Advertised Capacity vs 2024 Numbers

I agree that Gemini as a racing coaster is quite a bit more entertaining to ride than when it is only running one side.

Two weeks later and I wanted to circle back on this to see how things were going. Big kudos to the teams working the rides for steady improvement!

Looking at the webcams today the park looks absolutely packed and the ride operators have made really good progress in a short amount of time. Can't wait to see how low they can get the intervals down to by the end of summer.

Raptor = 1,600/hr advertised capacity
June 2: 2:20 dispatch interval = ~823 per hour (51% advertised capacity)
June 13: 1:58 dispatch interval = ~976 per hour (61% advertised capacity)

Gatekeeper = 1,710/hr advertised capacity
June 2: 1:55 dispatch interval = ~1,002 per hour (59% of advertised capacity)
June 15: 1:32 dispatch interval = 1,252 per hour (73% advertised capacity)

Valravn = 1,200/hr advertised capacity
June 2: 2:40 dispatch interval = ~540 per hour (45% of advertised capacity)
June 15: 1:43 dispatch interval = ~839 per hour (70% advertised capacity)

Millennium Force = 1,300/hr advertised capacity
June 2: 2:15 dispatch interval = ~960 per hour (74% of advertised capacity)
June 15: 2:14 dispatch interval = ~ 967 per hour (74% advertised capacity)

Maverick = 1,200/hr advertised capacity
June 2: 2:05 dispatch interval (group of 2 trains) = ~691 per hour (58% of advertised capacity)
June 15: 1:51 dispatch interval (group of 2 trains) = ~778 per hour (65% advertised capacity)

^Thanks for posting. It's still so strange to see Raptor's dispatches like that??!!

I don't think it's realistic to ever see any of these rides to hit their max capacity while monitoring them, but I think all of them can (and hopefully will) continue to improve. I monitor 10 cycles per ride while trying to keep in mind that any abnormally long dispatch times more than likely were due to a guest issue that was out of the crew's control and those are omitted.

It's certainly possible to catch one of the rides at a bad time when timing the dispatches, but it's worth noting that each one of them has had flashes of brilliance. Taking the quickest dispatch that I've seen for each ride to date, this is what I view as the current max capacity for each of these rides with the crew's current experience level and constraints that they are currently operating under:

• Raptor: 1:46 dispatch interval = ~1,087 per hour (68% of 1,600 advertised capacity)
• Gatekeeper: 1:18 dispatch interval = ~1,477 per hour (86% of 1,710 advertised capacity)
• Valravn: 1:36 dispatch interval = ~900 per hour (75% of 1,200 advertised capacity)
• Millennium Force: 2:02 dispatch interval = ~1,062 per hour (82% of 1,300 advertised capacity)
• Maverick: 1:46 dispatch interval (group of 2 trains) = ~815 per hour (68% of 1,200 advertised capacity)

Maverick and Raptor are the two rides that appear to have the most to gain. Raptor looks like it it still has work to go. Just massive stacking 90% of the time with 2 trains on the brake run. Maverick, while notably off compared to it's theoretical max capacity, looks about as good as it ever does so that crew may be right on par with pretty much any other time before and the target number set by Intamin just may not be very realistic.

Anyways, I'm going to go drink a beer. That's enough nerding for the night.

Raptor is definitely the one that seems crazy to me as that ride has historically had really good crews and pretty fantastic throughput. When I worked at the park on Magnum back in the early 2000s, we completed intensely with Raptor and we hit our 80 second interval about 95% of the time on average with our 36 passenger trains. Raptor often beat our numbers for the day/year with their 32 passenger trains so that put their interval back then at sub-80 seconds. I believe the manual says 72 seconds for Raptor and 75 for Magnum, but the speed of the lifts has varied a bit over the years so I happen to know anything better than 80 seconds was not possible as we'd literally have the train cleared and be pressing the dispatch buttons (as the previous train was heading up the second hill) and having to wait a second or two before the train would actually go. I don't know if the timng is any different these days with the newer control system. I suspect it might be a few seconds longer with the variable speed slift engagement.

I remember ride nights on Raptor where they'd be running all three trains and the second train would never stop and just roll into the station. It was a beautiful combination of B&M engineering, riders who knew what to do, and fantastic Cedar Point ride operations!

