Six Flags - Flagship Park?

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2Hostyl said:
Did you all ever for a moment entertain the possibiity that there is *no* flagship park for SFI? Everything that I have read seems to point to the parks being 'tiered', but never have I gotten the impression that SFI favors any one park as a standards bearer over the other. On the contray, they tend to mention MM, GAm, GAdv and oT as a collective.

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Not that I didn't say that or mention 'Tiered' Parks earlier in the thread, Jeremy...

;)

Please don't get too hostile with my;).

I think Q-Bot's are a good feature for anybody willing to pay for them. There are some people that go to a park to stand in line and ride rides, some people will even argue that that's part of the experience.

I, and a few others I'm sure, think that it's well worth however much money you have to spend to get a q-bot and not wait in line all day. I know it's been established that I have no bearing on how important it is to save money or the value of a dollar, but my opinions on q-bot, fast pass, expresspass, or freeway will never change. I just like being able to ride a ride at Universal, Disney, Six Flags, or Cedar Point without having to wait 3 hours on one of the busiest days of the season for it.

At sfgadv batman the ride had the reserved rows blocked off and so did scream machine. The rows with the grabage cans blocking them are the qbot reserved ones. one thing though is people dont understand that if there is a garbage can there it means dont use the row. people just go around it and use that row anyway so when qbot people get on that row and find people there the ops have to take extra time to ask the people to get up and put the qbot people there.

I think all the rides should have reserved qbot rows., also i think kingda ka should make one row in one of the cars a qbot row.

Kyle, my 'problem' with Q-bots is that it costs. Freeway(isn't that what its called @ CP?) and other similar systems at parks are free.

But I don't worry bout Q-Bots or anything like them much. Of the 5 Major theme parks I went to during the summer, I made sure to go on days that weren't crowded beyond belief.

Carowinds made me wait no longer than 30 min., and that was for SuPeR sAturAtOr, and waiting is half the fun.

PKI was crowded, but mostly in the kid's section. I feel like an idiot waiting as long as I did for Scooby Doo's Ghoster Coaster @ PKI as it sucked and I'll never ride it again, but I had to have my credit. Face/Off was 20 min. wait and not bad. EVerything else coaster wise was little wait for me.

SFKK was walk on madness all day, every coaster.

CP was crowded moreso that I thought it would be, but I still managed to hit 14 coasters, with TTD 2 times. I didn't wait long for Corkscrew, Mean Streak, GEmini, Maggie, WT, Blue Streak. TTD was an hour and 20 wait, with most of that being down time. I actually waited only about 30 min. of up time. Millie was stupidly long at 2 1/2 hrs. Never again will I wait that long. And 2 1/2 is my limit regardless of what coaster any where, ever. Disaster Trasnport was well worth the 30min. wait. The Veko kiddie was about 20 min., but I got the credit out of the way, and I'll never have to wait for Mantis again. Raptor was 40min. and worth it. My stupidity caused me to miss wildcat, not the crowds.

Geauga was walk ons.

I don't wait at parks. The only reason I waited @ CP so much was because it was my first time. Next year, I'll go during Dead week.

Back on topic for the Thread, I think its safe to assume that SFoG, SFoT, SFGAm, SFGAdv, and even SFMM (I personally don't think they'll sell, YMMV) are supposed Top Tier parks due to size mostly. They usually poor Cap Ex into those parks for a period of time.

SFA, SFFT, SFEG, SFNE, SFMW, SFM all seem to be Second Tier Parks. They get something either every year or every other year (yes, I did mention SFA). They are all also mid-sized parks (not including attendance in any of these, BTW), with SFMM almost falling into this catagory.

SFKK, SFDL, SFStl, SFAw seem to be the Third Tier Parks. They may get something new here and there, but not always.

Not that I'm not rating these parks on experience they give, as I've only been to one of each level, and actually had a better time @ a 2nd Tier park than at SFGAm. If SFI would re-structure their system to deal with parks in a Tiered system, while upping their customer Service (obviously), and keeping the parks looking clean and fresh, I think they'd fare much better.

QBot does have it's drawbacks and tradeoffs. You can either PAY to not wait physically in line as much, or NOT PAY to wait in the line. I fail to see how the QBot people are equals that are line jumping. They pay for the privilege.

