Zippin' Pippin - August 8th

Bay Beach Amusement Park
Green Bay, Wisconsin
Zippin Pippin
August 8th

Outing Plan: Meet grade school friend and her kids
Activity: Zippin Pippin rides and dinner.
Number of hours of rain before she called to cancel: 1
Chance of my still going: 100%

Weather: Pouring rain. Wind.
Temperature: 68 degrees.

Likelihood Park is open: Zero percent.
Likelihood Zippin Pippin is open: Zero percent

Park: Open
Zippin Pippin: Open.
Rain: Continuous

Park attendance: 1
Zippin Pippin Wait times: 0
Trains Running: 2
Ride ops: 4
Cost per ride: $1
Track: Slicker than a Koch-backed politician on election day
Getting to re-ride continuously: Priceless

First impression of coaster: Big
Second impression: Well maintained
Third impression: Holy SH** this thing is fast in the rain

Air Time: Every hill
Second to Last hill: Ridiculous, Painful Canon-fire Airtime

Ride Ops: Friendly.
Safety speeches: None
Amount of pain medication required for Green Bay's pelting cold rain: Vicotin 2

Front Seat Airtime: Extremely aggressive.
Rear Seat Airtime: Aggressive.
Middle seat airtime: Medium, better for the age 50+ crowd like me.

Chance that land clearing at back of park will include a new coaster: 50%

Chance of returning to this coaster: 100%

Chance of riding this for seven hours the day before I die just like Elvis did: 100%

Chance of this being an awesome trip report: 100%

Pippen is the poo. So take a big whiff.

Bill said:

Cost per ride: $1
Track: Slicker than a Koch-backed politician on election day
Getting to re-ride continuously: Priceless

Honestly, as much as I like "family-friendly pricing" - that's somewhat ridiculous. I felt almost guilty handing them tickets for their seriously-underpriced rides. I'd like for Bay Beach to be able to maintain itself regardless of the political climate, and there's just no way, IMO, that the park is making enough to survive without community funding (see: Koch comment).

On the plus side, I brought home some tickets as souvenirs - and hopefully incentives to return.

From the back of my envelope: staffing costs for the ride - 4 staff x 10 hours x 100 days x all-in cost of about $12.00 per hour would run $50,000 for the summer. Plus some additional management, security, ticket sellers, additional maintenance crew - maybe we're at $150,000?

Plus parts and supplies, electricity and fuel, insurance - maybe we're at $200,000?

The ride had 400,000 riders its first year; assuming that's paid riders, then it cleared $200,000 over my WAG, which ought to be more than enough to pay the bonds these days. That's ignoring the additional tickets sold for all the other rides, which looks to be about another $400,000.

http://archive.greenbaypressgazette.com/article/20110927/GPG0602/10...t-pays-off

(It's also ignoring all the other economic benefits, but those ought to be left out of the Parks Department's calculation.)

I'd say it's likely Bay Beach is not maximizing profit, but perhaps that's not the purpose of a city park.