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The designer of The Racer, Racer 75 and Thunder Road, John Allen, considered The Racer to be the finest of the roller coasters he designed during his legendary career. And he designed some good ones!

It’s hard to remain non-political when the reason we’re in this giant mess is strictly political. The ruling party has pushed out to their cult that masks are unnecessary and frowned upon, that the nation’s top infectious disease experts are not to be trusted and that we need to CUT testing in order to make the whole thing disappear. States are going BACK on lockdown for a second time because we have a complete void of leadership in the White House. Ban me or delete my post if you wish, but you cannot refute these facts.

Or why doesn’t anyone question why the USA makes up only 4.25% of the world’s population; yet we are 26% of the total known Coronavirus cases and 23% of the total world deaths due to Coronavirus…we are leading all countries by a long shot…Strive to be Number One in every category I guess...

Let's be honest - RMC's reliability is on par with Intamin, and the capacity is even worse.

You and everyone else lol. Either that or an intamin blitz

Reflection of Orion

We don't ban people for having a political opinion. We do understand this topic is hard to discuss without politics. Respectfully, we do ask to try and keep politics out of it, because nothing good ever comes out of that. Lastly, people come to KIC to get away from it, not read more about it.

Top healthcare facilities and professionals, sure. Top healthcare? Not so much. We’re probably not in the top 10. And yeah, let’s not beat around the bush. Our leadership is awful right now.

I'm actually hoping for a ground-up RMC in The Vortex spot.

^ For passholders, the reservation is tied to your season pass. When they scan you in at the front gate, they're able to see your reservation for that day.

Would like to see park change hours to be open later. People wishing to come after work wouldn't get there until >6p. Not much incentive to come out at that point.

Orion taking everyone by Storm

If this country doesn’t substantially change its policies very very soon and take this seriously the parks are going to look substantially similar next season as well. This is a slow moving ship and changes need to happen now, not 7 months from now.

I purposely did not include healthcare. Are you kidding me? The party in power is in court trying to strip healthcare from 30 million people with no backup plan. It would also kill protections for people with cancer and such where they can get locked out of even being able to PURCHASE insurance. All this happening during a 100 year pandemic. SMH

America is #1 in the world in medical research, medical innovation, and top healthcare professionals/facilities. It's not even close, but we are the absolute epicenter of the Coronavirus pandemic. Also not even close. You have to ask yourself why? Who is responsible? I think we know the answer.

There was a 50s show that was all outdoors and an outdoor stage where they did a modified peanuts show I think that I saw. All were socially distance the entire time and they wore masks before getting the equipment down or near each other and were all outside. Also dueling pianos in the gazebo near maverick and the firehouse looking building.

KDD who believes any discussion of any food item at a CF park is negligent and incomplete if it doesn't stipulate if it is on the meal plan or not.

Actually they are ! Rivertown Potato Works Gluten Free Chicken Tenders with Fresh Cut Fries Buffalo Chicken Fries Pulled Pork Fries

Saturday I was able to ride Orion! Thankfully, I was able to get in just as they opened. I was allowed to get in line without a time ticket, and after the ride I got a return time of 11-12 and rode again. The theme of the ride is my favorite thing. I love that they tied so many rides in KI's history into a great story and themed area, and I particularly like that they continued with FoF's theme, despite it being over 24 years old. As for the ride itself, it was a blast. I think this is the first coaster that ever made me blackout at the bottom of the first drop. The speed and force of the ride is awesome. My only issue is the length, it is incredibly short. I overheard many people saying the same thing while exiting, but were also praising the ride at the same time. Overall, this has been an excellent addition to the park. Banshee is still my #1 at KI though. Hopefully the next coaster is not another B&M.

I never thought nofnit that way. Close early and the electric bill drops significantly. In a time when you're looking to cut costs in any way possible that's a smart move.

The Eleventh Commandment is willing to make exceptions for improvements to the ride.

