Logger's Leap

[mrmonkey]

On 1/6/2017 at 11:09 AM, Vince800 said:

As much as that seems like a good idea, they have yet to replace the rock work on Dragon Falls at Chessington which is supposed to have it in the first place and hasn't had it's complete themeing in over a decade.

 

Your not wrong - shame.

 

[TPJames]

On 5 January 2017 at 5:56 PM, mrmonkey said:

If merlin has some good forsight - Loggers would look great with some rock work build round the drop (make it a mountain facade, rebuild the tunnel - and extend the route to include a 3rd drop (backwards)! 

 

 

1. Do Merlin have good foresight? No.

 

2. I genuinely find the glimmer of hope in some of you pretty hilarious. The chances of this thing re-opening are abysmal let alone it getting this brand spanking new refurbishment with a rock work and mountain facade. 

 

Lets take a look at the evidence for a minute:

 

2016- Loggers was SBNO the whole year due to being too expensive to run/maintain etc. no work done on it whatsoever.

 

2017- Loggers will be SBNO, the chances of any work taking place on it are absolutely minimal.

 

2018- Well who knows? The ride may open in its current deteriorating state or alternatively they'll just scrap it altogether. I don't know where these ideas of rebuilding tunnels etc are coming from because face it- its not gonna happen!

 

I don't have any plans of visiting Thorpe probably ever again or at least for a long time however if you ask me, the rides most likely going to be scrapped because they clearly can't be bothered to either pay the bills to run and maintain it in the first place let alone refurbish it. It will most likely make way for a new Gimmick IP to try and temporarily get a few guests in before being removed a few of years later, for example "I'm a celebrity" or DGBT- because after all, that's the way Merlin operate, so don't get your hopes up- things aren't gonna change round here anytime soon.

 

 

[CharlieN]

@mrmonkey didn't say they had good foresight though. He said hypothetically what the situation could look like if Merlin did have it. We are all allowed to have a sense of hope - even if it false.

[Coaster]

51 minutes ago, TPJames said:

1. Do Merlin have good foresight? No.

 

2. I genuinely find the glimmer of hope in some of you pretty hilarious. The chances of this thing re-opening are abysmal let alone it getting this brand spanking new refurbishment with a rock work and mountain facade. 

 

Lets take a look at the evidence for a minute:

 

2016- Loggers was SBNO the whole year due to being too expensive to run/maintain etc. no work done on it whatsoever.

 

2017- Loggers will be SBNO, the chances of any work taking place on it are absolutely minimal.

 

2018- Well who knows? The ride may open in its current deteriorating state or alternatively they'll just scrap it altogether. I don't know where these ideas of rebuilding tunnels etc are coming from because face it- its not gonna happen!

 

I don't have any plans of visiting Thorpe probably ever again or at least for a long time however if you ask me, the rides most likely going to be scrapped because they clearly can't be bothered to either pay the bills to run and maintain it in the first place let alone refurbish it. It will most likely make way for a new Gimmick IP to try and temporarily get a few guests in before being removed a few of years later, for example "I'm a celebrity" or DGBT- because after all, that's the way Merlin operate, so don't get your hopes up- things aren't gonna change round here anytime soon.

 

 

Completely agree.  One of my biggest frustrations with Merlin is their willingness to sacrifice popular long-serving rides and overall guest experience in favour of flash-in-the-pan stuff like IAC.

[Ian-S]

Is it the same management team now that bought us Smiler, Swarm etc.

 

Wonder who **** in their scrambled eggs to make them so anti-coaster/anti-flume nowadays since they used to love them?

[Marc]

I don't think they are against coasters / flumes at all - they clearly identified work which they feel is needed on loggers leap - I personally think it will get this work and will reopen in the future.

 

As for coasters Merlin are building one at towers and I expect it won't be all that long till we start hearing rumours of a new one at Thorpe!

[pognoi]

jesus christ I always forget how depressed people are until off season.

 

should be thorpe pessimist mania tbh

[Benin]

Given that there's nothing to be excited about in terms of new additions or no news on Loggers, it's no surprise that people are pessimistic about it reopening...

 

I do think saying Merlin is anti-coaster is weird though, purely because one major investment was a dark ride? If anything they're anti-flat ride...

