All Season Fastpass

I personally would love to see a yearly membership option kind of like Six Flags. My wife and I get a Platinum Pass every year from Wonderland and visit 3 or 4 other Cedar Fair parks a year. If there was a monthly fee on auto pay with the top option being like an all inclusive that featured meal plan, drink plan, funpix and fast lane i bet they would do a lot of business on that. Though I'm sure the price would be pretty high to make it worthwhile over/in addition to the current setup.

Fast lane and early entry are not even comparable. Early entry is just a nice benefit you get as a season pass holder, it's not really taking anything away from the general public. I'm pretty sure early entry was originally for guests at the hotel and they just let season pass holders in on it because why not, it is another incentive to buy a season pass. Not to mention a season pass only costs twice as much as a one day fast lane.

Does Fast Lane sell out often? Maybe they aren't offering it at Cedar Point because they don't want to sell it for the season, then have people try to redeem it and be told they can't on a really crowded day because it isn't available (unless there is a separate allotment just for All Season Fast Lane).

I wouldn't be surprised to see a $699 or $799 price attached if they did a FL+ on season passes.

I wonder what the cost would be to add an all-park FL+ option. We could then figure out the value of the Platinum Fast Lane Drink & Dining Season Pass.

Maybe $1000 for a Platinum All Inclusive Pass? I'm guessing here obviously but I had that number in my head.

Oh I forgot FunPix too.

I think we can all agree CP is different from most of the other CF parks in that it is a destination attraction that draws people from hours away, and less so a place where locals go.

If you've ever been to KI you know that a majority of patrons at the gate are flashing their gold pass. Same goes for KD, and especially CW.

I have nothing against FL and have used it before, but not often, because I tend to visit the park when lines are going to be short anyway. But I see it's value. What I question though, for a place like CP where people are generally driving from a ways to get to, is if Platinum passholders are offered that seasonal FL+ option, and THEN you add in FL+ sales inside the park which people generally buy more of when it's busy, is that I can see situations where the FL line is longer than the regular standby line.

I'm all for CF making more money but I'd really hate to see a seasonal FL+ option offered at CP. That doesn't mean it won't happen, and we have to deal with it if/when it does. But if I experienced a bad year of long waits without it for myself and my family it would give me pause as to whether or not I'd renew our Platinum passes the following year.

What if the FL+ on CP passes was for weekday only?

A weekday only would be better, but the park can still be really busy weekdays in July/August. There are days already where they have not sold out where it seems to me there are too many.

If anything, I think the price of FL is too LOW. If FL waits are exceeding an hour on busy days, I think they need to raise the price. An all-season option would have to be priced really high.

I can easily see fast lane being $200 next year on peak days. That’s insane, considering it’s already cheaper to get a platinum pass than it is to go on a Saturday with fast lane (total of about $225 plus parking for one day vs $189 for all season), so with an increasing fast lane price as well as ticket price, it can get to like $250-$275 plus parking for a single day next year, whereas platinum passes are still around $189.

Thabto said:

If anything, I think the price of FL is too LOW. If FL waits are exceeding an hour on busy days, I think they need to raise the price. An all-season option would have to be priced really high.

They need to lower the amount of Fast Lane passes sold each day to keep it a good experience for Fast Lane users regardless of what price is charged. A Fast Lane line of 45 minutes for Maverick last Saturday was ridiculous, you should never have to wait more than 15 minutes or so if you purchase a Fast Lane pass. A season long Fast Lane option should be sold with the understanding that a Fast Lane pass is not guaranteed to be available on busy days if the limit of Fast Lane passes for that day is reached. I'm assuming a Fast Lane season pass would need to be redeemed for a wrist band each day so they would be able to enforce a limit.

Pete said:

A season long Fast Lane option should be sold with the understanding that a Fast Lane pass is not guaranteed to be available on busy days if the limit of Fast Lane passes for that day is reached. I'm assuming a Fast Lane season pass would need to be redeemed for a wrist band each day so they would be able to enforce a limit.

This sounds reasonable (if they even offered it). They already put restrictions on the 'free' fast lane passes that are included when an existing season pass holder renews for the following year. You are limited to only Friday or Sunday Halloweekend dates.

As a platinum passholder who only goes on Sundays, I've only bought a fastlane pass once this year, and that was because I was attending with a friend who hasn't been in years, has a small child and twins on the way, so probably won't make it back for another few years, and we wanted to make sure he got to do everything he wanted to do.

My daughter and I, who go at least once a month (and in October I'll have been every Sunday but one), will just do smaller things or just hang out or only spend 4-5 hours there if lines are long.

Pete said:

A season long Fast Lane option should be sold with the understanding that a Fast Lane pass is not guaranteed to be available on busy days if the limit of Fast Lane passes for that day is reached. I'm assuming a Fast Lane season pass would need to be redeemed for a wrist band each day so they would be able to enforce a limit.

Agreed, but that also limits your ability to show up later in the day. A possible solution would be an online reservation system with a non refundable deposit if you don't show up to redeem it. But that adds complexity and headaches for Guest Services. While waiting in line for Saturday at Guest Services for an unrelated issue there appeared to be two other guests there complaining that they had purchased FastLane online but could not get them because they were sold out when they arrived.

When you buy FastLane online, don't you have to specify the date you are purchasing for?

It's one thing if you have the free voucher, or could pay an ultra-cheap discount online price for a good any day pass, but if you paid the premium for this specific Saturday in October price, that FastLane pass should be reserved for you since they already have your money.

Never bought a FastLane so don't know. But those guests were not happy that they could not get their FL and had to fill out a form for a refund and could not get it immediately. Maybe there were other factors involved as I was not trying to listen in but that is a small room.

Sadly I think they look at FP's much like the overall max capacity of the park. The number is so high that even when implemented accomplishes nothing because it's too late.

Some places will even say "Sold Out" and that only means at that location specifically. Found this out a couple years ago when I went to buy one saw the sign and grabbed a drink. Making small talk I just said "Wow must be crazy busy to be sold out of the passes". Well sure enough the kind employee pointed me to a different location without me even asking.

Prior to that I always took sold out at a particular location to mean the whole park. Hopefully someone out there has the scoop if there is an actual cut off where everyone is told to stop selling them or if goes by location or abit of both?

Freeway anyone? *crickets* Yeah, I remember getting the stamp for a time range, I wonder if that COULD make a comeback?

Definitely agree Fast Lane program needs either (a) a time slot to enjoy a ride like back in the Freeway days or (b) a restriction on how many times you can ride an attraction using FL. I've seen many comments on social media about people just riding major attractions over-and-over which kills the FL experience for other purchasers as well as the regular queue. As was said, FL should not be a 45 minute wait like has been seen on busy days for some attractions....frankly I would be displeased had I paid for faster access to rides with that kind of wait. In the range of 15 minutes tops seems reasonable. I suspect with the Cedar Point app at some point we may see these suggestion become a reality.