Kings Island shakes up its food options

Those new touch screen kiosks which offer wait times looks really nice:

I remember when SeaWorld Parks used that font in its mobile apps. Just sayin'.

Why didn't they go with Comic Sans?

What about wait times are they considering the need for interactivity? Why is it a touch screen and not just a sign that changes as the information changes?

I think those signs have multiple screen options on them, if they're the same as last season. There's a map and location options for food, rides, shows, etc. You can touch what you're looking for and it brings it up.

Every time i go to a park the wait times posted are inaccurate, like when I rode batman at sfog, it said 15 minutes wait but I waited 1hr 15. At sea world it always had inaccurate times for manta, typically it estimated longer times then the time you were queued.

There is only one thing worse than not being able to see posted wait times; inaccurately posted wait times, or at least under-estimated ones.

Not surprisingly, Disney pretty much nails their posted wait times, or at least 90% of the time, which I think is pretty good. Not sure if they do this un-purpose, but I have noticed that in many cases, a posted wait time is the longest that you will wait for a WDW attraction. In fact, most of the time I have found that the actual wait time is 5-10 minutes (or more) less than what is posted.

If this is Disney's way of under promising and over delivering, great. Nothing better than thinking you will be waiting 30 minutes and you are on the ride in 15-20.

Disney "lies" as a means of crowd control. I don't fault them for this, but there are certain rides they consistently jack up wait times on.

I was there opening day as well as walked through the new Sweet Spot. Was impressed with how big it was and how much stuff there was in it. Posted a picture of my personal favorite item in there.

Sweet Spot looks good. I'll be checking out the one at Cedar Point on opening weekend.

And does anyone know if they will roll out wait times at Cedar Point this year? I doubt they would be of much help to me since I usually do my rides in order and they may be inaccurate as posted above.

Mmm that looks good 😏😏

Jeff said:

Disney "lies" as a means of crowd control. I don't fault them for this, but there are certain rides they consistently jack up wait times on.

When you really think about this, it is a very powerful behavior control. Think about it. The reason why FP was developed over a decade ago was to drive revenue; not necessarily a guest service initiative. When you are on line, you can't spend $$$. When you are in the park, you can. So why not artificially inflate wait times to discourage people from waiting on a standby line?

I really wonder how much back room research is done and analyzed resulting in algorithms built into the wait times for certain situations to help "convince" guests not to wait on standby, and stay in the park to hopefully spend $$$ somewhere.

While it hasn't happened a lot, I have gotten on a standby line that was say a 30-45 posted minute wait, and the ride was practically a walk on. I wonder how designed this is; in an attempt to discourage guests from riding.

It's actually brilliant.

So, in summary, you can't trust fan-made park apps that give wait times because they rely on user input which is typically lacking. You also can't trust park apps because they inflate the wait times to encourage guest spending.

Since King's Island has a Starbucks now I hope Cedar Point gets one soon!

They do! It's right up front where Donut Time used to be.

There is also a new Starbucks opening in the lobby at Breakers!

Pagoda Gift Shop said:

So, in summary, you can't trust fan-made park apps that give wait times because they rely on user input which is typically lacking. You also can't trust park apps because they inflate the wait times to encourage guest spending.

Well, I almost never input actual wait times into the fan apps. If I do participate, I'll just input the stated wait time on the way into the queue.

I didn't realize that. It's good that CF parks are trying to get better food!

I'd like to point out that the "healthy and/or healthier" options are few and far between , however. Sure, you can get a salad, but that's not going to fill you up.

I wound up eating Chicken Shack and could only finish 2.5 tenders before feeling full and almost guilty. :)

It's too bad, too - I love those tenders.