Cedar Point guests experience traffic jams, complain on the Internet

The simplest solution would be to leave the park open until 2 AM or 3 AM. That would widen the exit window of guests leaving the park and alleviate the traffic jam caused by everyone trying to get out of the parking lot at Midnight.

I said something like that a few pages ago. I would close the attractions at different times to stagger the times that people leave the park.

I was at Halloweekends last Friday, and while I had no trouble at all getting out of the parking lot, I did notice that it seemed that everyone wanted to leave at the same time.

But that's assuming everyone doesn't leave at the same time. Are a good majority going to stay past midnite if they start staggering the ride closing times?

If everyone wants to leave at the same time, even if the park isn't closing, then it's still gonna get backed up, and could still be backed up when everyone else leaves at 2am.

The only time I've ever been stuck trying to get out at Carowinds is July 4 (several hour waits for everything, including food), which took well over an hour, and I left before the park closed, right after fireworks (like everyone else), and then a couple of SCarowinds visits.

In both cases, I was parked in the main lot, and not the Season Pass/VIP parking lot (as it was full when I got there).

If you leave the park open until the early morning hours I think it is a pretty safe assumption to make that the exit crowd will be staggered. One of the main reasons that the laser show start was at closing was to help with the exit crowd. It will also allow guests who stay late to get some extra rides in the now less crowded park. People will leave early, especially those with younger kids while the night owls will stay and ride.

But again, is that going to be enough people to stay till 2am that will alleviate the crowd leaving? How many people that go to these events are going to stay till 2am, and is that going to be financially viable for the park to do?

Midnite is already late, and the latest I've seen them stay open for Haunt is 1am. If rides are staggered and the closing time is later, is that going to help, or is it going to make a difference at all?

Is the stagger enough to take care of the problems with people crowding the exit, or is a large amount of people going to leave all at once, and then a steady stream of people leave for the next couple of hours to add to the problem?

I dont' know that I buy that that's whats gonna happen.

Tekwardo said:

I dont' know that I buy that that's whats gonna happen.

I see you're a graduate of The Lord Gonchar School Of Sentence Structure.

Well done, my friend. ;)

I know one way to see if it will help: Try It

(Not a graduate of The Lord Gonchar School Of Sentence Structure. :))

Agreed. Let's try Communism :-P

I'm gonna try opening a hotel by Six Flags Great Adventure.

If they needed a hotel, there would be one there already. I'm sort of an expert on this.

^ Expert? Hotel economics or CoasterBuzz memes?

Oh, stewardess, I speak meme!

James Whitmore said:

Hotel economics or CoasterBuzz memes?

Both. See how such a simple post turned out to be so complex and layered? I'm sort of an expert on posting.

And with the authority granted due to my expert nature in the subject of CoasterBuzz memes, I say the hot meme for fall/winter 2013 is "I'm sort of an expert on this."

It will be replacing the late summer/early fall hot item, "Popcorn smell."

If you want to be on the cutting edge of CoasterBuzz meme fashion - you heard it here first!

Don't mention popcorn, you bully!

Can someone link me to the topic where the popcorn thing started?

I would have been very disappointed if Gonch would have answered with anything other than "Both".

My late and not funny contribution to this thread:

SFoT at some point offered limited season passes. (I think those have been replaced by the "membership.") You could buy a "before Memorial Day only" pass and a "before Labor Day only" pass at a various discounts.

SnoopySnoopyDoo... Where are you?

Sorry, I had to.

More on the idea of calling the day and night events different things - here's a tweet made today by KI:

"Tonight is the 12th and final night of Halloween Haunt for the 2013 season."

They're calling it the last night of the Haunt event even though they're open tomorrow day. They've clearly separated the ideas of the night and day events.

Now all you do is make it a separate ticket and play with the pricing...and you have exactly what I suggested.

All that's left to do then is put the idea in a pretty little box with a bow and drive it north on I-75 and hand it off to the folks in Sandusky.

And my take from that is that they're really trying to say "if you want to experience the haunt you better get in here, it's the last day". And because the haunt is a nighttime conversion they're compelled to use the word "night". Truth is, the rate is the same and they'd be glad to have your business starting at noon. But this week the Haunt is the main attraction. I'm probably going to be very sorry that I say this, but I don't see a cryptic message that bodes any future plans or road trips in that tweet. :-)

I still think the KI haunt differs from CP's in that they get a lot more visitors that show up for evening only. There's a large metro area a lot closer than the other park's and it's easier for Cincinnatians to head out after supper just as they would to go to the haunted house or forest in their neighborhood.

While I still agree with you that separate ticketed events and/or higher prices are probably the wave of the future for Ohio, keep in mind that right now the gate and on-line price is the same whether the customers come for all day or not. I seem to remember, and correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't KI once offer all day tickets and then less expensive Haunt only tickets? That sounds like a money loser in the long run, so maybe they realized that by charging everyone the same amount no matter when they show up is the best way to do it. The real crime here is how ridiculously low the ticket prices are for Haunt weekends. As low as 29 bucks? And that's for all day and the Haunt? Please. Are they afraid no one's gonna show up? They're also open til 1a which I think is interesting.

Cedar Point will have the biggest challenge in trying to re-invent their Halloweekend event. Many fans here have suggested that they charge a separate evening rate and sweep the park, clearing out those daytime visitors and starting over. I see the trouble with that line of thought is that the park has a resort atmosphere with venues offered other than the park, and multiple gates designed to service those venues. So by sweeping toward the front gate they'll hear "sorry, I have to get to the Breakers from here" or "but we have reservations at Bay Harbor in a half hour" or "my friends are at Fridays and we're leaving from there" or "my boat's at the Marina". It just won't work. Add to that the fact that CP is more of a destination than most regional parks with 4 overnight options on property, 2 slightly off, and hundreds of hotels in town. CP would be faced with re-educating their customers to accept that they will participate for half a day or pay twice, basically, for all day and night. Their best bet is to charge everyone 120 bucks to get in, that's for all day, forget the deep discounts and company picnics, and hope and pray the weather is good so that enough show up so that it's manageable crowd-wise but still contributes to the overall profitability of the park.

Just some random, however awkward thoughts on the subject. Had a chance for CP on this cold as hell blustery day but I think I'll hold off til tomorrow to bid farewell to park season.