cedar point fast pass?

I have no clue. We waited 25 minutes in the station to ride. The rest of the trains were resting on the transfer track.

Ffej, I totally agree with your sentiment that the empty parking lot can create a feeling of dread.

I pick mostly the dead days to go, with a very high success rate. Yet, I get screwed over most every time by lowered ride capacity. This has to stop. I'm quickly falling out of love with CP.

I would love to see a fast pass type system put in place at cedar point.

Wow these are some pretty dismal reports of lacking capacity on rides - especially this late in the season. I've typically tried to go early in the season and late in the season to avoid the heat and huge summer crowds, but if they're going to make me wait in long lines because of cutting capacity, I just won't go. It's really as simple as that. If these reports are true, I think they've done too cost cutting and the guest experience is suffering.

Magnum running one train? Seriouisly? The only time ever did that was Labor Day 2003 and it was a torrential downpour all day long and we were about the only large ride open at all. Pretty much we ran three trains every day except for ARC day or if there was an actual problem with one of the trains and in that case, we'd put it on as soon as we could. If it was dead to the point where at least two cars worth of seats (1/3rd) were empty on every train in the middle of the afternoon, we'd go down to two. If we were generating any kind of line, even station only, we would not transfer off. Really the savings for cutting trains has got to be pretty minimal in terms of what it costs to get the park open for the season in the first place.

^^what dies the ATL stand for?

I don't understand this at all... What sense dies it make to cut trains when the park has a low crowd? I can totally understand cutting down the trains to certain rides that are not as popular, but when they do this with bigger rides like millenium and magnum it is just crazy. Last time I went, there were three millenium trains running in early morning until about 3 in the afternoon. With those three trains running, the longest I saw the wait time get was about 1 hour. Then for some strange reason, the removed one of the trains now causing the wait time to just from 1 hour to 1 and 1/2 hours. It didn't make sense to me at all as to why they would do this..

Any number of reasons why they would pull a train off. The most likely on a ride like MF is that there is a maintenance issue like a bad wheel that needs to be remedied.

That is true, but things like that seem to only happen when there isn't high attendance.

It goes without saying that capacity has been cut across the park. Iron Dragon, Corkscrew, and Mine Ride (and arguably Mantis and Dragster) have all lost a train. Mean Streak was down a train last season, but seems to have gotten it back. My guess is that from the park's stand point, they have plenty of attractions which has spread the crowd across the park. As a result, they can afford to lose a train on these attractions and save the money associated with maintenance on them, as well as save the time that would be spent during the off season rebuilding them.

As for the attractions that have all trains on, and are merely running at lower capacity, I have to wonder if weather conditions aren't a factor. It seems to me that rides that either go down entirely in rain, or can easily transfer off units, run with all units until rain hits, and then close, or transfer off units. However, coasters that can run in rain, but are more difficult to transfer off units on, will run either just one or two trains all day on days when there is a high threat of rain. My guess is the hope is that while capacity might be reduced during non-rainy times, it will not be lost during rain, and thus capacity will be a wash.

It should be noted however, that running ride units does cost money. If the park is not busy, it does in theory make sense to run fewer rides units to maximize profits, when you're income is going to be less.

SSL, in regards to your story on Millennium... Realize that rides are machines, and machines break. It is very possible that the train may have been transferred off due to a mechanical reason, such as bad wheel.

Whatever the excuses, capicity has been down this year. I just hope this isn't the trend for the future.

It deffinately has..

JuggaLotus said:
Any number of reasons why they would pull a train off. The most likely on a ride like MF is that there is a maintenance issue like a bad wheel that needs to be remedied.

How about all but one one on Magnum for an entire day? That's what happened Friday and maintenance isn't likely the reason. I'm not saying for certain, just unlikely.

That's ridiculous. If I was at cp that day when they were only running one train, I would have been furious.

This is happening in soak city last year, and this year too it seems. In the kids area (with the big bucket) there are several waterslides that are kid-friendly, in case your kid not 48", as mine are not. As long as I can remember they only have a couple of these slides open, leaving several closed, with the excuse being "we don't have staffing for those slides". Hogwash. It's a shame too cause although I don't really enjoy those slides, my kids do, and having more variety keeps them entertained much longer, which makes daddy happy. And when daddy's happy, everybody's happy!!

VW - what was the weather like on Friday? I know in Michigan it was off and on rainy. And I'm pretty sure after Magnum's incident a few years ago, it is down to single train operation in the rain. So if it was rainy, that's the most likely explanation.

Not sure about Friday, but when I went in early June it was a sunny day and they brought both millenium and magnum down to two trains.

You would think they would have all the rides at max capacity because the less time people wait in line the more time they could be spending at places such as games, food, and Merch stands spending more money. Atleast thats how I picture it.

(Sorry for the giant run-on sentence. I didn't know how to break it up.) ;)

Jugga, it rained late morning and til around one but the sun came out and it dried right up. Clear, nice afternoon an evening. I totally understand the safety concerns. I definitely don't want to be hurt or anyone else for that matter.

You would think they would have all the rides at max capacity because the less time people wait in line the more time they could be spending at places such as games, food, and Merch stands spending more money.

I would think they would have all rides at max capacity because this is supposedly the "number one amusement park" on the planet.

^^ +1
If things keep up the way they are, I don't think it will be the number one park this year. This season seems like it is very poorly run compared to past seasons.

With the amount of ad space they buy from Amusement Today, I don't think they need to worry about that.