My gf and I had a miscommunication and she only reserved for herself - not both of us - the other day. My pass came up as a no go. Fortunately I was able to just go on my phone and make a reservation. Not gonna lie, I assumed the reservation thing was all smoke and mirrors too. Also, anyone else notice that the number of spots available is no longer in the drop down?

has the soundtrack for orion been released yet? i heard snippets from videos in area 72 and i really wanna hear the full thing Sent from my SM-N960U using Tapatalk

The design of Racer 75 and Thunder Road is/was highly improved from KI Racer. 1. 3rd hill after the drop is/was a great floater hill on 75 and TR vs. the higher hill on Rscer that the trains just get over. 2. The split turnaround on Rscer really takes away from the racing aspect as you lose sight of the other train. 75 and TR stay/stayed together. 3. Drop into tunnel finale on 75/TR. Racer never had the tunnel even before they removed the final drop. Racer 75 is one of my favorite coasters because of the train interaction. Especially now that the lift hill is synchronized.

I must add that the ride references in the Quonset hut contain even more Easter eggs, namely in the captions of the Polaroid pictures adjacent to each ride's poster. Since that theming is by the Fast Lane queue, those smaller Easter eggs are much more difficult to notice from the slower-moving regular line, especially since that's where one would actually have time to look at those photos and references more closely. We haven't seen them all just yet!

Shake, Rattle & Roll debuted 45 years ago. Guests loved it! Today its opening would result in a thread comparing it to other similar type rides, debates about the ride's colors, the lighting package, how the queue was set up, etc. Once upon a time, people just enjoyed the ride.

A reference to a favorite ride in the queue of another.

