrance and batching or a turnstyle.

[Benin]

If Thorpe decide to make this system the only way to queue for their coasters next year then I won't be visiting...

Though tbh I'm already considering if I can be bothered to renew my MAP in the first place...

[TPJames]

I just realised a slight flaw in the system. I was trying out reserve n ride and it turns out you don't actually have to be at thorpe park to reserve... This means that people at home can mess up the system(not my intention I promise!) by adding loads of people in making the queue much longer for people at the park.

Needs a thing to determine your location as it can easily be tampered with and messed up.

[OliOliOli]

Ideally, I think in order to use the system you should need a code. On entering the park, either as a pass holder or a ticket buyer, you'd specify how many are in your group, with those people there, and get a code for that amount and then enter the park. Entering that code would enable RnR for the number of people in your group on one device. This would mean people not at the park couldn't reserve and would prevent the situation where 6 people in the group can all virtually queue and reserve for the 6 others, being in 6 queues at the same time.

[Mark9]

If Thorpe decide to make this system the only way to queue for their coasters next year then I won't be visiting...

Though tbh I'm already considering if I can be bothered to renew my MAP in the first place...

 

This, although I still haven't renewed my pass and haven't visited Thorpe since March AP day. The rollercoasters

 are the only things really worth riding at Thorpe and I won't be queuing 2 hours for Rush or Zodiac to fill the inbetween time.

 

Has anyone told Thorpe (Or Merlin for that matter) that the way to get a queueless theme park is to have excellent staff, high through put rides, maximum capacity at all times and no fastrack clogging up the system.

[TPJames]

Sorry for breaking the conversation here... Please can someone tell me how swarm has a main line of 60mins but the reserve n ride is walk on? Makes utterly no sense and seems like a free way to fastrack to me.

EDIT: it's the same with inferno aswell, main queue of 30mins but RNR of 0. I can only presume this is due to all the RNR being fastracked through due to the ridiculous main queue to RNR ratios.

[Olistjj]

When I was there two days ago I had to refresh the page a couple of times on my mobile to show up the queue times, however it might also be because it is at the beginning of the day and not many people have used it yet

[TPJames]

But then I don't understand why people are waiting in 30-60min queues atm for the big rides when you could go straight on with RNR?

[Olistjj]

Probably because they cba or they just don't wanna try the new system, they probably will towards the end of the day when they realise r&R goes in through the fastrack entrance and that if they did it thwy wouldn't be being cut up. In the summer this system is working good as you couldn't re ride anyway so using the system doesn't mean you'll go on less rollercoasters, and so far the flats have been coping well from my experience.

[TPJames]

The only reason the flats are coping well is because the main queues are open for the coasters. If these main queues for the coasters are closed off and people are forced to use RNR, then the flat rides will get exceedingly high queue times, which will be a shame.

On a side note there, Colossus, swarm and saw are all over 45mins and RNR is still walk on. I really fear about the unfair ratios as by this rate I could have done all 5 coasters while someone in the main queue will have only done one.