Six Flags America 6-9-04

So with Regan rolling into DC today why not go to an amusement park and beat the crowds. That part was true. Sadly the rest of the day was so so......

We got the park around noon and it was deserted, you would normally think this to be a good thing, but if only the fates had told me what lied ahead.

ROAR- a great coaster, much like all of the coasters in the park they were running two trains, but only loading into one. The ride ops lacked total motivation. It made chinnese water tourture look better in the long run. After waiting for our turn the ride ops let us on and we got seated and situated. The ride op running the ride gave us this show about some gal on the train before us about how scared she was and it just made me scared. He was screaming into the microphone and doing all sorts of crazy ****.

Joker Jinx - This coaster was great all around and the ride ops, though slow as molassas did a great job.

LUNCH- had a nice basket of chicken fingers. The guy running the counter could not count change. AHHHHHH

Paradise Island Water Park - most of this was closed but the wave pool was fun. The most scary thing about this was seeing some gal loose a hair extension and watch it float on by....scary...

Super Man Ride of Steel - Only running one train. At one point a guy on our train said he needed a drink. The ride op released his restraints (which now totally suck ass thanks to that accident in New England) and let him hold up the train so he could get a drink from his ****ing water bottle.

Penguins Blizzard River - with a huge line they were running only 4 rafts. I counted 13 not being used. It was a long wait. The ride was okay. It totally spins you around and gets you crazy. It does not get you wet which sucks

Batwing- ARGH WHY CAN'T ANY ONE IN THE PARK LEARN HOW TO LOAD AND UNLOAD PEOPLE INTO CARS ON COASTERS. TOOK AN AVERAGE WITH ONE TRAIN ABOUT 10 MINUTES TO GET THE TRAIN IN AND OUT.

Wild One- fun coaster just the same comments as all the others.

To me this is a bland urban ghetto park. Trash all over rides looking old and delapadated. More kids under the age of 10 going f this and f that. LINE JUMPING IS A HUGE HUGE HUGE PROBLEM!

it was an okay day but not worth the price of admission. I wish six flags would just realize that it needs a total over haul and a new sence of motivation. I hate going to a park where I am not sure if we are having fun or about to embark on a forced death march.

Well what can you expect when SFI is dumping nearly all of their capital investment funds into parks like SFMM,SFGRADV & SFGRAM & very little investment has been going towards the parks that really need it in recent years?

It seems that Batwing is down to the ever popular single train op again? I knew a two train op on that thing was too good to be true & wouldn't last long.

An interesting note is that most of paradise island was closed....save for monsoon lagoon,there has been talk over the past season or two going around the park that they might consider moving the waterpark after all & I've never seen PI closed once it has already opened for the season.

Perhaps that might be the spot for next season's new ride?seeing as how it won't go in GC the only other place I could see it going in would be coyote creek somewhere behind Mind eraser...although I should just keep quiet about it after what happened last week.

Last week I mentioned something about it in one of the other threads here(either an SFA TR or the SFGRADV 05 coaster thread,can't recall which) but my source read what I posted & was mad as hell about me posting anything about it & as a result I can't get any more information from him about it.

It was the SFGadv 2005 thread.

Thirteen rafts not being used on PBR? Plus the four on the circut? Seventeen rafts total? Funny, cause PBR only opened and was only designed to run eight rafts. Either SFA is replacing all the rafts, you miscounted, or you are extreamly exagerating. They run so few to prevent stacking. Before they put the seatbelts on the ride, they could run all eight rafts with no stacking at all moving lines very quickly, but now thay they have top check all of the seatbelts and all, I guess they run much fewer rafts to prevent stacking. I wouldn't be too surprised to see only as many as rafts on the ride this year for just that reason.

As for the park on such limited operations, it is a weekday, and schools are still in, no need to chance wear and tear on rides when one train will do just fine.

As for the trash, I've been to SFA dozens and dozens of times, and I'm sure you are exagerating about the trash, SFA does as well if not better than any other SF park when it comes to cleanlieness. As for the coasters looking so bad, it's already been discussed that most all need repainted...most of the flat rides have been repainted within the last couple years so I'm sure the coasters are just the final items left on the list of things to paint.

You know...that could also be the reason for such bad capacity on TSC.