Hi guys, figured I would give you a heads up on my experience.I will start by saying current handling of ride operations in my opinion makes this park not ready to be open at the moment. Let me explain. For starters, I will say that from an enforcement of mask and social distancing policy standpoint, mostly Cedar Point nailed it. They were clearly the best enforcers of this in all 5 parks I have been to post covid (Indiana Beach, Holiday World, Six Flags St Louis, Kings Island, and now Cedar Point). Multiple associates using their best ability and diligence to make sure people are wearing their masks, distancing in the lines, and generally following the rules. There were bathroom attendants making sure people weren't all flooding the bathrooms with too many people with clickers. Signs and stickers in que lines enforcing distancing were everywhere, even in food lines and outside restrooms. I loved this. Very much appreciated and overall good job on this front! Now, let's get to the nitty gritty about the actual days there. I'm not going to talk about how the pass reservation system needs updated in this post, but we had reservations on Saturday at 12 and Sunday at 10 because one was planned and one was a bonus day we decided later when they allowed 2 days. We knew we weren't able to get to the park at noon Saturday but that was the latest reservation so that's what we got. We arrived at 215pm. Getting through the touchless temp check and security checks easily, all walk right through. Off to ride a ride, we said! I always avoid the first visible rides in the beginning of the day so we headed to Millennium Force. We went up and went to ride, was stopped by the ride attendant. He asked for a ticket and I didn't know what he was talking about. I told him we just arrived. He looked at the line and at that point it was short so he just let us on the ride sans attraction pass. This turned out to be the only thing going for us on Saturday. Got our ride on millenium and then headed back to Steel Vengeance / Maverick. Got there, and was told that there are no Attraction passes and they sold out at noon. Bust. Couldn't ride. We ended up going defeated to Cedar creek mine ride, magnum Xl 200, and then GateKeeper. All about 30 min lines or so, and we avoided Valravn and Raptor due to them showing 120 minutes. Along the way rides that were down all day that we couldn't ride were as follows: Blue Streak, Gemini, Top Thrill Dragster, Rougarou, Wicked Twister. Some were not that big of a deal, others very much so. Top Thrill in particular was a complete deal-breaker for me. These never opened and according to guest services Gemini and Top Thrill at least have not opened all season . This is one of my major issues. I get that rides can go down, but it's clear that these rides were never opening any time in the near future. Top thrills trains aren't even on the track, they are all on the transfer area and were both days. They also have zero social distancing markers in the que and station / exit. It's clear Cedar Point knew it wasn't opening. There was zero communication about this on their website, app, or email / Twitter / Facebook blasts. This is unacceptable in my opinion, it's one thing to inform us and say some rides will not open until further notice, but no such notice was given. Also, no notice of the attraction passes being handed out when they were or that they would be needed to ride. I would not have driven to the park on Saturday or Sunday knowing half of this. I did have an amazing conversation with a Cedar Point guest services supervisor upon leaving the park and talked about suggestions to fix obviously broken things and the room for improvement and that was nice. All the employees are helpful and nice. Well trained! Now this gets us to Sunday, but first let me remind you that Saturday they passed out passes to ride the three big rides: maverick steel vengeance, and millenium force. They were all gone by noon. Sunday, we have the earliest reservation at 10am, to hopefully snag some reservations. We arrived before 10am, a few minutes before and are one of the first people in for the day. This already was my least favorite part of the day at Cedar Point, and it became more annoying than normal. My normal park MO for any theme park is go on a lighter day if possible but always arrive before open, scope out coasters that are low capacity / new and popular and lap those in the early hours before crowds flood in. Cedar Point is the absolute worst at this, because of Hotel Breakers entrance even in an non pandemic year. The worst offenders for lines and two of the three attraction pass rides are just after that entrance, that opens at the same time the regular entrance is. This year, you cannot enter that entrance unless you are a hotel guest and have got a red band that shows you were temp screened because it does not have a mobile temp checking tent. These people have a 3 minutes walk to Steel vengeance and maverick and can get in line easily. Anyone else enters from the front of the park, and forced to walk all the way back to the ride and get in a line to get a pass. We were one of the very first people through on Sunday, power walked all the way there, and were in the last 10 of the passes passed out in the morning.to alleviate the tickets running out so fast they now release some every hour for about two hours out or so A group 2 groups behind us was the cut off. This means unless you stay at breakers as operations stands currently your chances of getting a steel vengeance attraction pass is slim to none. Better odds winning the lottery. You had to be all together in your party to get a ticket one per physical person, so couldn't get two different ride passes. When we got our steel vengeance passes, there was a line still past the freestyle drink pass and almost to Cedar creek mine ride. This brings me to another point. They have all these social distancing signs and markers for everything, and none of it for these attraction passes. Long lines of people were camping out in lines just to get tickets to ride later. It was creating worse social distancing than having the people wait in line a long time and monitoring the lines with the markers. Also, by the time we got through steel vengeance line we couldn't get to mavericks line it was sold out and passes weren't being passed out again till an hour from then, at noon. This means you basically choose the one of the three that you can maybe get a ride on in the morning and maybe at best you can get a second pass after waiting in the attraction pass lines for a large chunk of your day. It had unintended consequences in the walking category. We got a pass to ride steel vengeance from 12 to 1, and it was just past 11 and we can't ride any major ride nearby, so we headed off to do some rides that were busy yesterday. Valravn. Problem is, its at the other side of the park. We do this and get a 15 min wait on Valravn. So before noon we had essentially lapped the park. We also ride corkscrew and then rush to get to Steel vengeance as it was now 1240. We wanted to get in line before they let the next group in but while the line was thinned out. This worked, line was only to the stairs. Now comes the next issue, fast passes. I get that they aren't sold right now but they were sold previously and they're allowing those people to completely avoid this pass in continuously ride all of these rides. They said my opinion is a huge miss they need to turn off all fast passes for these rides pretty much every train had at least two rows of fast passes making the line move very painfully slow because they only have half of the trains capacity. I get that they paid for it but it will be good next year when it's actually something that is a fair measure based on the amount of volume. For regular guests to basically have to choose which ride is the most important in order to maybe secure a ride on it with one action pass and others leisurely just walk on these rides is complete lunacy. After riding Steel Vengeance, we tried to get a ticket for maverick. It was about 120, and they said the next tickets wouldn't be available to get for maverick until 3pm. Again, not many rides near that area so we again had back towards the front of the park, to this time get some lunch and talk with guest services. By this time it was going on our second lap of the park and us going to have to lap it again to potentially ride maverick. We talked again with guest services about the setup and how it needs serious improvement and then headed back on the skyride because our feet were tired then walked the rest of the way to mavericks action pass que. We managed to secure one of the last tickets for the 6pm to 7pm time slot. At this point it was 3pm, we decided to go ride magnum (since gemini was down) and it was a great second ride. 30 min wait. People were either using fast passes or accessibility passes and it definitely made the line move slow. After riding, we decided that we just needed to get some liquid and chill and relax in the shade in frontier City area. We used our drink passes and day at a bench chair in the shade, resting our feet from walking back and forth so much. We sit until 530. We then head to mavericks social distancing markers just outside the ride, and sit down. To our surprise, the ride attendant calls us up at 545 to get in line and we rip up the attraction pass and get in line. Yet again, see many people using fast passes. This really hurts the line speed and is overall not a good experience for anyone. These people have an advantage that you cannot buy and its causing others to suffer. About an hour later we get on maverick, and then head towards the exit. Talked with guest services again and went on our way home. Takeaways: Attraction Pass system is a joke, and needs to be part of your reservation or something else digital. Smaller parks like holiday world did it, you have zero excuses They knew Top Thrill Dragster and other rides wouldn't be open for the foreseeable future. They don't even have the social distancing markers or the trains even in a position on the track. No work happened while we were there this should have been advertised to potential guests on the website.i would not have visited knowing this. Breakers hotel guests and fast pass holders have way too much advantage this year to make anything of a fair experience for normal guests this year. This needs to be rectified. All this is subject to change per Cedar Point. undoubtedly they will tweak things to make a better experience for future guests. I would have said this was an ok trip knowing the anxiety it would cause and lack of open rides beforehand with notice vid online so it website or Facebook or Twitter, but alas there was none. And therein lies the problem. - Jon

