Alton Towers General Discussion

[Pickles]

22 hours ago, Inferno said:

 

 

Also why on earth is Hex of all things opening at 11? I thought that would be quite popular given it’s been closed for all this time.

 

Honestly, went over around 2 and it was walk on. Stayed at 5 minutes on app for most of the day after that. 
 

Overall, going again tomorrow however the lack of Sky Ride is telling for my poor friends arms having to push my wheelchair around. As much as I understand the complex engineering of it. It’s just not good enough from an accessible aspect anymore. 
 

It’s 2024, time to catch up. 

[Benin]

Well it lasted just over a day at least.

 

 

 

 

[Inferno]

Oh dear……

 

The website now says it will re-open on Tuesday, so hopefully it’s all ok.

Looks to just be a bit of facade to hide the door rail?

[Matt 236]

That lasted about as long as the sale of the old Duel blasters.

 

How they can’t run a madhouse sufficiently compared to other parks baffles me. 

[Benin]

1 hour ago, Matt 236 said:

That lasted about as long as the sale of the old Duel blasters.

 

How they can’t run a madhouse sufficiently compared to other parks baffles me. 

 

You mean like the also been closed all season Defi de Cesar at Asterix?

 

Hex isn't the only one that's been struggling.

[Matt 236]

1 hour ago, Benin said:

 

You mean like the also been closed all season Defi de Cesar at Asterix?

 

Hex isn't the only one that's been struggling.

I mean, that is true to an extent. But one could argue Hex has had a lot of more one and offs in the last eight years. Including the whole of 2016 on top of the whole of the last two years really. 
 

I have no information regarding the Asterix madhouse, but it is a pity if that too has been closed as that leaves the place without a sufficient indoor attraction at present. Following Transdemonium’s removal years ago.

[Glitch]

But why is the themeing on the cylinder being bent and broken… that doesn’t make sense!

[Pickles]

12 hours ago, Matt 236 said:

I mean, that is true to an extent. But one could argue Hex has had a lot of more one and offs in the last eight years. Including the whole of 2016 on top of the whole of the last two years really. 
 

I have no information regarding the Asterix madhouse, but it is a pity if that too has been closed as that leaves the place without a sufficient indoor attraction at present. Following Transdemonium’s removal years ago.

Speaking goon to guest assistant this year with Lego. Madhouses in general are problematic. When they run, they run fab but when they go wrong it’s expensive. Like a Volkswagen Golf, the older model the less likely parts will be around for the older ones. 
 

If it counts, most of all of it is the same. 
 

Love to Mr Carson always 

Edited October 14 by Pickles
I be dyslexic

[Benin]

11 hours ago, Glitch said:

But why is the themeing on the cylinder being bent and broken… that doesn’t make sense!

 

Getting caught between the external shell and internal seat mechanism. Bit of something breaks loose after suddenly moving for first time consistently all year and right in the way.

 

Incident many years ago (think Japan) where a person got caught between the 2. Didn't end well.

[Glitch]

Imagine being invited to a content creator programme and then slating it because they didn’t allow you to film the ride therefore impacting your content schedule and monetisation plan by spoiling the ride. Entitlement at its finest from TPWW. How is getting previews and freebies including unlimited fast track very one sided towards the park. I hope they get taken off the programme and a smaller channel invited.

[Mark9]

Looks like Alton is crawling to the end of the season with Rita down for the foreseeable and Nemesis ending the year on one train. 

 

Something needs to change, this is the third year in a row where the park is limping along and it's just not good enough. It says a lot when out of your premier parks, Chessington has the best reliability. 

[Cal]

Something really does need to change, they must be killing their reputation. Apparently Oblivion was on 1 station yesterday too on a 2 hour queue. Hardly helping matters. They’ve also sent out notifications to guests saying queues will be closed early once capacity is reached.

 

3 hours ago, Mark9 said:

It says a lot when out of your premier parks, Chessington has the best reliability. 

 

Does it though? 
 

I’d argue Thorpe. Yes Hyperia has had issues this season but apart from that everything has been pretty reliable and running on full capacity.
 

Chessington can’t seem to keep Fury open longer than 5 minutes and Tiger Rock seems to have evacs multiple times a day, if it’s open at all.

[Inferno]

Yes it’s not looking good at towers is it…

 

Between all the staffing issues, reliability, cuts to hours, price increases and rides closed all season, it’s been another tough year.

 

To be honest I don’t think Towers has ever quite been the same since the Smiler crash. I know cutbacks were rife before then, but since the low attendance following that it’s been worse than ever.