In order to prevent stacking on TSC they only run 4 boats max on that thing but PBR has been worse because when I was there last month they were only using 3 rafts that day with some major stacking & the slow crews running the ride weren't helping matters one bit.

Anyone else find it ironic that he used the same foul language in his trip report that he complained about 10 year old kids using?

Not me....it didn't come across my mind until you brought it up but at least he had the common sense to censor himself to an extent.

Anyone here going to the park tomorrow? I'll be there from just after opening to close(so long as it doesn't rain) & hope to get a few good laps in on S:ROS,as well as Roar on the black train to see if it really is running better than the blue one.

Roar doesn't have a blue train silly. I think it's Teal:) As for the trash comment, I 'm sorry but I'll have to agree that it's a major problem for the park at times, mostly when it's really busy. I also agree that line jumping is rampant. The language problem is nothing you won't hear at other parks. Just last week I was at Hersheypark, and I heard a lot of swearing. What can you do, there was mostly school groups there. Kids (and many adults) these days seem to have no boundaries about swearing around other people.

I was there yesterday & boy was the park busy! it was so crowded that from the top of superman you could clearly see that they were making good use of the overflow parking area.

Of course big business is good for the park & shows to corporate just how much potential they've got in the DC market but they really need to get their ride capacity issues straightened out because if everyone's stuck in a queue for any given ride/coaster for any marginal length of time then they're not out on the midways shopping or eating & of course that greatly reduces the overall amount of guest spending on any given day.

This Park has always had problems with Trash and bad, umotivated ride ops....When i lived in DC back in 2000 and 2001 it was the same thing as this poster said.....sounds like not much has changed since i left?? The park is very ghetto IMO..it does have some nice rides though.....I live in San Antonio now and SFFT is a much cleaner better run park by comparison...

SFFT is an UNFAIR comparison....everyone in that place deserves a raise and/or promotion, it is the cream of the SF crop. The ONLY reason I rate other SF parks higher is due to better (wooden) rides...staff, food, steel rides (SKC, Poltergeist, S&S combo tower, Top Spin, Frisbee, Scooby, etc.), plus the theming, friendliness, cleanliness, SHOWS....SFFT is plain *loaded* with good reasons to praise that park....

SFA has great rides, one of the best lineups in the chain (IMO as always)...while I have seen SOME improvement in the OTHER areas, there remains a LOT of work to be done...esp. in staffing, which to me is THE single most important aspect of park mgt....
*** Edited 6/14/2004 2:55:47 PM UTC by rollergator***

I didn't go to the park in 2000-2001 so I don't have a way to compare it to. However, I have been going since 2002 and haven't seen a really bad trash problem at the park. SFFT is a clean park and cleaner than SFA but none the less. I don't see overflowing trash cans or trash on the midway. However, there is room for improvement especially in the queue areas of the busier rides. Example, one recent Saturday, I noticed a major problem with trash in the Two Face queue.

Well..im glad to hear that SFA has cleaned up some....like i said..a few years ago I thought it was very poorly run. I do think they have some great rides and coasters, they just need better management is all......But as we all know, Six Flags seems to have a problem "parkwide" with poorly trained rideops and poor management in general. There are a few exceptions though..with SFFT being one..

You know while I was there on saturday I noticed that paradise island appeared to be closed as well.

From all of my vantage points (both in the park & on central ave. waiting to enter the lot) I never saw anyone in line for any of the slides at all & believe me it was hot enough for the waterpark to be open that day.

Now of course for special events they sometimes hold concerts in the waterpark near monsoon lagoon but never before have they closed the entire waterpark just for such an event,also I found it odd that Renegade rapids was closed & dry as a bone as well.

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BATWING FAN SFA said:
Well what can you expect when SFI is dumping nearly all of their capital investment funds into parks like SFMM,SFGRADV & SFGRAM & very little investment has been going towards the parks that really need it in recent years?

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It appears that ALL coasters got large shelves of cubby holes that match train colors. Very nice addition, On my 6/20 visit I also noticed security guards at the beginning of the station queing on most coasters, watching for line jumpers. Also, 4 lap bar checkers on ROS, 2 train operation everywhere possible, and I was nearly knocked down twice by park sweep people going after litter.

Lots of new merchandise is appearing including dancin man items like shirts watches and mousepads (I'm using my mousepad today:)

So all in all the park "is" getting it's cash, it's simply being used for training and uniforms and the such.

SAM