Also, I can verify the estimated time is almost always longer than you'd wait if you were physically in line. I used it in 2003 with a friend of mine, and we decided to Q S:UF, and get in the physical line anyway. We figured that way we'd be able to get off, and then go right back up the Q entrance. Well, the Q bot told us an hour and a half, and we were off the ride inside of an hour. We took the extra half hour to go get food. The only exception to the Qbot being longer is that if a coaster breaks down, the physical line doesn't move, but QBot does.

But still, they pay extra for the privilege. That's part of park policy.

As for the rows? It depends on the coasters. If it was designed since the QBot was introduced (i.e. S:UF) then they have a special pathway, and rows are not reserved. If it's older (i.e. Chiller, Scream Machine, Skull Mountain, etc.) then they block off rows, usually in the middle. If there don't happen to be any QBot riders, then they let people slip over to fill the rows.

I could understand your protestations if it were Freeway @ CP, since that is free, and it's just a matter of near-sprinting to the ride and being in line for the stamp before they run out, which was usually by 11 or so when I was last at CP. I was actually in line for MF back in 2002, and there was a friendly, polite ride op sitting at the merge point (no, I'm not being sarcastic). A rather large group of roughly 30-40 people all came up the Freeway entrance (all with valid stamps), and the friendly ride op politely told us that it was park policy that the people in the freeway line get preference. So, we had to wait 2 dispatches to move (until all the people that came up the freeway entrance were able to merge into the line on the ramp). I understood that it was park policy (and took advantage of the freeway program the rest of the week) so I didn't complain.

Good example, and I can verify it. What I try to do is reserve the ride, and then wait in line, I can usually do so within the window of the q-bot time.

However, I don't neccessarily think that free systems are completely good. When I was queing for Millennium Force at Cedar Point, the amount of FreeWay riders really slowed the line down. If they limited it (though they do, but maybe limit it even more) this wouldn't be a problem but we probably saw an additional 30 minutes added on to the time in line. Its just how different parks manage their systems, ie, I think the system at MGM, while free and basically "unlimited", worked much more efficiently than CP's FreeWay. Just my opinion though, the lines still seemed to move.

I'm not familiar with how MGM's system works.. can you explain it?

Its a free system in which you scan your admission ticket and it prints out a time where you can return. It is kinda like freeway, in that you merge, but you merge closer to the station, and you can get new ones after you used your current one. IE, I get one for Tower of Terror, I wait for it and ride it, and can then go over and get a pass for RRC. It is very similar except for how it is attained and the fact that it isn't limited to two per day (I think thats what CP is). But somehow it seemed to work MUCH better.

As far as I know CP is supposed to be one a day, but I've seen people in the bathroom scrubbing it off their hand, and I've seen others put their tagged hand in their pocket, and keep it there while they ask for the free hand to get stamped. I think it's supposed to be on a particular hand (maybe varying per day, just like the ink color?) because I've seen some workers ask to see their other hand, and refuse to stamp their hand when they see they already have one (even if it's used). Not 100% sure on that, though, b/c I was only there for a week twice.

Mr friend worked at SWOA and he said Q-Bot caused more problems than satisfying guests. Maybe it was the management, look at my previous posts in this thread about the former SWOA now Great Adventure park manager, but it just doesn't seem like that great of an idea.

Not to mention I always like a little wait for the rides. Now that I am up there in age, the time between rides lets me recover. Lets not forget if your with good company half the fun of going to a park is spending time with your freinds in a fun enviornment. Chatting in line with your buddies can be a good time. If the ops are doing a good job and the line is moving, I don't mind. I have always had fun "people watching" and when I'm riding a coaster that is a little intense the build up makes the ride more enjoyable.

Q-bot takes away from that expereince, but again this is just my opinion. *** Edited 12/24/2004 9:25:43 AM UTC by Commish*** *** Edited 12/24/2004 9:33:10 AM UTC by Commish***

I ususally end up going on coaster trips by myself because I work weekends with weekdays off, and my friends all work thru the week with weekends off, so I'm usually there by myself. Unless I meet an enthusiast at a park.

