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Kentucky Kingdom


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  SIX gets so many things right. Ride operations isn't really one of them, IMO.  And it's such a basic point, people standing in line aren't spending. They are, most likely, becoming frustrated. Frustrated people tend to leave. As I and 2 other posters here did once from SFGA. Granted the park was packed, but low expectations of line movement from the preceding day, greatly influenced the decision.  There was a lovely recovery at Indiana Beach though :-)

 

  Sorry, pretty off topic. But, thread was headed that way.

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I've been to all but two of the SIX parks in the US/Canada and all but one of the FUN parks - all in the last five years.  I'd group the parks as follows:

 

Good Operations:

 

SIX parks - Great Adventure, St. Louis, Fiesta Texas

FUN parks - Cedar Point, Canada's Wonderland, Kings Island, Carowinds (Nighthawk excluded), Dorney Park

 

Average Operations:

 

SIX parks - Over Texas, Over Georgia (Goliath & Mindbender crews have been good), Magic Mountain, New England

FUN parks - Kings Dominion, Worlds of Fun, Valleyfair, Michigan's Adventure, Knotts

 

Below Average Operations:

 

SIX parks - America, La Ronde, Great America

FUN parks - none

 

In general - I much prefer ride operations at FUN parks versus those at SIX parks.  SIX parks do have some parks with overall good operations - Great Adventure and St. Louis come to mind immediately - but most of the other parks often vary wildly from ride to ride.  It's also not helping that SIX isn't adding new attractions that help with capacity in meaningful ways.

 

Interestingly enough, at both SIX and FUN parks the rides with the best capacity are the B&M coasters.  FUN has been wise enough to realize that continuing to add B&M coasters to their larger parks is a great way to add much needed capacity.  Meanwhile, take a look at SIX additions the last ten years.  Once you get past X-Flight at SFGAm, what attractions are they adding that deliver meaningful capacity?  The RMCs all average less than 800 people per hour capacity.  The Justice League rides are really fun, but they only average around 400 pph.  Each Justice League car has two rows but 3 seats.  How was that in any way smart?  How many amusement park groups have exactly 3 people?  Certainly not enough to justify that seating arrangement.  The net effect is that they're ALWAYS asking for single riders at the platform, which slows down loading even more.  If SIX really cared that much about ride operations, wouldn't they have made some provision to add the fourth seat to each row make it much more palatable?

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And back to Kentucky Kingdom, the T3 ride operators were great last year in the handful of times I rode.  Granted there was only one train and waits were long, but the ride ops were mostly efficient and had good interaction with the public.  Lightning Run  was consistently average, but really slow about sending vehicles out after the all clear was issued.  Thunder Run had some great crews and some terrible crews. 

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And back to Kentucky Kingdom, the T3 ride operators were great last year in the handful of times I rode. Granted there was only one train and waits were long, but the ride ops were mostly efficient and had good interaction with the public. Lightning Run was consistently average, but really slow about sending vehicles out after the all clear was issued. Thunder Run had some great crews and some terrible crews.

One day when I was there I was in the station for T3 Most of the ride ops were ACE members one cracked a joke about SLC'S that was a great day!

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

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And back to Kentucky Kingdom, the T3 ride operators were great last year in the handful of times I rode. Granted there was only one train and waits were long, but the ride ops were mostly efficient and had good interaction with the public. Lightning Run was consistently average, but really slow about sending vehicles out after the all clear was issued. Thunder Run had some great crews and some terrible crews.

It has been announced T3 will have a second train this year, no?

Either way, I think that will be my first ride of my first visit to Kentucky Kingdom since it has been said to be slow moving and since Storm Chaser will be a long line either way.

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And back to Kentucky Kingdom, the T3 ride operators were great last year in the handful of times I rode. Granted there was only one train and waits were long, but the ride ops were mostly efficient and had good interaction with the public. Lightning Run was consistently average, but really slow about sending vehicles out after the all clear was issued. Thunder Run had some great crews and some terrible crews.

It has been announced T3 will have a second train this year, no?

Either way, I think that will be my first ride of my first visit to Kentucky Kingdom since it has been said to be slow moving and since Storm Chaser will be a long line either way.

Yes, T3 will get its 2nd train this year.

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I had heard that they had the second train last year but never added it.  I take that with a grain of salt since I never saw it, or saw where it could be stored when it wasn't being used (like they do with the second train on Lightning Run.)  Just another thing to look forward to finding out about.

 

I think that is why I am such an advocate of this park.  I went in with very low expectations, and my socks were blown off when those expectations were thrown out the window.  But I tend to set the bar low for many things so I end up not being upset.

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I had heard that they had the second train last year but never added it. I take that with a grain of salt since I never saw it, or saw where it could be stored when it wasn't being used (like they do with the second train on Lightning Run.) Just another thing to look forward to finding out about.

I think that is why I am such an advocate of this park. I went in with very low expectations, and my socks were blown off when those expectations were thrown out the window. But I tend to set the bar low for many things so I end up not being upset.

Nope Kumbak was building the train after last season

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Some update photos via some random guy in KY because the park isn't doing a great job at keeping the hype up. (They posted a picture 20m of this post, showing track that was completed last week for some reason. 1-2 weeks between posts on Instagram? Ehh probably a bit sparse.
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Midgetman82.tumblr.com -- Marcus Dorsey

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http://midgetman82.tumblr.com/post/140643557351

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http://midgetman82.tumblr.com/post/140693395501/storm-chaser-at-kentucky-kingdom-march-6-2016
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Almost all trackwork is completed! All the airtime in this ride looks great, as well as the three inversions!

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And back to Kentucky Kingdom, the T3 ride operators were great last year in the handful of times I rode.  Granted there was only one train and waits were long, but the ride ops were mostly efficient and had good interaction with the public.  Lightning Run  was consistently average, but really slow about sending vehicles out after the all clear was issued.  Thunder Run had some great crews and some terrible crews. 

While Lightning Run sometimes gets slow crews in, I was certified to operate it on its maiden year and that darn thing has a huge delay in its own system after you hit the dispatch buttons.  The restraint solenoid was active any time it was in contact with the train, instead of moving to the side like most do, it had to detach and drop down which caused about a 5-7 second delay after you would hit dispatch.  That is what the long kind of air pressure noise was after clear was given. 

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That second photo is great! How bizarre that it dips under the supporting beam like that!

Looks like the track already had trains run the course with that wheel wear.

The track looks like that when they put the final plates over top the bulk of the track. It looks worn-ish before the train ever rolled.

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Looks like the track already had trains run the course with that wheel wear.

Don't quote me on this, but I want to say I read somewhere that RMC has started having non-painted strips on their track intentionally. Something to do with friction. I wish I could remember where I read that, because it explained it better.
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