[Josh3103]

12 hours ago, Ian-S said:

Is it the same management team now that bought us Smiler, Swarm etc.

 

Wonder who **** in their scrambled eggs to make them so anti-coaster/anti-flume nowadays since they used to love them?

I don't agree that they are anti-coaster because they are building one at Alton towers and I think we will see one at Thorpe in a few years 

 

In regards to log flumes I agree because they let a loggers rot for a whole year when they were supposed to work on it . Also on Dragon Falls they never replaced the rock work and that retheme never happened.

[MattyMoo]

I think Loggers has been rotting for more than just the year it's been SBNO - as I mentioned before, the fact there are acrow props in use in places is not a good thing - these are only every supposed to be a temporary fix to use as support, which implies there are underlying problems with the existing support structure of Loggers in places.

[ste193]

Maybe a petition to get loggers leap back would give Merlin the kick up the backside it needs to actually spend some money on the maintenance and work needed to bring the ride back up to scratch.

[Mitchada04]

It once again comes down to a mix of different views from different managers. The amount needed to sort Loggers is around the price of a medium investment as the station needs entirely rebuilding and for H&S purposes they want an evac path all around the ride plus other stuff. Merlin give Thorpe a yearly budget and its up to Thorpe how they spend it. And fixing Loggers would take from that budget meaning other rides close or we see huge budget cuts. Hopefully with a medium budget for next year they may invest that in Loggers. There's been a lot of management change at the park lately too so what was a "leave it we'll get rid of it" is now a "hang on I want it back" from the new Divisional Director.

 

The future of Loggers is brighter than it was 6 or so months ago.

[Matt 236]

The problem here is not so much the case of the ride being mothballed for several seasons (including the one coming) but the overall state of the ride in recent years.

 

Logger's tunnel was in a terrible state during the last 5+ years of the ride's life resulting in complete removal of a large chunk in 2013 and the first drop no longer being enclosed. Considering it remained unchanged for it's final three seasons amongst the increasingly stale station building, queue and landscaping says a lot about the ride's TLC (or lack of perhaps). 

 

Merlin have been under the steering wheel for ten years now and given the ride's increasing poor state and park success, you could surely think a company second to Disney could implement the acceptable renovation procedures to keep it in a workable state in the first place. A constant TLC scheme should be mandatory at all parks as presentation and operations should be a priority.

 

Hopefully if what Adam says seems to be true, maybe we will finally see the return of the ride somepoint in the future with much needed updates and safety enhancements. However recent track records such as the abrupt closing of the Flume, Dragon Fall's rockwork and others don't give much optimism. 

 

It would be a shame to lose such a classic, iconic and staple ride, especially given it's famous reputation in the nineties with a former famous figure.

 

 

[SteveJ]

I think Loggers was just great fun, and there's less and less of that at the park now. That's the biggest loss with Loggers Leap. Were something big and entertaining all round to come along and fill its place, then there'd be no problem. We'd say bye to a classic and hello to a new one. But we know from everything in recent years, that it's never that simple.

[Vince800]

It's interesting that Dragon Falls had some extensive work done it very recently. There are new evacuation platforms throughout and new evacuation stairs, not to mention the other work done to the ride recently. Both Loggers and The Flume have not had this work carried out which I'm assuming is essential or else they wouldn't have done it on Dragon Falls. Now with The Flume, its demolition was probably planned for years ago so we can ignore that. But Loggers might have come to the state where it needs these works completed, there were even problems with the anti roll-back ratchets in the lifts before it closed.

 

We know that the pumps were unserviceable on loggers as others were drafted in for the remainder of the 2015 season. It could be possible that the pumps from The Flume may be in a better state (Could have been refurbished when Imperial Leather took on the sponsorship) but even so, those would have been sat idle for 2 years if they were to be used on Loggers.

 

On previous experience with the way Merlin seem to handle these projects, if they do ever allocate a budget to reopen Loggers, it'll probably be as it is with the repairs or safety upgrades done but with nothing much else, in fact more theming could potentially be removed for similar reasons to Dragon. It's likely that they're evaluating whether to repair or replace the right now.