Millennium Force's interval used to be about 1:37 in the early 2000s. It's been slowed a bit since they replaced the lift motor with a single slow speed one several years back. Over 2 minutes still seems like it's being limited by the crew and something operational in the station and not the ride itself. Supposedly they're going to replace the motor again next year with the right one. We shall see.

MDOmnis:

I remember ride nights on Raptor where they'd be running all three trains and the second train would never stop and just roll into the station. It was a beautiful combination of B&M engineering, riders who knew what to do, and fantastic Cedar Point ride operations!

MDOmnis:
Millennium Force's interval used to be about 1:37 in the early 2000s.

These are both good validations that I'm not making things up in my head. I remember being in Millennium Force's station fully bolted in as the train in front of us was coming out of the second tunnel and dispatching as soon as they were able to, and Raptor felt like you could always see 2 trains in motion out of the station. As you pointed out, there are some mechanical changes that we are aware of that affect this, but there also may be some that additional policies or mechanical changes that we don't know about that compound the longer waits between dispatches.

Decided to run another test today after being bombarded online these past few years about how much more efficient King's Island's operations are compared to Cedar Point's. Taking into account that this is a limited sample size from one day, the numbers don't add up to the hype. After monitoring KI's three major attractions that are featured on their webcams, their average operational efficiency is not only not better than CP's, it's actually...(gasp) a tick worse.

Orion = 1,600/hr advertised capacity
1:33 dispatch interval = ~1,239 per hour (77% advertised capacity)

Diamondback = 1,620/hr advertised capacity
June 2: 1:58 dispatch interval = ~976 per hour (60% of advertised capacity)

Mystic Timbers = 1,200/hr advertised capacity
June 2: 1:50 dispatch interval = ~785 per hour (65% of advertised capacity)

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(6/15) Cedar Point = 69% advertised capacity
(6/16) Kings Island = 68% advertised capacity

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All this to say, I'm not sure why it's become a thing online these past few years to push the clickbait of KI being an operational juggernaut and the new king of Ohio amusement parks, because the initial data definitely disputes the claims that CP's operations don't hold a candle to KI's.

Additional note:
Orion had one dispatch at 1:09, which is absolutely blazing. That was the only dispatch from either park in any of the times that I've been monitoring that if it were to be maintained would exceed the ride's projected max capacity from the manufacturer. With that said, none of the other 9 dispatches were within :20 of that one lol. Still a great achievement, though!

Speed104:

Maverick, while notably off compared to it's theoretical max capacity,

Maverick’s listed THRC is likely unattainable (even theoretically) due to a delay in the release interval between Train 1 and Train 2 of each dispatch pair. As initially designed, the computer would release Train 2 from the ready brakes to the lift hill much earlier, so that both trains would duel with each other at several synchronized near-miss points along the track. In reality, there is almost always a significant delay from this synchronization time point when the computer releases Train 2; not sure if it’s a random computer thing or it’s deliberate to avoid a lift rollback from Train 1 not clearing the tunnel fast enough, though. (I've had one ride in recent years where the trains managed to sync up, and it was incredible.)

Theoretical is just that. It's assuming perfect operating conditions. The major obstruction to achieving anything close to those numbers is the general public. Always has been, always will be.

Sure, but it is factual to say that good crews can get pretty close to those numbers, and have in the past. The point is that if you're doing half that number, there's an awful lot of room for improvement.

I will give the park a little bit of leeway. For example, I grew up with Gemini that 1. Didn't have air gates; 2. Didn't have seat belts (they went to one that covered both riders, then went to individual); and 3. Probably had more people doing the checking and crowd management to maintain the trains were being filled. I believe Raptor ran its first year without seatbelts, and most definitely didn't have air gates. On top of that, people carry around a lot of extra stuff and aren't very attentive as compared to being on their phones. Some of this has to do with the people taking their sweet time getting in.

But... for Gemini to stack every single time with two trains as opposed to three on each track is tragic. That can't be good long term for such a short brake run that was never intended to stop a train every single time.

My visit Friday night, I was struck by just how damn good the Steel Vengeance crew is. We caught multiple times where the train was clearing the lift when the train in front of it was just coming back into the brake run. Minimal parking time in the readies. That's a ride with NO loose articles. If you want to see the other rides perform like that, I think its safe to say that some sort of NO loose articles policy would need to exist.

