Gordon Bombay

Thats because you obviously dont know what good guest service is about. Like woofer said, obviously with the attitude you have, if its the same attitude your crew has, you all need to get a crash course in what service excellence is. Woofer knew what this was about even back in the early 90's when he worked at KI so decent guest service isnt that new of a concept, I think its time you got off these boards and learned that. Change your attitude and make your crew and parks reputation better, rather than making excuses that no one here is buying.

Then your sups are wrong, and yes I do know whats in your handbook and I do know the specifics for the X flight handbook, I'm a former Paramount Parks and Cedar Fair employee and I'm well aware of what the rules and regulations regarding employee behavior are. Your sups tell you to do it? Well that obviously means you werent one like you claimed. Listen this is a fight you cant win, theres too much opposition here against you, I reccomend you stop, read the handbook, then take your passion for the job and turn it into something possitive for the next season at your park, turn around the parks bad reputation. "Pretending to be doing something" translates into "make sure the boss doesnt know I'm loafing". In my time since I've stopped working for amusement parks I have worked for two major retail stores and while the operations of both companies are far differnt than that of an amusement park, the customer service techniques are the same, you should be looking out for the customer, not for yourself, and when you pretend to be busy you become un-approachable to most people and your doing it so both your superiors and guests alike will avoid you. Now if 4 major amusment park chains (The Former Paramount Parks, Cedar Fair, Disney, and Six Flags (all of which I have updated guidebooks and specific ride manuals for)) and 2 major retailers whom I've worked for dont practice "pretend like your doing something" and all these companies are sucessful, then doesnt that tell you something? "Pretending like your doing something" is not an acceptable practice, and neither is most of the other things you kids claim to be doing, or claim to have been told to do. So follow your guide books, change your ways, and turn around your bad reputations.

How about you do what your guidebook says and interact and guest relate isntead of pretending to be busy, when you appear to be doing something guests dont feel they can appraoch you its that simple. You said pretending to do something looks better than standing around, not actually doing something. Pretending to be busy makes you appear un-approachable and its not an acceptable guest friendly practice, hence why it is not in your employee hand book, your not super heros, your kids with a seasonal summer job at a park with a bad rep. you should probably just follow the book.

^PKI isnt the poster child but it is certainly has a far better reputation than Geauga Lake. I must say this you though buddy, while we rode Dominator we asked if we could stay on when no one was in line behind us, we were told no, then told why and that it was company policy. That was the first employee that day to give us an answer for a weird rule then he asked us about PKI and where we were from, one of the few instances of good service at that park. Looking like your doing something? How about interacting with a guest instead or just paying attention to the ride around you instead of pretending to pick at the spot of dirt on a hand rail. Im pretty darn sure that it doesnt say in your company hand book "When not doing anything at your ride, pretend your busy", in fact I know it doesnt since Im looking at it right now. And by the way, a ride op at PKI hoping in quite alright, its required by the maintenance staff that 3 seperate personel test ride then sign off on their ride each day and usually when they do this they interact with the guests so Im pretty sure hoping in to check out how the ride is performing and interacting with guests is much better than pretending to be busy and un-approachable.

^Arent you the same guy who told me the IJ audio was gonna come back and that smoke effects would return on Tomb Raider? I'm just kidding, you know I love you Tom.

If zosobeast can find it, we have a very special surprise for our firend muted dark ness, we have on tape a ride op at X flight screaming from the station for us to put our camcorder away......no one ever had a bad experience at x flight my @$$. This summer at GL I never encountered a good employee except for one.....having worked a similar job myself for a long time I can cut them some slack and be udnerstanding in some ways.....the heat, the long working hours, the monotany, but theres no need to treat guests like garbage. At x flight we were constantly yelled at for cameras then never given an explanation, the employees escorting charecters were either sitting on benches while the charecter played with the kids or even one time we saw one employee trying to climb on a tree branch while his charecter sat on the curb, as soon as i rasied my camera they propped up. The girl at teh gift shop acted so ****ed when I asked her where postcards are, and I remember telling an employee he missed a lap bar on head spin. The only friendly employee that day was the girl at GR who kept trying to call Kings Island for me, she must have tried atleast 5 times and I was very greatful. Muted, I respect your passion for your job, but in all honsety GL does not have a good reputation, and I'm sure your one of the few who actually tries, but so far I've never been impressed. I just hope CF doesnt turn the Kings Island employees into the same zombies.

^Well said Teenageninja, KI has fantastic employees who re constantly praised in the "Doc John" Nasco safety audits. In 2004, The Beast crew was named best crew in the state of Ohio and and received their best audits yet this past season and having personally met you ninja, I can say with confidence that you know what your talking about and are one of those fantastic employees.

^Buddy, you are just a ride op at Geauga Lake who has no experience at KI what so ever, and no real bearing or knowledge on the industry at hand except taht you have a summer job, no offense, i respect your pride in a seasonal job, but you are not a select few like the marines. I've been working in rides the past 5 years and have first hand witnessed how your crew works and how Carowinds works their Borg assimilator. X flights controls and procedures are very similar to that of other Vekoma coasters, I'm sure KI will be more than able to accomidate and train people to run the ride should it come to Kings Island. While visiting this June, as a guest and no longer an employee of any particular park anymore, I saw first hand how your "select few" perform. You ran one train, in one station, told jokes over the microphone, two kids stood and argued like little girls about who was going to get to operate controls for the next hour, and then I had some punk kid with no guest relations experience at all come up to me and tell me to "Freaking put my camera away for the last time!" Select few.....I think not....more like typical rides ops if you ask me.

