Dorney Park - New Policy - No single riders on Ferris Wheel

I was at Dorney Park today, and I could not ride the Ferris Wheel alone, because the ride ops said that because of a suicide, no one is allowed to ride by themselves (has to be 2-, 3- or 4-people in the Ferris Wheel car). I talked to guest services, and they haven't heard of anything. Guest services, called the supervisor of the Ferris Wheel, and the supervisor said that this policy started yesterday (8/4).

This is the dumbest policy. Do only single riders commit suicide? Can't someone jump out when there is 1 or 2 other people in the car?

Has anyone heard about this new policy? Is it CF chain wise?

* *** Edited 8/5/2007 9:49:13 PM UTC by Mtbiker99***

I would bet the point of the policy is so that there is a witness that can say Dorney was not blame should somebody jump out of the car.

I would GUESS that it is to make sure the wheel is balanced. Still, that is a weak policy and I've never heard of another park implementing something similar.

I think the only reason the policy is stupid is because of the reason. Suicide? Give me a break.

Why do people go to parks by themselves anyways? Don't you find it....boring?

I also thought it was for balancing because I was the only one in line, but others were on the Ferris Wheel. I had to ask about a dozen times. The ride op was from Columbia. I kept saying "2 people" as in "2 groups" for balancing. The ride op kept saying "2 people" in each car.

Highlo, if I am going to a park that I never been to, then it isn't boring. I go on a few business trips alone a year, then I make a detor to an amusement park. For a park that I've been to countless times, like dorney, it does get boring. I have a dorney season pass because I used it for KI, KD, and CW. I go to dorney only because it is free (I got a season pass for the other CF parks). When I go alone, I only go to the water park side from 10-12pm, then 1 hour on the ride side.

If there was a suicide from a ferris wheel, we would've heard about it. Since the thousands of other wheels seem to run fine when balancing with single riders, my guess is that it's a capacity issue. Most wheels load slow as it is, and having several cars filled with only one rider can slow the queue to a crawl.

Yea, i agree, more go solo than you may think. Sometimes i enjoy going alone. Then you ride what you want, and don't have to worry about whether it's worth it to the rest of the group. It's not boring to go to a park by yourself. If you visit this website, and attend a park with any roller coaster, you won't be bored, until you've ridden everything and the walk to the next coaster is to exhausting.

The only suicide I've heard about involving a ferris wheel as of lately is when a 40-yr old woman intentionally jumped out of the wheel at Navy Pier. That was like 6 years ago, though.

With two people you can push the other person out! :)

Sounds like another stupid CF policy. I hope they don't adopt this policy at other rides at Dorney as I often go to the park alone.

I figured it out. In Mighty Joe Young, the little boy who was riding alone was at the top of the Ferris Wheel and the monkey saved him and the Ferris Wheel fell on top of the monkey and Cedar Fair thinks that 2 or more lives would be sufficient to having the loss of a Ferris wheel. No thats horrible, its just Cedar Fair doesnt want to have dead bodies near the Ferris wheel because the Ferris Wheel is a peaceful ride, again horrible stuff and this is a stupid rule.

I used to drive charter/tour buses and it would have killed me if I couldn't have been permitted to ride things alone!

Once, I actually found a total stranger on a boardwalk pier in NJ to ride the Zipper with me, coax them into riding and pay for their ride, since no one in our party had the cocoanuts, and my son was just a baby at the time. No single riders! :(

Looking at the photo on Dorney's site...that's a Chance wheel. This is fall-out (so to speak) from something that's going on in California right now related to an incident last year and is a direct result of a service bulletin issued by Chance last month.

The new rules will probably affect Dorney Park and Michigan's Adventure. The wheels at Cedar Point, Valleyfair!, and Geauga Lake are not Chance wheels, and therefore are not directly affected by the new bulletin.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

MTBiker99, I would think it would be highly unlikely that a person with other people in the gondola would attempt suicide.

And highlo, going to a park by yourself doesn't have to be boring. Granted, I don't do it much anymore, because I have other coaster enthusiasts friends (whom I met because they were at a park alone and we struck up a conversation)/friends/or a family-member to go with.

There is a sense of freedom when going to a park by yourself. You don't have to be weighed down by another person or persons who doesn't like spinning rides, or doesn't like heights, or doesn't like to get wet etc.

I'm sure many people on Coasterbuzz go on business trips and just happen to have some hours where they can go to the local park. If you've got no one with you, but you've got the opportunity to ride [fill in the blank], and that opportunity may not present itself again, I'd think any fears of being bored would go right out the window.

The obvious disadvantages to going to a park alone is the lack of people to talk to (unless you're good at striking up conversation with perfect strangers), rides that don't allow single-riders, and a lack of another person to share the ride experience with afterwards.

Back in the mid/early 90s there was an incident at Geauga Lake on the sky ride (ski lift) type of attraction. A young man (maybe 16 I'm thinking) got up to the highest point of the ride and jumped out. I'm pretty sure he was there with a group of the mentally disabled.

The question is, should a seasonal ride operator (him/herself also likely young) be given the responsibility to decide who is or is not in the right frame of mind to ride on an attraction? That is a tough one.

This "policy" by Chance seems to be useless. In the case I mentioned above two kids with a mental illnes could have ridden together and yet still have jumped. There needs to be more responsibility on the part of a parent/guardian in these types of instances.

Am I the only one that finds this absolutely hilarious? Or am I just suffering from the Monday morning blues and looking for humor in anything?

Fear of suicides on a ride where no suicides have ever occurred? That's rich.

I believe this the reason why they are doing this. At a carnival, someone just fell out of another Ferris Wheel going alone. They were only 3 years old.

The problem is that there is no restraint, and you have really young kids going alone, and they stand up when the wheel is going, and maybe lean over the side. They lean, and accidently fall out. Don't give me that this would only happen at carnivals either. If more amusement parks had them, and they allowed that young of a child to go on them, this would happen there.

This a ridiculous accident. If you are under a certain height, I say you shouldn't be able to ride without another person that could watch the darn kid. If you are sitting properly, there is no reason why anyone can't go on this ride.

However, when young kids go alone on anything, they do what in the heck they want. They try to get out of the ride when it's moving because they just want to get off. The problem we have is this. You say no single riders on a Ferris Wheel which is unfair because the people that are jumping off the Ferris Wheel are always young kids.

They just need to adjust the height limit for young kids to go on with there parents, or someone else. How about 8 years old and beyond (You can start going on rides alone?)? That would be whatever 8 year old= to in height. Otherwise, you have to go with someone else.

Who rides solo anyway? Isn't the point to get in and make out with someone?

^LOL. Sometimes the point is to get a good vantage spot for pics.... ;)

Anyhow, I've ridden several Chance wheels by myself, most recently WA's, and haven't had any problems....then again, I'm older than 6 and am over 42". Seriously, what level of maturity are you at these days when you hit 42"? Not enough to ride something like that alone, IMO.

Matter of fact, the ONLY time I've *ever* been told I couldn't ride solo was at Idlewild (I love that place) - darned if the op didn't find a girl walking along the midway they had turned away earlier...so we both got to ride! :)