What a shocking turn of events, that Steel Vengeance is being used as the metric of success for dispatch intervals. And with full trains no less. Consider the beginning of the season when again the wand staffing/policy was slowing the line down so much that trains were being sent with only a few people on them.

MDOmnis:

Millennium Force's interval used to be about 1:37 in the early 2000s. It's been slowed a bit since they replaced the lift motor with a single slow speed one several years back. Over 2 minutes still seems like it's being limited by the crew and something operational in the station and not the ride itself. Supposedly they're going to replace the motor again next year with the right one. We shall see.

I’ve noticed this as well, and it to me it seems to slower speed up is only half the issue. After all, with the old multispeed motor it would be “slow” 75% of the way up when they were on interval anyway. Another major problem seems more that the return of the catch-car speed down seems slower as well. To make matters worse it seems take it's time to park itself correctly for dispatch.

With the old motor/ setup, the catch-car would be ready when the on-course train was around the bunny. Now it’s pretty much only ready for dispatch when the on-course train hits the retractable magnetic brake right outside of load. That's a significant delay of probably 20 seconds.

It’s strange that the motor can’t be geared to speed way up on the way down since it’s not carrying an extra 10 tons and working with gravity. Probably was meant to be a simple/ quick fix but the fact it’s been like this for years makes it seem like a low priority.

While the new theoretical interval is probably 2 minutes flat, it still seems like there are too many cases where the trains stack for 20-30 additional seconds. A Ramp wait/ Fastlane is 20+ minutes plus anymore whereas in the past it was 15 tops.

Lighter side story from the Ouimet/ Old Lift motor era (yes, the good old days). One day late in the season during early entry we were riding MF and noticed the crew was really hustling (like crazy fast). The lift was still in ‘slow’ mode near the top, so I looked back and saw the on course train hadn’t even cleared the fixed brakes yet. I told everyone “Hey, I have a feeling were going to stop here for a bit” and everyone though I was nuts. Sure enough the lift stops to a crawl, the rollbacks start dragging with that awful sound, and everyone was freaking out and cursing me. Of course, once the train cleared the block ahead, we resume as normal 4-5 seconds later.

What made it remarkable is when hit the brakes, I could see the next train already well up the lift. Once in unload I couldn’t see the lift, but sure enough I hear the rollbacks drag and the ops first pumping and high fiving each other op saying, “3 in a row!” Yes, they were trying to get the lift to do the stop/ slow drag on purpose with ultra-fast dispatches. While I am sure most guest and probably management didn’t appreciate it, I sure did!

(Side note it was cooler and was running slower since it just opened, so only possible under conditions like that)

The motor used to be hydraulic, I think, which wouldn't make it geared, just controlled.

Joe E:

What made it remarkable is when hit the brakes, I could see the next train already well up the lift. Once in unload I couldn’t see the lift, but sure enough I hear the rollbacks drag and the ops first pumping and high fiving each other op saying, “3 in a row!” Yes, they were trying to get the lift to do the stop/ slow drag on purpose with ultra-fast dispatches. While I am sure most guest and probably management didn’t appreciate it, I sure did!

When I worked Millennium, if the train on the lift “block checked”, maintenance would get mad because the anti rollbacks were sensitive pieces. I assume that is still the case. I also noticed the blue train’s anti rollbacks have been engaging as the train crests the top of the lift a lot this season.

Heyisntthatrob?:

"I grew up with Gemini that 1. Didn't have air gates; 2. Didn't have seat belts (they went to one that covered both riders, then went to individual); and 3. Probably had more people doing the checking and crowd management to maintain the trains were being filled."

supposedly gemini also had 3 trains per side, as opposed to two. not sure how much this might affect operations, but with the old day's dispatch times, I imagine it would.

It isn't "supposedly." We've seen it. 🙂

Six trains on Gemini felt like a standard thing for years. The throughput was impressive.

Fun fact, I’ve heard before that Gemini actually had to add a second station queue entrance in its second season because they found that the six-train throughput was so high that there were issues with getting riders into the station fast enough to fill all rows for each incoming train pair with a single station queue entrance.

Yep. I remember that. The current Fastlane entrance was for "Front of Train" and the current standard entrance was for "Back of Train". The queue split before the switchbacks and you would choose which side you wanted. On slower days/days when they only ran four of the six trains they only used what is currently the standard entrance. But on those days they needed to crank out six trains and fill them, they absolutely made it happen.