[Ian-S]

On Sunday, January 08, 2017 at 11:04 AM, Josh3103 said:

I don't agree that they are anti-coaster because they are building one at Alton t and I think we will see one at Thorpe in a few years 

 

breakIn regards to log flumes I agree because they let a loggers rot for a whole year when they were supposed to work on it . Also on Dragon Falls they never replaced the rock work and that retheme never happened.

 

Swarm was the last big coaster yes?  What have we had since? IAC, Penguins, Bears, Shrek, DBGT, Octonauts being the only coaster and a ton of stuff removed?

 

They may not be anti-coaster but they did take a 5 year break and invested in mostly live action stuff for a while.

[MattyMoo]

34 minutes ago, Vince800 said:

It's interesting that Dragon Falls had some extensive work done it very recently. There are new evacuation platforms throughout and new evacuation stairs, not to mention the other work done to the ride recently. Both Loggers and The Flume have not had this work carried out which I'm assuming is essential or else they wouldn't have done it on Dragon Falls. Now with The Flume, its demolition was probably planned for years ago so we can ignore that. But Loggers might have come to the state where it needs these works completed, there were even problems with the anti roll-back ratchets in the lifts before it closed.

 

On previous experience with the way Merlin seem to handle these projects, if they do ever allocate a budget to reopen Loggers, it'll probably be as it is with the repairs or safety upgrades done but with nothing much else, in fact more theming could potentially be removed for similar reasons to Dragon. It's likely that they're evaluating whether to repair or replace the right now.

 

Yep that tallies up with what my Stealth breaking buddy @Mitchada04 said a few posts up

[Benin]

1 hour ago, Ian-S said:

 

Swarm was the last big coaster yes?  What have we had since? IAC, Penguins, Bears, Shrek, DBGT, Octonauts being the only coaster and a ton of stuff removed?

 

They may not be anti-coaster but they did take a 5 year break and invested in mostly live action stuff for a while.

 

 

 

 

5 year gap between major coasters is fine for any big park... The problem is that the investments between these periods range from ok to questionable to who agreed to this?

[Mark9]

Could you argue that Oblivion: Black Hole was there last big coaster or do we only care what Merlin do in the UK these days?

 

Agreed with Ian though, in-between their coasters (which I think are excellent additions personally), Merlin just don't seem to know what they're doing. The budgets they set (or the money the park spends) don't match up to whatever they are attempting to do.

[Matt 236]

With the exception all of Chessington, all of Merlin's parks have built several major coasters in recent years. Towers has Smiler (2013) and SW8 (2018), Thorpe has Swarm (2012), Garda has Raptor (2011) and Oblivion Black Hole (2015) and Heide has Krake (2011) and Flug Der Daemon (2014). 

 

The problem isn't so much the gap between each major coaster, but fills that gap. Phantasialand for example left a ten year gap before building their most recent major coaster and filling the between years with a major flume Ride, dark ride, major flat, splash battle amongst enhanced kids rides and reworking of the park's hub. 

 

 

[Coaster]

I think that gaps between coasters are fine as long as the overall park(s) show improvement during this time, not just on new rides but on improving guest experience, such as the appearance and atmosphere of the park and general operations.

 

Sadly that doesn't (generally) happen at Merlin parks, instead of which we see things like IAC and Storm Surge.

[Ian-S]

19 hours ago, Mark9 said:

Could you argue that Oblivion: Black Hole was thlere last big coaEuropean d o we only care what Merlin do in the UK these days?

 

Agreed with Ian though, in-between their coasters (which I think are excellent additions personally), Merlin just don't seem to know what they're doing. The budgets they set (or the money the park spends) don't match up to whatever they are attempting to do.

 

I was just talking UK yes, Merlin seem a little more hands off with the running of their Euopean parks.

 

But oops, I honestly thought Smiler was older than Swarm for some reason, so err, ill show myself out up the rainbow stairs t... LOL

[RobF]

I wouldnt be suprised if loggers Failed its Adips certification with the state of the ride along with the evac routes for the ride needing updating 

[Theme Park Joseph]

Does anyone here know if there have been any changes to the sign outside loggers this year or is it the exact same sign used as last year 

[LostCityBoy]

"This Attraction Is Currently Under Development" Same as last year