Cedar Point 8/6: The Good and the Bad

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OhioStater said:
Heck no. Long lines means high attendance. For a day in August, that is pretty average for waits at CP. I would be disappointed if everything was a walk on.

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Or it could mean things are not being run efficiently as Craig the Coaster Freak mentioned with Raptor. That line with a full queue in 2001 or 2002 took 1 hour. Now it takes 2+. It truly is ridiculous that such poor operations are allowed to continue though the busiest part of the season. They must be really desperate for employees and really lack anyone good to allow that to go on. They are going to give hundreds of thousands less rides than they did last year and attendance will be about the same. So that means each guest is getting less rides per visit and they will leave the park feeling like the got less for their money than they did the year before. Not good.

Raptor isn't the only problem, but they are the most glaring example of the mediocre state of Cedar Point ride operations.

I appreciate all the feedback. Again, I went at 4:30PM because I had to...it was the only free time I had. It was either that or no park at all. Next time I will have at least 2 days to explore and experience everything the park has to offer.

So, it appears Mean Streak has always been impressive to look at, but not to ride. Did they add new trims or did it always have so many? I thought the trim at the top was a bit much....I mean, really, I sat in the back and there wasn't any "pull" over the top. It must be interesting in the front though just dangling there for so long looking down.

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eightdotthree said:

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I think Great Adventure made the right choice for what land they had available. Imagine this ride in the center of the park...

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That doesn't make it better. There is just such a cool atmospher of moms, dads, younger siblings and scaredy cat fans that sit in the stands and wait for the riders to roll up to the launch. People stop and watch in awe. It changes the feeling of the launch area too, cause everyone is looking at you. Its the same thing at Hershey only less impressive because of the speed.

My reply
Where did I say I thought it made it a better ride? Ka is a completely different theme as you know. They wanted a ride that felt like it was in the jungle and not even in the park and to me they obtained it. I just said to have put in the middle of the park would have meant tearing out all the shade that Great Adventure has, plus removing or moving multiple rides, and that would have been stupid. Remember, CP only had to move two flats to put TTD in.

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The way I look at it, we "flashpassed" both the MF line and the Maverick line.

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But you don't get to skip the lines all day. I think thats his point right? They aren't putting out other guests all day long who are waiting in long lines while resort guests are skipping them. Its for one hour every day, and the amount of resort guests who are putting out early morning patrons is pretty mimimal...the resort isn't THAT big.

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Right, we didn't get to skip lines all day, but having access to MF and Maverick before the non-resort guests puts you at a huge advantage time-wise. We only rode Maverick during the early-hour open (while we did both rides on day one). We did wait for MF again both days, but that's much more mechanically sound then Maverick, even though they had to take a train off MF the first night.

Had we waited for Maverick during the day, how long do you think those lines would have been? I can tell you that we thought about riding it again around 7 p.m. on Thursday before we left, took one look at the line and said "no way." Even if we had waited, there was no guarantee that it would've been mechanically operating correctly, as we had troubles both days (one of those problems was caused by a guest who lost something and they actually stopped operations). So, I'm guessing we saved at least two, if not more, hours each day.

You say that the resort isn't that big. There are eight different places to stay that give you early access, and some of them are quite big like Breakers. Even though we had to drive to CP each day, that was five-minutes from Breaker's Express, and according to our timer, that gave us about a twenty-minute lead on the non-resort guests at a walking pace. On day two, we practically parked at the entrance plaza. That gives you an advantage as well.

In response to Touchdown, I'm really surprised that no one pushed the Joe Cool Club on me when I got my Maxx Pass at Geuaga Lake. Understandably, I realize that it only works at CP, but the parks aren't that far apart from each other. It would be worthwhile to me if I was traveling that direction again next year, but we're headed to the land of Dolly next year.

One hour of time in the park with other resort guests is not a flash pass. I get your point, but its not the same thing. When most people are arriving, not the first thing in the morning for instance, the fact that resort guests got in an hour early has no effect on them. A badly run flash pass system does.

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Intamin Fan said:
I just said to have put in the middle of the park would have meant tearing out all the shade that Great Adventure has, plus removing or moving multiple rides, and that would have been stupid.

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And palwine said

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Watching TTD launch is a sight to see. You can see the fear in the passengers faces just before take off.

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Which he prefered over Kingda Ka's launch area. No big deal. I am sure SFGAdv could have incorporated the launch area into the ride more, but they chose not too.

