Cedar Point: 6/8/25

Just a few observations. Some of this might not be new--I only visited once or twice in each of the last few seasons---but they were things I noticed.

I showed up at about 3:30 or so, and stayed to close. It was not busy, but it also wasn't dead. The crowd was in good spirits and people seemed to be having a good time. As mentioned elsewhere, TT2 was down all day. Raptor was down when I arrived, and never came back up, with a train stopped on the lift as I was leaving. Most everthing else was mostly up, with the full set of trains running.

Definitely not new, but: Pretty much every coaster I rode was aggressively grouping to try to fill seats. I appreciated this.

Lots of old-school hand slapping on Gemini. It's been a while since I've been on it with that many people participating! I was definitely not stapled on Skyhawk. After riding it, I kind of wish I had been. I think I am getting old.

Restraint checking seems to be less IROC-robotic (and a little more efficient) than in past years. Maybe I'm just used ito it, but it does seem as though the process is a little less formulaic. I'm not sure what, if anything, that means, but noted. I did not ride Magnum, which struck me as the most obvious offender in past years, so maybe I just missed it.

Coasters has switched to a cafeteria-style service with trays of pre-made burgers and tenders. A quality vs. scale tradeoff. That's maybe not the worst thing in the world given the overall nature of food service in the park. The tenders were not cookout-approved; they could have used some actual seasoning. But they were not otherwise overly-processed.

Maybe relatedly? Happy Friar is an actual enclosed building now. That might have been done before this season, but I don't remember seeing it. I did not go in, so cannot comment on process.

Also not new but: Starbucks is not operating after park close, which is a bit of a bummer because I used to always grab a coffee on my way out for the drive home.

More to add if I think of it.

But here I thought the park had transformed into hot Six Flags garbage...

Happy Friar building is new this season. That was always a frustrating line because although the two windows were in the same building, you could only get a corn dog/cheese on a stick in one line and fries in the other. That shouldn't be the case with the new building but I also did not go in when I was there a weekend ago.

They were definitely taking steps to fill all seats on trains. Something they hadn't really done (it was at least the exception rather than the rule) in a long time.

Anticipate heavy grouping on Siren’s Curse so there will be no empty seats dispatched. I think we all can support this effort to maximize efficiency and keep the line moving.

Last week on TT2 they were so aggressively filling seats that they wouldn't even let you ask for the front or back row, which previously has always been allowed. The first guy I encountered was actually quite rude about it. I always feel that filling rows is okay, but people should be allowed to voluntarily wait extra for front or back should they desire.

I'm wondering if Colleen Murphy's years of ops experience are at play here now that she is the park manager/pseudo GM.

I sure hope that's the case. Ops could really use a boost. On my last visit in 2022, aside from a couple bright spots the operations were pretty rough. It's incredibly frustrating as a guest. Even more so when you've been going to the park for years and remember the heyday of operations at CP; but I doubt that level of efficiency is ever coming back.

Happy Friar is a definite improvement. It is formatted similarly to BackBeat, Farmhouse, and Grand Pavilion where the entire menu is available as an entree and side. It is becoming a must stop on our visits.

That's the format Coasters is using now, too.

I haven't been in Coasters Drive-In for years. May have to try them next. Frontier Inn is a similar format.

Gunkey Monkey:

I think we all can support this effort to maximize efficiency and keep the line moving.

Yes and no. I definitely do not want to see empty seats going around while I wait in a huge line, but in many cases these crowd/turnstile people tend to really overthink and overcomplicate a simple job of getting people in and making sure there are people in every chute. Last trip I encountered an overzealous grouper at Magnum at 9:30 at night when they had an empty station and about two queues full of people down below. Just go clean or something and let everyone up there and let them pick their seat. It was as though they purposely wanted to keep a line in the queue for no reason. Maybe it makes the people that paid for Fastlane feel better, I don't know. There wouldn't have been more than 4-6 people in each row. In some cases, the interval of the ride should be fast enough that getting exactly two people in each row takes too long and you're better off just making sure people keep walking and stopping the flow for a moment if the station is getting too full. I tend to agree that waiting for the front or back should be allowed unless those people are blocking the flow to other rows due to the logistics of the station setup.