I would be happy with a fastlane refund plus interest. But just simply a refund or saying hey you can't use it in 2020 at all but its good for all of 2021. That isn't good enough. You are taking it personal by making the post I am replying too. I drove 2 hours to ride Orion yesterday for the first time and used my fastlane twice while I waited. At 12:30pm Onion Mystic, Diamondback and Beast were still not running. So I left and drove back home. I had somewhere to be and couldn't stick around till pay close and hope the one new ride I drove there for opens. As of right now I don't know if I will be back to any Cedar Fair park at all this year or until things go back to normal next year. The masks restrictions, The slow lines and slow ops, the rides all being half closed at King's Island and Cedar Point and the mixed reviews of Orion make me think it may just not be worth my time. When my passes run out my money is going to a park like Holiday World who is handing everything so much better.

Currently on the KI website it says you can use the dining plan to “enjoy two meals every visit at 20 locations throughout the park“. By my count you can only do this at 16: Chick-fil-A Chicken Shack Coney Bar-B-Que Coney Mall Skyline Chili Festhaus (La Rosa & Grill) Hank's Mexican Grill International Street La Rosa's Juke Box Diner Miami River Brewhouse Panda Express Planet Snoopy Grill Rivertown La Rosa's Rivertown Potato Works Skyline Chili Subway Coney Mall Tom & Chee I’m guessing this is because they didn’t update the website to reflect that the waterpark isn’t open... as I think there are 4 more options there: BBQ place Subway The la Rosa/grill option The little shack by the wave pool with burgers/brats. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I'd like to see the park bring back the drink wristbands as an option for single day ticket holders, like they've done the last few years (presumably to compete with Holiday World). I'm not carrying a souvenir bottle around with me all day for refills. With it being as hot as it's been, and not wanting to use water fountains during COVID, I'll probably be spending $20-30 a day there on drinks. I'd honestly be happy to just pay that up front for an unlimited wristband, just for the convenience of not having to pay each time I get a drink. I think the season drink plan is only $32, but it's only available as an add-on for a season pass.

I got 2 rides on it over the weekend. So far, I like it. I'll need a few more rides before I can make a good judgment on it. It's a solid addition to the park. As of now, Fury 325 remains my favorite giga coaster.