I just hate waiting in lines. I think its ridiculous to wait hours upon hours for a ride that lasts all of 30 seconds. Its putting alot in with too little pay off. If the ride lasts for a good length of time, I don't mind waiting for a bit. Or if its a fun que, like on super saturator, where the line can be more fun than the coasters if your in between enough hot chicks of legal age;).

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Impulse-ive said:
Well the trains certainly weren't full! All I know is this: I was sitting in some scorching hot sun beyond the shade for Nitro. For seven dispatches in a row, I was able to see people constantly walking right up the Qbot steps and into the station. For those seven dispatches, the trains were leaving with the front and back couple of rows filled and the middle had a scattering of people, maybe 5 1/2 full rows of people. In those seven dispatches, I moved up one queue rail, so what, about 6 feet? That's pathetic, and I could see that the line was stalled because there was such a backup in the station, except there were constntly people filling in the front rows from the back of the station, meaning they were coming from the Qbot line, which is completely separate until the loading platform and doesn't join up with the other line as you claim. There were no employees monitoring the entrance to the Qbot line, there were none monitoring the top of the stairs to the platform, it was just chaos.

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This is not a surprise. The line for Nitro gets held up all the time because of the stupid people that are waiting for the front not staying to the left and those who are not waiting to ride the front not going up the right hand side of the stairs. This is a common occurrence and drives those that know what should be done, batty.

I do agree that the stairs should have made wider with a handrail down the middle but it wasn't, now we have to deal with this situation quite often.

Ed *** Edited 12/24/2004 7:11:20 PM UTC by chillforce5X***

I hate that about Nitro! The line will be an hour long, yet you get into the station and there's nobody there except the people waiting for the front. There used to be an employee who worked Nitro that we called "The Regulator"...because he got on that mic and made sure the line kept moving. He was an amazing op but I did not see him around this year.

Commish, I couldn't agree with you more about the Q-Bot. I'm not aware of any Gadv staff that actually like anything about the system. I'm personally not a fan of it myself either.

Thanks for your insight on things. I'll try to keep an open perspective on things. For now, I think he has us on the right track.

Commish, QBot has the potential to take away from that experience, but it depends on how you use it. For example, if you look higher in the thread, I explained how me & my friend actually would Q a ride, and then stand in line anyway, kinda like a 2-for-1 deal. So we'd stand in line with that experience, ride, get off, and essentially go right back on. It's almost like extending the length of the day since we were waiting in "2 lines at once". The park is open for 12 hours, and we got roughly 20 hours worth in that time. We still had the wait-in-line experience, we just were able to ride more times.

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chillforce5X said:
The line for Nitro gets held up all the time because of the stupid people that are waiting for the front not staying to the left and those who are not waiting to ride the front not going up the right hand side of the stairs. This is a common occurrence and drives those that know what should be done, batty.

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I've offered to re-design the stations/queues for SFA several times already...seems that some parks aren't able to *predict* that more riders will want to wait for the front (and even back) row....I guess it DOES take a genius to figure that out...;)

Back to "flagship", I think it's relatively clear that SFI has decided to pour the most resources onto those parks that pay the biggest dividends...not surprisingly, those are located near Chicago and NYC.

SFMM has too much competition from better-run, and better-financed, competition...

SFoG and SFoT, I dunno, I guess I *am* a homer at heart....Southern hospitality and all... ;)
*** Edited 12/29/2004 5:26:37 PM UTC by rollergator***

I've been to the 5 parks referenced here last season (SFOG, SFGadv, SFMM and SFOT) and I'm not sure if Six Flags thinks they have a "flagship park."

However, I can easily comment on the parks themselves. SF Great America and SF Over Texas were very well run parks - as good as some of the best in the country. Six Flags Magic Mountain and Great Adventure were, and I'm not exagerrating here, two of the worst run parks in the country. What's particularly cruel about this is that both parks have some of the best coasters in the country.

I don't really understand people comparing Six Flags Over Georgia to Six Flags Over Texas. For me, at least, there was no comparison. SFOT was quite easily the best park in the chain and one of the best amusement parks in country. SFOG, on the other hand, was run, it seemed to me, like your average Six Flags - better then the bottom like SF America, Great Adventure and Magic Mountain, but nowhere near the top examples like Great America, Fiesta Texas and SF Over Texas.

