CP needs more family coasters

While talking to some families in Toledo, I have found most with young kids to preteens prefer PKI. They even bought season passes because theres more family coasters there. And sadly I agree, its great CP is building the new coaster and all (I can't wait). But as I get older and compared CP and PKI with my my ten year old cousin we had more coasters and more fun at PKI. I think CP is hurting badly here. I think camp Snoopy was great but add on to it. Use a part of peanuts playground for a family ride. Cp to me alone is better than PKI, but family coaster wise goes to PKI. Live-E is nice but coasters are great and I think CP needs to build on their greatness in all forms. What do you all think???
~~~~~~~~~~~~~Jesus-Freak~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
*** This post was edited by newt 10/14/2002 6:20:12 PM ***

I think it's safe to say that Iron Dragon, Woodstock Express, Wildcat, Cedar Creek Mine Ride, and Disaster Transport can be considered family coasters. How many more do you want??

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Brent Haley
Gemini Crew '02

Corkscrew, Gemini....

Well Brent02, I think that the original poster was referring to rides that young children can ride with the whole family. All of the coasters that you mentioned with the exception of Woodstock Express and Jr Gemini (which you didn't mention) have a minimum height requirement of at least 46".

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...and enjoy the rest of your day at Cedar Point, The Am-aaaa-zement park!

I would not consider Jr. Gemini a family coaster as only one adult can ride in each car at a time.

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Brent Haley
Gemini Crew '02

Both my kids were past 46" when they were 9. When I said "Hey, lets go to PKI for a change". They would roll their eyes. Then again, they are my kids.

CP would do well if they redo Peanuts Playground and install a junior suspended coaster, like Kings Island has. It would add variety to the children's offerings and would make better use of the space. Chaos and Troika could be worked into that area also.

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Florida may have Disneyworld and Key West,
but Ohio has Cedar Point and Put-In-Bay.
It's great to live in Ohio!

My son was 48" by the time he was 7 (in 1993), which was the first time we took him to CP. We specifically waited until he was 48" so as not to disappoint him if he couldn't ride coasters.

His first ever coaster was ID, which he found boring at age 7. By the end of the day, he was riding Mean Streak and Magnum and loving it. ID and the Mine Ride were left in the dust.

I realize not all kids are coaster freaks, and agree that a couple more family coasters could be added. The thing about PKI, is they have a huge "family/kid" section with most of the coasters for kids in one area. I think a "runnaway reptar" clone would be well received at CP.
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I'd rather die living than live like I'm dead

I wouldn't mind seeing more family-friendly pseudo-thrill rides, but I would not say that the park lacks for things to do with kids in the not-quite-tall-enough range. My family (kids 2 and 4) went for 2.5 days last August, and between the beach, soak city, and the two kiddie lands we didn't come close to running out of things to do, and there were several things we didn't manage to get to.

Of course, Dad had to sneak in during ERT to get his coaster fix---the kids aren't yet tall enough, and Mom won't ride anything bigger than Gemini---but that's another story for another time. I'm hoping my 4 year old daughter hits a serious growth spurt, since she has loved everything she can ride so far. Her first WE trip was a white-knuckler, but by the third trip around she was all giggles, though still holding on. In the meantime, I resort to dragging my grad students along with me on coaster-focused trips---they work for me, so they have to ride everything. :-)

CP has coasters that aren't very challenging, but with height restrictions that put them out of the little tyke's reach.

46" is not a kiddie coaster height requirement. Kiddie equals young child equals three-to-five years old equals 36" - 42" in height. In the category of family coasters, PKI doesn't just outcount CP, it just plain stomps them. Period. If you stretch the requirement a couple inches, the gap only widens as kids can board Reptar and Racer while they're still barred from Draggin' Iron and Gemini.

Take a real family, including 3-4 year old children to either park and see for yourself. I have.

A much less expensive alternative to a new coaster is a trip to Arrow asking for trains designed to accomodate 42" riders. They already have restraint designs on the Arrowbatic that should come close. If they could be adapted to the Corkscrew or the Mine Ride, end of problem. On the other hand, a new coaster is much easier to market...

-'Playa

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The CPlaya 100--6 days, 9 parks, 47 coasters, 2037 miles and a winner.....LoCoSuMo.
*** This post was edited by CoastaPlaya 10/15/2002 10:54:19 AM ***

Believe it or not, Arrow's original height requirement for Magnum was 42 inches! I wouldn't be surprised if the same applied for Mine Ride, but CP decided to take a more conservative approach.

-Matt
2001 Magnum Crew

CoastaPlaya said:

Take a real family, including 3-4 year old children to either park and see for yourself. I have.