Noticed that on AE as well. Don’t understand why first tunnel can’t get some basic LED flood lights just so you can see what’s in there (I swear I even heard snake hissing in there) but that last lift. Wooof that’s bad. Most of the rock work is now gone from overhead. Lighting is almost nonexistent and soundtrack is pretty much silent. Even some basic projection mapping would go a LONG way in there and maybe eliminate the mechanical animations that barely work anyway (if at all)

Awesome Coaster Studios review of Orion. Totally agree with the feel of the speed hill and the last airtime hill. Regarding a possible rattle, as a structural engineer I do not feel the ground beneath B&M coasters at Kings Island is the cause of the so-called B&M rattle. As a mechanical engineer, I would feel it has something to do with dampening. Personally, I love Diamondback's rattle. A visit to Kings Island would pail without the sound of her rattling over the first airtime hill. And in the wild, Diamondback rattlesnakes rattle.

? How is that his problem? lol

According to the dictionary they should just shoot out of you quicker with increased thrust, but cannot confirm.

Anyone tried this yet? Looks very good . Per @chuck norris above it does not seem to be on the meal plan.

I made a solo trip to the park today. (The rest of my family didn’t feel safe attempting it.) My opinion...because I know everyone cares. I give the park credit, I think they have done ABOUT all that is possible to make the park reasonably safe...but in the end, you just can’t fix stupid...or arrogance. (It will be a job to enforce all of the rules if the park REALLY gets busy.) Here are 2 examples I saw today...I think the second one falls into the stupidity category...I’m not sure about the first one... Example A: I was next in line to enter the tent to have my temperature taken, I glance behind me...and I kid you not, a guy is within a foot of me! He couldn’t even make it through the “turnstiles” without breaking the rules...he did have a mask on though. (I swear, if I had a nickel for every time I’ve shaken my head at stupidity during my lifetime would have been able to outbid Cedar Fair for the parks back then. ) Example B: A mother and a daughter were walking down one of the “main drags” without masks on, drinking cups of water. An associate called them over to explain that they had to have their masks on. I felt so bad for the associate, what should have been about a 30 second conversation went on for about 3 minutes. The mom seemed to think that because they were drinking it was a “get out of jail free card”. (In my hometown, grocery store cashiers are receiving “hazard pay”...maybe the park should consider something like “stupidity pay”. ) I thought most people seemed to be wearing their masks properly...but I wasn’t purposely staring at everyone. Keeping masks on the little kids seemed to be the hardest thing...but it also seemed like parents were trying. I thought that most of the time people were doing a good job at social distancing...but, since the park wasn’t crowded it was easy. I did notice that people bunched up into a normal crowded line to collect their Orion ride tickets though...I just don’t know how many extra associates it would take to stop that from happening. My overall opinion, I wanted to be able to say that I experienced this COVID style Kings Island...and I don’t regret doing it...but, I didn’t think of something in advance that I should have...“this” Kings Island would be lacking one of the main ingredients of why I visit the park...escapism from the real world...unfortunately, it followed me to the park. I hope the park can make this work...I don’t envy them. I did pick up quite a few souvenirs...because as @BeeastFarmer said earlier “because you help people when they are down.“ (That, and I love all of the new pins! ) Out of everything I bought though, I thought this souvenir summed up a trip to Kings Island in 2020 perfectly! (The idea of getting a caricature now just seemed so ludicrous...something I’d expect to see in a “Naked Gun” or “Airplane” movie.

To much common sense

they're selling in park? NM I see them on the website. 85$ everyday through the week. Seems high for 8 hour days, but I guess better then nothing

Had a great lunch at about 1230 at Brewhouse before the crowds hit, excellent burger. Wife had the sliders. Tots too greasy as always but thats how i always feel about tots, not specific to KI. Added the spinach dip, it was excellent. Restroom was clean and hit the sanitizer on the side door exit. Second meal at Hanks, steak burrito for me and my wife had a Carnitas bowl. They gave us both a ton of guac, great value overall. A solid day. Kings Island has some of my favorite dining plan items, on par or better than CP and Knotts for top 3 in the chain.

Get em @DonHelbig

Kentons Cove Fantastic Voyage on the Lost River at the Flooded Phantom Theatre Maestro Revenge. Has a ring for a nice indoor out door Adventure