Fast Lane

Natas said:

Minji, I thought about pointing out that I was only joking when I wrote the post but figured that I didn't need to. Anyway, for the record I was just kidding about the Wildcat and Paddlewheel Excursions thing.

Yeah, I'm not very good at detecting sarcasm...

About the Lamborghini analogy...it doesn't affect anybody but them. FL, on the other hand, affects even a normal pass holder's wait time. But I do agree with you on the money issue.

When did people start going to amusement parks, especially a popular park like cedar point, and not expect to have to wait in line to ride?

BayernKurve said:
Pete and Adrian, your understanding of queue waits is simply not true. Take Dragster for example, it's capacity is in the neighborhood of 1,000 people per hour on a good day without breakdowns or Fastlane in use. Now, Cedar Point has effectively reduced that capacity by 50% loading one train for standby and reserving one train for Fastlane.

Your logic works if trains go out with empty seats, but if all seats are filled, where is the capacity reduction? While it is true that re-riders will make the normal line wait longer and just the Fast Lane operation probably makes the normal wait a little longer, no way is the wait doubled. All the people in the Fast Lane line would just be ahead of you anyway. I can see Fast Lane adding maybe 25% to the normal line wait, but I doubt it is more than that.

Ok what about sporting events - You pay more at a hockey game to be on the ice or behind a players bench. Do you just think they should charge general admission for everyone to a Hockey game and it's first come first served?

Of course not, you pay to have better seats otherwise the people who don't work all day can camp out and snipe the best seats.

An amusement park should be an escape from the harsh realities of life, not more cramming it down the throats of the have nots.

I can accept the argument that one may want to rethink a vacation if they can't afford a $5 up charge attraction but a $50 up charge multiplied by 4 in a group or family is a considerable expense.

And to the hockey game argument you are arguing apples and oranges. A better analogy would be those people paying more to skip a line at a restaurant or better yet paying more money to have first dibs at buying said hockey tickets.

Even Disney stops the fast pass line at a certain point to allow the queue to move. They really shouldn't have made it Instant Access, and instead make it more of a shorter wait. For instance, move the Queue X amount up, then have Y Fast Lane people merge in, and repeat process. Right now is if Y is >1, they always move ahead. And looking at it right now, Y VERY rarely hits 0.

Also, for the ones that are saying "Why not BUY it every time you go," I think families want to eat later in their life then pay 200+ more dollars one day to ride coasters.

Well, this is kind of dispiriting, if these reports are true. I have no problem with extra money buying extra perks, but it seems inarguable that the value of a general admission pass (which has not been reduced in price) is considerably less this season, at least when compared to seasons past.

And the comparative value of a platinum pass? It's pennies on the dollar now.

*all of the above assumes no changes for the better are made.

Just a quick question as well, Is the Fast Lane discount for Pre-Purchasing only? or do they give the discounts for more people in park too?

I think it's for inside the park as well, but you can't guarantee getting a Fast Lane if you get it at the gate.

Are we taking bets on if they ever sell out of fast lanes? I'll go with no! ;)

So, it sounds like the waits for fast lane at the big 3 are less than 10 minutes??

Well instead of complaining about it, let's pool our collective enthusiasm and take advantage of the cheaper group price. There are two new topics in Trip Planning that are asking for particular days and I can see this working out to our benefit. I like the thought of enjoying front of the line access with the ability to enjoy the park without feeling rushed and would like to get away with it as cheaply as possible.

That right there is an issue. It's not wrong because you are allowed to do it, but how would everyone feel if fast lane was just a perk if you stayed at one of cedar points hotels only?

I'm not sure if anyone has pointed this out yet, but Universal's Express Pass Plus (which is very similar to Fast Lane) does have some ride exclusions. For example, some of the newer, more popular rides, are not included at all (i.e., Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit, Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey, and Pteranodon Flyers). I would imagine that Cedar Point may consider excluding certain rides if there was a major problem. And that approach wouldn't necessarily require them to implement an electronic Fast Lane system. But it will likely take at least a few months (if not more) before they know the true impact of Fast Lane.

Speaking of new perks, I'm surprised that no one has complained that preferred parking discriminates against season passholders.

I like the idea of having fastlane access for people staying on the onsite resorts. This would limit the number of passes on any given day and would also be a way for the park to increase or recover income. I know Universal Studios does this, and as far as I was concerned it was one of the major reasons that I chose to stay onsite despite the considerable cost difference. I am staying onsite when I come in July. That allows me early access to the park, combine that with the fastlane pass I already have reserved and I feel that I will be able to experience the park favorable way that will make me want to return and recommend the park to friends. Hopefully those friends will take thier families who in turn will buy the fastlane passes and further increase the revenue to the park. The management of the park is not taking this fastlane issue lightly, but it all comes down to money. They can make more money off of families coming and staying for the weekend then they can off of thier loyal season pass riders. It always comes down to money, unfortunately CP is no different than any other business.

Thats where parking in the soak city lot comes in handy! There are ways around that. That's not a deal breaker! You are going to be walking all day anyways.

You can't please everyone, so eliminate the "X" factor and go back to the way it was. It wasn't broken to begin with!

Pete said:

BayernKurve said:
Pete and Adrian, your understanding of queue waits is simply not true. Take Dragster for example, it's capacity is in the neighborhood of 1,000 people per hour on a good day without breakdowns or Fastlane in use. Now, Cedar Point has effectively reduced that capacity by 50% loading one train for standby and reserving one train for Fastlane.

Your logic works if trains go out with empty seats, but if all seats are filled, where is the capacity reduction? While it is true that re-riders will make the normal line wait longer and just the Fast Lane operation probably makes the normal wait a little longer, no way is the wait doubled. All the people in the Fast Lane line would just be ahead of you anyway. I can see Fast Lane adding maybe 25% to the normal line wait, but I doubt it is more than that.

Don't really want to get into the whole FL argument, but wanted to point out what I'm going to assume is a misunderstanding of how it seems FL was being implemented yesterday at TTD and what was being said by BayernKurve. If the front half of the TTD station was being used only for FL users, the effective capacity (yes, the "raw" capacity number supposedly is not effected at all by a VQ system, however we're not talking about how many people the ride removes from the line overall, we're talking about how many it removes from the regular line) has just been cut in half, since only one train is available to load people from the regular line. What would have been a 1 hour wait with the line using both ends of the station has now become 2 hours. You have effectively removed half of the trains from use for the "normal" line and reserved them solely for FL users.

Hopefully it is indeed going to be changed to a more normal merge point, and I'm really surprised they didn't just use the old Freeway line on every ride that used to have it.

Also, it seems likely that there will be shifts in ride lineups for FL use come Halloweekends, as Troika (why does it have FL anyway?) appears to be using Happy Jack's line for FL access.