-'Playa

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The CPlaya 100--6 days, 9 parks, 47 coasters, 2037 miles and a winner.....LoCoSuMo.
*** This post was edited by CoastaPlaya 10/15/2002 10:54:19 AM ***

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I thouhgt we were talking about kids around 7-11. Anyone that puts a 3 year old on a coaster should have their head checked. Most kids that age have little comprehension of saftey.

Nonsense. My (then) 3 year old daughter was plenty sensible about "sitting up right and holding on tight" on woodstock express. She also will happily point out if you don't have your seat belt on when the car is moving, if you have a pen in your mouth, etc. etc. This may not be "comprehension" of safety, but she knows the rules she's given and expects you to follow them too.

Like I said "MOST kids". My daughter rode the Chiller at SFGA when she was 7, but I didn't see too many kids her age in line.

Building a bunch of small coasters that kids will out grow in a couple of years and never want to ride again doesn't make sence to me. A couple kiddie coasters for the tiny tots is great, but CP already has that.

PKI just builds a bunch of cheap baby coasters to up their coaster count. I don't know anyone with kids over 7 that like PKI more than CP. That's all I'm trying to say. If you got kids just out of diapers, then PKI may be better for you.

The "nonsense" was in response to the need for having my head checked. My wife is a psychiatrist, and has been known to diagnose me with other difficulties, but child neglect is not one of them. :-)

Here's why it might make sense to build such rides. I suspect that families might produce more revenue than thrillseekers do. I know that's true for me: when I'm on a "family trip", we stay on point, eat in full service restaurants, buy on-ride photos, etc. etc. When I'm on a "coaster trip" I might get some fries, a beer, and a burger. The kids generate less at the gate, but may more than make up for it in other ways. Since the kiddy coasters cost less, you get a better ROI, and it's always good to improve ROI.

That said, we find CP to be a wonderful spot to take the small kids. We would go even if they never built another kid-friendly ride. To be fair, the ride park is only a part of why that is true. The kids have as much (if not more) fun in SC as they do in CP, and the beach is a nice draw, too. I'm sure that will change as they get older, but then they'll just be "growing into" CP. Plus, after having spent some time in SC this year for the first time, I've decided that it is interesting in its own right, so I don't see us abandoning it anytime soon.

Sorry about the head check thing. lol. I guess now that I look back on it, my kids were pretty close to the age 3 when they rode Jr Gemini. It just seemed so young when I read it.

I see what you are saying about spending more money when you go with the whole family, and I'm sure that's true now. But kids dig deeper in your pocket every year. The 10 to18 year old range is going to kill you, lol. That's the age range I feel you spend the most money on them, and those are the years they want bigger thrills. At least thats the way it worked for me.

Moron, I was refering to all age groups under 11. And my cousin does like some rides at CP, but hes not a huge height freak, he isn't there yet. He loves coasters and for now hes comfortable with PKI. Although hes pretty much done with them after this year (bigger thills await this young coaster hopper!). I was just refering to the family setting, PKI young coasters provide.
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~~~"I'm gonna be your lover, gonna be your friend, I'm gonna be there to the end"-Blessid union of souls
*** This post was edited by newt 10/15/2002 8:06:59 PM ***

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MDOmnis said:
Believe it or not, Arrow's original height requirement for Magnum was 42 inches! I wouldn't be surprised if the same applied for Mine Ride, but CP decided to take a more conservative approach.

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Matt, when Mine Ride first opened, and for years after that, the height requirement was "children under 48" must be accompanied by an adult". So there was no real height requirement. They even had a sign that said "no hand held infants please"!

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Florida may have Disneyworld and Key West,
but Ohio has Cedar Point and Put-In-Bay.
It's great to live in Ohio!

Your name fits you well Moron.

I take offense to that statement. My daughter is 3 years old and has been on bigger coasters such as Jack Rabbit at Kennywood and Skyliner at Lakemont. If she wants to ride them, makes the height limit and I feel that she is ready for them, your damn tootin' I'm going to take her on them. Either my husband or I, or both of us in the case of Skyliner, ride with her, make sure she understands all the rules (which most 3 years can do) and keep a firm grip on her (except kiddie coasters she can ide by herself.) It's not too difficult to figure out.

Back to the topic, PKI is better than CP as far as kid/family coasters. Think about it, until you are 48", there are only 2 coasters at CP that you can ride. That can be a disappointing fact to some children, like my daughter and some other kids I know. I would love to see CP add a junior sized woodie, ala Beastie.

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I'M OUT OF ESTROGEN AND I HAVE A GUN
*** This post was edited by loriu 10/15/2002 9:08:10 PM ***

Hey loriu, read my last post. I said I was sorry about that.

Your signature fits you well too.