^How did you get the estimates for the wait time? When the ride runs all 3 trains and both stations and the crew knows what they are doing then it can be a capacity monster, however GL never ran it well at all. Every time I had been there it was always one station, one train. PKI has a much larger staff and from working there myself I can tell you that the rides managers will make capacity their first priority next go guest safety and satisfaction.

None of what you said has been confirmed, the park said they "hope" not "will".

No offense Railrider, but what makes you an expert on trains? I'm not saying that to be mean or anything but I just want to know if you have any additional experiences with working around rolling stock or dealing with the companies that make them. I draw my conclusions from my own experiences of working at the park the past two years and my fathers opinion since he is a former manager at SFAW and then went on to work for Six Flags before moving to Cincy. He's witnessed the construction and decisions made during the building process of many coasters. Just wanting to know a little bit about your background, not being an ass or anything. Honestly, no one wanted their trains on there before it was even built, now its been built and dissapointed people, even hurt them, who wants to be associated with the thing? Certainly not PTC who have a great rep. and charge accordingly, intamin? No, not Intamin, after the movie park germany fiasco I dont think Intamin wants anything to do with RCCA ever again. Millenium Flyer? Millenium Flyers are known to be on coasters that are ranked high and give smooth as glass rides....doesnt sound like SOB to me.

But who has confirmed new trains are coming? The park press release called for lighter trains, you can make the existing ones lighter, they were made heavier in 2002. No one wanted to build trains before when there was no accident, now there has been an acicdent and even more negative press about the ride, why would you wanna put your trains on there now? New trains at a high cost would have to be manufacturerd to the SOB gauge and if the park is claiming they are going to have it open by opening day or atleast some time around there, then thats not enough time to get new trains. I would LOVE to see newer trains, but I think the park is going to do a fine job or retrofitting the old ones.

Railrider, you may hate their business plan but its better than all their parks going down hill, I'd rather see them cut off their non-performing parks and work to appeal to families and lighten their debt load.....then rather what old managent did where they would add a coaster every year and runn all the parks into the ground. There are very few 'decent' six flags parks left, they need to cut their loses and improve the ones they still can. I agree with you though, I hate to see that these parks may possibly close, and when real estate companys and parks combine, the parks usually dont end up as parks.

^look on the front page!

^Read some of the other topics and read back a little, the loops is being removed because it allows the ride to be able to use lighter trains. These could be lighter trains from a new manufacturer or re-modified versions of the current trains (the current trains were modified with more weight and more restraints in 2002). No manufacturer wanted to make trains for the ride initially for fear of an accident, I'd doubt theyd be any more willing to now, most likely we will see re-modified versions of the current ones. The loop removal was reccomended by the state as well as added stell supports was anohter reccomendation. The state even stated the park has gone above and beyond what they reccomend and I'm sure the loop removal is for the best.

Go Figure, that ride is also better than the voyage........5 more months till im there!

^There has been Nick theming at Dreamworld Australia since 2000.

Not ALL operations was promised a Best Buy gift card, it varied by dept. For example, in rides we received end of the year awards depending on how many hours we put in during "post season". So the more you put in, the more rewards you could get. None of the 4 a ride employee coudl get were a best buy gift card.

Correct, you can even stand at the gas station across the street from the park and take the pictures.

The person was'nt tresspassing, I chat with the gentlemen who took those and know what camera he uses and have met him before up at GL. He is in good standings with the park and takes his pictures from public property.

What Dane said is very true, however it was an immature 36 year old man who sprayed the fully clothed family. Yes, while they shouldve been smarter to not walk around in their full clothes, the middle aged man who sprayed them shouldve had the same common sense not to spray them. There are dining areas for fast food and shops in the water where they have chairs where you can sit and eat a meal. Some of these are in danger of getting wet. Like woofer said, its a water park, but as th interpreter was right in correcting him....its an indoor one with other ammenities right next to the water attractions.

It is definently not appropriate to splash any park employee or unsuspecting guest. The people walking through the GWL water park were fully lcothed and having personally been on the playground thing with the water jets I'm sure the morons up there could plainly see that and chose to be malicious.

Uh, I dont know what your talking about I have a folder I keep all my finances in and tax forms and paperwork and such and I still have envelope that was mailed to me last year with my notification of what crew I was placed on and what my wage would be as well as an app. to fill out there and mail in and online directions. So yes, rehire packets were sent out last year.

Hope they charge him wtih felonious assault. What a moron. They need to ht him over the head with a bat, as well as the tigger kids dad.

I agree shman, I would love to see a monorail. Have it run from GWL to Action Zone, back around Son of Beast to show off some good view of the ride then up past AE and The Racers over the park and turn the Eifel towers 50ft platform into a monorail station, then have a third stop out at Boomerang Bay. Too bad monorails are pretty expensive. It seems the Cincinnati area has terrible problems with light rail systems. PKI's monorail closed, Jungle Jims has done very little with it, the cincinnati subway always fails to get any good support in the votes.