I guess I quoted you cause it seemed you were down on someone having a good time on their first trip to Cedar Point.

Palwine, Mean Streak added that trim to keep the speed, and the wear and tear on the structure down. In its opening years, you could say that the section before the mid-course was OK, but everything after was a drag. IMO it was never worth the 2-4 hour waits it had back then.

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BANDandDCI said:
And Maxair is one of the largest.(Stating the obvious) Delirium at KI isn't as big as MA. I was excited to ride it, then I noticed that MA is just that bit bigger to provide an amazing ride. MA seats 50 and DE has about 40 seats, and that makes a difference.

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Delirium also has 50 seats as #46 is my favorite! I think MaXair has one more full swing at the highest swing-apex....

While I've never ridden MaXair (no point since KI is my home park and I'd rather ride a coaster instead), two weeks ago I stood in front of MaXair for 2 ride cycles, and though my observation is anecdotal...it sure looked like MaXair was NOT going any higher than Delirium (from what I remember), and which they BOTH seem to not go as high anymore this year...

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MDOmnis said:

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OhioStater said:
Heck no. Long lines means high attendance. For a day in August, that is pretty average for waits at CP. I would be disappointed if everything was a walk on.

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Or it could mean things are not being run efficiently as Craig the Coaster Freak mentioned with Raptor. That line with a full queue in 2001 or 2002 took 1 hour. Now it takes 2+. It truly is ridiculous that such poor operations are allowed to continue though the busiest part of the season. They must be really desperate for employees and really lack anyone good to allow that to go on. They are going to give hundreds of thousands less rides than they did last year and attendance will be about the same. So that means each guest is getting less rides per visit and they will leave the park feeling like the got less for their money than they did the year before. Not good.

Raptor isn't the only problem, but they are the most glaring example of the mediocre state of Cedar Point ride operations.

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Yea, when I was there on the 6th I absolutley noticed that operations seemed slower. Especially on Millinneum Force, last year that crew would hit interval a lot, they never did it this year that I saw. You can see the trend if you go to Cedar Points website and go to the rollercoasters page and scroll down to where they list the number of rides given per year...on most of their coasters, it gets progressivly less each year...now I know a couple is due to the rides being less popular, but thats not the case on all of them. Raptor is easily the best example of this:Ridership

2006 1,645,189

2005 1,838,824

2004 2,089,853

2003 2,117,551

2002 2,145,298

2001 2,171,280

And you cant tell me thats because of it being less popular, I wont buy it. *** Edited 8/13/2007 4:04:55 AM UTC by stljason1***

Last time I was at the point was on Memorial day weekend. Best kept secret. Lines are at a minimum. The first year MF opened, I only waited 1 hour. I sat in the very back of the train, and the first hill did if for me. I'm glad you enjoyed the park.

I agree that SFA Superman is much better. I don't see the two coming close to one another. They are completely different Intamins. If you want airtime like anything, you have to try that ride.

I had a must ride list too because I knew it was going to be very crowded. I think more parks should install clones of Raptor. It's a great design like Batman the Ride. There are really crowded lines at that park, and there are manageable lines at that park. MF, Mantis, Raptor, Maverick, and Top Thrill Dragster are the really crowded ones. I believe everything else is manageable even though Blue Streak was 45 minutes. However, that was a Saturday. I'm sure it had to be a little less on a weekday.

Man, the guy has a great time at the park for the limited amount of time that he had and gets reamed for it by a fanboy. *rolls eyes*

As for Mean Streak, I LOVED it the first three years. And there were many more who did as well considering the lines were 2 hours long during high summer the first two years.

It's always been a rough woodie, though, and many people don't like that (Obviously Jeffry Smith doesn't). But I loved the rough, out of control feeling. I also know to sit "loosely" in the seat (not leaning back). CP had to trim it hard because it was tearing itself up in places, so it's a mere shadow of it's former self.

You can still get a decent, fast ride on it once in a while...especially after a couple of days of soaking rain when the wood gets nice and wet, and if you happen to catch it after they've greased the track.

And I also agree that operations on some of their rides (Raptor especially) seem to have slackened off from a couple of years ago. It seriously takes a special kind of person to put up with the long hours and low pay and perform above and beyond the call of duty. Hell, McDonald's pays more and you work in air conditioned comfort.