As Great Adventure is quite close to me, I'm hoping that the park really does turn itself around, but I'm not holding my breath. The first day I hear the park was empty and they DIDN'T close half the rides I'll pay attention. Hell, I'll even pay more attention if they ran their coasters at full capacity all the time, stopped using garbage cans as a substitute for "line closed" chains, posted employees at ride entrances to explain ride closures to folks, and made a real effort to cut down on line cutting. However, the chain seems to have attitude problems toward it's guests that are rooted at the very top of management, and the only question I really have is how SFOT, SFGam and SFFT have stayed as good as they are.

I think the problems that great adventure had is with the park managament not the chain management. I think the new head of the park is trying . The only time ihad a real problem at gadv was during fright fest. Al l10 times that i went the only rides that were closed were viper and half the time caos. IF sfgadv can get better management and teahct their employees some manners they can be an awesome park. also from what i heard the park pays very little to work there. Its not the rides that are the problem its the service.

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majortom1981 said:
Its not the rides that are the problem its the service.

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Certainly the quality of the rides are not the problem. However, I find your statement that only Chaos and Viper were closed to be dubious. I was only there 2 times last season, once at the beginning (May) and once at the end (September). Both times there were many, may more rides closed then 2. In May the park was empty, but in September it was a packed day and the park still had many rides closed. Here's a photo of the rides closed list from my visit in May:

http://rollercoaster.dreamhost.com/P1010006.jpg

My thinking the problem comes from the top comes from visiting a lot of Six Flags parks. As opposed to Paramount, Cedar Fair, Busch and Disney parks, they tend to run coasters below their potential capacity consistently, then charge for the privilege of cutting the long lines they have created. The attention to theming shown in the parks can be best shown by the name of my favorite Great Adventure food stand, "Del Rio Waffle Cone." Employees at Six Flags parks tend to mirror, in attitude, the people who serve me my burrito at Taco Bell. Somehow, Cedar Fair and Paramount parks are able to find employees who are pleasent and efficient, while paying very similar (if not lower) pay rates. The chain, in general, has the worst food, while also being the most overpriced (well, Paramount parks compete on this front). The efficiency of the front gate security at most Six Flags parks is abysmal, with needlesly long lines often greeting visitors at the start of their day. At many Six Flags parks (most notably Great Adventure), on days when the park is less crowded the park is also understaffed, with many rides closed. Line cutting tends to be rampant at many Six Flags parks, Great Adventure included, while parks near inner cities owned by other corporations, like Knotts near Los Angeles or Dorney near Philly/NYC, have much less cutting and rule breaking.

All this does not add up to a chain that is broke and can't do better. It adds up to a chain that has a view that the bottom line is more important then quality. Six Flags parks (Great Adventure especially) tend to do the bare minimum to allow guests to have a tolerable day, and no more. There appears to be a belief that as long as one keeps giving 2 for 1 coke cans and new rides or coasters every year, then the people that come won't mind all the other problems. Thanks to their domination of the market and heavy advertising spending, they are also able to foster the belief that all amusement parks are like this, a feeling most often believed in NYC about Great Adventure, and Los Angeles about Magic Mountain (knowing a lot of people in both cities who are occasional park goers has given me this belief).

This is how I believe that the problems of Great Adventure are not an issue of mere management, but more a diseased core created by a larger corporate structure that continues to cut corners whenever possible to maximize profit.

Kingda Ka is one of my favorite examples of this problem. Cedar Point, a park with less annual attendance then Great Adventure, designed and outfitted Top Thril Dragster with the potential and ability to run 6 trains. Six Flags, with Kingda Ka, designed and outfitted Kingda Ka with 4 trains. 2 less trains for a park that is more crowded and for a coaster that will get even more national press then Dragster did. Why? This isn't a regional management issue. It's an attitude coming from the top and trickling down. Well, at least in my opinion. :)

I was pointing out that the 10 times i was there the rides that were down were viper(half of the time),caos(most of the time) and every time except the two for fright fest the batman side of the chiller.

I have been there at least 10 times this past summer. Also sometimes the rides close for stupid reasons like people puking on them. IF parks like six flags over texas are good parks as people call them then how can it be an upper management problem? Isnt the overal lrunning of the park like employee and customer service for that park left to the management of that particular park?