 

I wonder if it’s all down to the absolute absence of any form of long to medium term planning when it comes to maintenance and longevity of everything. It feels like for over a decade the place has run on quick fixes to get them through the foreseeable future… now it’s all coming to a head, with loads of money needing to me spent, and low attendance meaning that isn’t easily achieved at the moment.

 

Towers has had quite the fall from grace over the last decade or so.

[Benin]

All the Merlin parks suffered from the crash. Because of the inherent short-termism that is still seemingly rife in the company.

 

If things don't go right/well (say, the new coaster not being deemed a success) at any of the parks they seem to go into cut mode. There's no attempt to weather the storm as it were but keeping or improving the quality in the face of adversity. So people visit and are greeted by a poor state of affairs and operations, why would they return in future?

 

Combined with the numbers of MAP holders who don't tend to spend much anyway on their visits they need to take stock of what their goals are. Though a lot of MAP holders who are moaning seem to be more upset about the RAP booking system rather than the actual problems in the parks.

[JoshC.]

Was at Towers yesterday. It was also the day where a large number of the traveller community visit.

 

All in, it wasn't a bad visit. Certainly better than my summer visit. 

 

But between Rita being closed (apparently waiting on a part) and Nemesis being on one train (apparently engineers need to do some addition work to it), Th13teen being temperamental, staggered openings, no Skyride, etc, it wasn't exactly a good visit either.

 

Hex has certainly seen interesting changes. Broadly speaking, it's all a bit too light, and lacking in subtlety. The branch in the main show sequence is lit in what is best described as green Christmas lights for the whole ride, which I found distracting, and the ending has loads of little white lights across the whole room, which is a bit...eh.

 

The park are really limping through to the end of season. I didn't visit until May, so I can't comment on what it was like at the start of the season, but I do wonder if Nemesis' opening disguised some of shortcomings Towers had anyway this season, and the season has really just taken its toll.

[MattyMoo]

Towers appears to be absolutely shocking today. Glad I haven't bothered to visit this year to be honest...

[Cal]

At 5pm the only coasters open were Nemesis on 1 train and Wickerman 🤣

 

Twitter is a great read today.

 

 

They really need to sort this out as they're seriously ruining their reputation. 

 

So glad I didn't bother with Scarefest this year. For the first time in a long time, I've not renewed my merlin pass and bought a Thorpe one seeing as they're the only merlin park worth visiting at the moment.

[Inferno]

I find this all quite sad to be honest. 
 

I know it’s only a theme park, but Alton Towers genuinely is such a special place to so many people, and even for those who aren’t so sentimental, there’s no denying that it’s a wonderful and truly unique place.

 

… But it’s been utterly run in to the ground thanks to corporate greed.

 

I don’t even take issue with the current management - there has been a lot of money spent to overhaul clapped-out attractions lately - but it feels like too little too late. It feels like EVERYTHING needs replacing at this point. 

 

I know I’m like a broken record saying this, but I am so hopeful that Universal’s announcement about the Bedford Park finally happens in the coming weeks.

The UK so badly needs a shake up.

 

I don’t want Alton Towers to die, but I also don’t want it to keep going on like this either.

I really do think Merlin might be in some serious trouble if Universal opens, and actually I’ve come to be ok with that.  Things need to change if they want to compete. That can only be a good thing for customers.

[Benin]

Possible regionalised power cut perhaps? Plus Galaticair being it's usual self.

 

Unfortunately until Merlin remove the short-termism mindset things will continue as is.

 

Also shows the issue with a lack of supporting attractions in two of the major areas of the park. Not replacing the Retrosquad attractions was foolish. Especially with the over engineered nonsense they're currently building.

 

Also think that people are pinning too many hopes on Universal shaking things up competitively. It doesn't do much for the regional type parks in the US.

[Cal]

Just had a quick mid day check and this is the current state of things. 

 

5 coasters closed and 1 on half capacity. 

 

Genuinely feel sorry for the people that have paid a lot to be there. They'll probably never come back...

 

[Benin]

People kept going back to Thorpe when things were similar (constant ride breakdowns etc.).

 

Rita is buggered though atm. Which definitely doesn't help.

[Inferno]

Does anyone have any thoughts on why this constant poor availability might be happening at Towers?

 

To an extent I feel sorry for them as they have had a run of bad luck with Rita’s downtime, and the brand new Nemesis being on one train must be purely rotten luck as they’ve spent millions on trying to bring that up to date - however the relentless downtime of everything else all at once just seems too consistent to be down to “some really bad luck”.

 

Could it be that the rides themselves have just had it, similar to what happened to Hex and Skyride - they became so bad that there was no choice but to completely overhaul them.

This seems like a likely reason because cutbacks and money saving have been rife for years.

 

Or could this perhaps be an issue with the engineering department somehow? Short staffed, or overwhelmed with too high a workload? Again down to cuts and short term thinking I would assume.

 

I’d be really interested to know what the wider issue actually is, because this situation is unprecedented really, even internationally, especially as it’s seemingly peaking at the most critical time of the season.

[Benin]

Low wages (for an engineer, especially given the rural location), aging attractions and the short-termism are pretty much that.

 

Skyride was definitely planned to open this year but something happened. Hex was utterly buggered and needed a big fix. 

 

If the maintenance ends up just being a quick fix with a hope to do a proper one later then it all adds up. Especially if they don't get the budget or personnel to ensure that the full fixes are done. This then extends to day fixes if staff are stretched thin across the park and can't quickly get to rides because they're busy on the opposite end.

 

Though much like with modern cars, modern rides tend to have so much going on there's more likelihood of it breaking down.

 

So it's a lot of factors coming together.

[Mark9]

I was there Monday and to be honest had a good day but the problem is, I went in fully knowing it was going to be a disaster. For thousands of others it's incredibly disappointing. I went three weeks ago and everything ran smoothly with no issues at all. The moment a bit of pressure takes place, that's it, the park struggles. With all the ride removals over the last decade, there is no buffer for when things go wrong and the whole of CBeebies land closing at 5 and no Congo River Rapids, it  just compounds the issues. 

 

On 10/28/2024 at 2:27 PM, JoshC. said:

The park are really limping through to the end of season. I didn't visit until May, so I can't comment on what it was like at the start of the season, but I do wonder if Nemesis' opening disguised some of shortcomings Towers had anyway this season, and the season has really just taken its toll.

 

Something not really ever mentioned at the time but, at 10am opening day, Nemesis Reborn was really the only rollercoaster open on time. Everything else aside from Wicker Man was delayed opening.

 

 

And there's no easy fix. I think all of the things Benin mentioned plus extra procedures introduced after the Smiler crash just leads to Towers unable to prevent shutdowns and a quick recovery from them.

 

[JoshC.]

On 10/29/2024 at 8:58 AM, Benin said:

Also think that people are pinning too many hopes on Universal shaking things up competitively. It doesn't do much for the regional type parks in the US.

 

Yep.

 

I think there could be some short term issues, with staff maybe relocating and jumping ship to Universal due to the name. But Universal is a premium name at a premium price. No doubt there will be people who will choose to save up for a trip there over somewhere like Towers or Thorpe. But Towers and Thorpe will settle in nicely, and somewhere like Thorpe might even benefit in a weird way, given its close location to Heathrow.

 

Obviously very early, so hard to say for certain what will happen. But I'm not sure Universal will cause as many issues as some expect.

 

3 hours ago, Mark9 said:

I was there Monday and to be honest had a good day but the problem is, I went in fully knowing it was going to be a disaster. For thousands of others it's incredibly disappointing. I went three weeks ago and everything ran smoothly with no issues at all. The moment a bit of pressure takes place, that's it, the park struggles. With all the ride removals over the last decade, there is no buffer for when things go wrong and the whole of CBeebies land closing at 5 and no Congo River Rapids, it  just compounds the issues. 

 

 

Very similar for me on Sunday: I went in with low expectations and only really wanting to do 3 things (Nemesis, Hex and Compound). I got on more, but it is so easy to end up doing so little.

 

What happens at the moment when you go to Dark Forest and Th13teen is experiencing an issue? Rita is dead, the Skyride isn't there to take you away, and Hex isn't exactly a thrill ride. So for those looking for a more thrilling ride, they've wandered to a dead end and now have to go all the way to X Sector or Wicker Man. That's a lot of idle walking time.

 

And of course, if you don't want to do a coaster, you've got few options. Hex, Granny, Blade, Curse, Sub Terra, Rapids or Battle Galleons are the main options. Battle Galleons is more of a warm weather ride. Rapids are shut. Blade, Curse and Sub Terra are located very close together, in a more isolated area of the park. Granny is more a kids ride. Your options getting crossed off very quickly.

 

Personally, I think the decision to add a flat ride in Forbidden Valley is not necessarily the right one. More flat rides, yes. Another filler ride in FV, when there's other parts of the park in dire need of support, isn't the best move.

 

It's not a quick fix, it's a long journey. Let's not forget that right now the next installation is a ride type which was removed almost 10 years ago. They've got a long way to go to get back to where they were, let alone improve.