Lots of Cedar Point news on this week's "In the Loop" podcast

I think the park already does a great job at enforcing loose article policies. There are so few incidents, it's a non-issue. I don't want them to do what Universal is doing.

I agree, what they currently do at CP needs to stay that way, I've said this several times now.

Other parks in the chain however this doesn't apply to. Take a phone out, even in station at KI, show it to a ride op as you pass by, guess what, they'll just give an audible warning over the lift, no stop, no security, nothing. I literally pointed out a guy recording a video already in station last year, pointed to em and everything, op looked at me, then him, and shrugged as he threw a clear up. Totally disappointed.

You mean someone was indignant of some random telling them how to do their job? Weird.

Btw, you're still wrong with the physics workshop that you started here. It's important we don't lose sight of that.

All this talk about European Swallows reminds me of my favorite toast:

(Raise your glasses)

"Cheers to the Stork that brings legitimate babies" (clink)

" and cheers to the Lark that brings illegitimate babies" (clink)

"...and cheers to the Swallow...that brings no babies at all." (clink)

redsfan said:

I think the whole pretense of the arguement is misrepresented. If the idea is someone walking on the midway and having a phone hitting them underneath the corkscrew. Not a big deal, and highly unlikely due to the direction of momentum. But I have been on Magnum at night where a bunch of teens with their phones that their parents paid for got them out to take pictures in the cars in front of me. It was pretty scary. Not sure what their purpose was, but the one who lost their grip on their phone. I'd would have wanted to give a good spanking. I don't want to be hit in the face by a phone at 50 miles per hour. I reached out to grab the phone but there was no way in hell I'd have given it back. It would have gone in a trash can. If your idea of a good time is getting hit in the face with someones cell phone then good for you. But making fun of someone's assertion that it would feel like a cinder block is kind of stupid. Has any of you ever been hit in the face with a cell phone on Millenium or Magnum? I'm not talking physics. Do you really have to put a kinetic force value on the pain that you would feel? Can you justify getting your phone out on a ride now because they are so lightweight?

Obviously you aren't talking about physics, because the phone that was dropped on Magnum was traveling at the exact same speed and direction as the train itself was traveling. It would have continued on that path until acted upon by an outside force, in this case friction and gravity would cause both its velocity, and direction of travel to change. The greatest danger in this situation would be the phone hitting someone on the ground, not to you sitting a few rows behind the phone dropper.

There is no choice but to make fun of the original assertion that getting hit by a phone thrown off Corkscrew has the same force as getting hit by a cinder block thrown off Corkscrew, because it is so far from reality it defies the laws of physics.

Main reason I was poking fun was in an attempt to avoid being drawn into the physics discussion (obviously I failed) because it never goes well. Too many people simply do not understand the principles behind it.

Your odds of being injured driving to the park are certainly better than one in a million, but you don't have an issue with taking that risk. I dont understand why you defend safety theatre because there is an infinitesimal possibility of minor injury.

Changes are afoot! I haven't seen it myself, but I understand that ride operators are no longer required to wait for the platform to clear before locking lap bars. I don't know if there are any other procedural reversions along with that yet, but that alone is a step in the right direction, especially on rides like GateKeeper and Rougarou where the exit process is a little complicated.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

According to my Facebook, "The gate rule" is a thing of the past! Amazing news for employees, guests, and numbers as a whole!

That would be good news Dave and TwistedWicker77. Is the "gate rule" waiting to lock/check until the platform is clear? Or is that something different?

Over last weekend, I observed many setups at Magnum caused pretty much directly by waiting for the platform to clear before locking the lap bars. Literally everyone was seated in the train and the ops were ready to start checking and another 15-20 seconds would go by before they could start. It was obnoxious and defied common sense. They were also doing a "double check" at the end of checking which isn't a horrible thing to do and without waiting to lock the lapbars, there is probably enough time for it to happen before the interval point. But the guy at the front/unload side has to check his seats front to back, then walk (usually run since everyone else is waiting on him) all the way back to the front, squeezing by the control booth that sticks out too far to double check and then walk/run halfway back and get behind the elevator gate before giving a clear. Why can't he just clear from right behind the control booth? Why does he have to go behind the elevator fence? Back in our day, we checked and cleared as we walked back to our position (they had to be done in order front to back so in the front you'd clear right away, but if you were middle or back, the guy in front of you had to be clear first). It seems now they want everyone totally stationary before clearing and often times, they are in ridiculous places too (behind poles, fences, on dots, etc).

Then I heard they had some issues with overshooting the safety brakes the other night. You think? The train isn't supposed to be stopped there 100x per day! They are probably wearing through brakes dozens of times faster than in the past.

At Raptor, they appeared to already be ignoring the procedure and things were running fairly efficiently. Not sure if/when things changed officially or whether it was all at once or kind of ride by ride.

Doing away with that "rule" will make a HUGE difference though! Glad to hear common sense is taking over.

I just got back from the park. While I was in the Gatekeeper line, I thought it was moving pretty good. I timed dispatches and it was around 1:20 which is much better then it was earlier in the year. I did notice no one was holding the gate open. I rode in the second row and by the time I got to the back, the attendant was checking the harness on the rear seat.

I visited the park for the first time this year yesterday and did not notice any difference in operations. Everything was the same as years past.

I was at Carowinds for the first time last week. It was so strange hearing "Station clear. Scanning... Dispatch." I just assumed it was a Carowinds thing, but sounds like they are just (one of) the first in the chain to implement these new procedures. I can confirm that MI Adventure seems to doing what CP does. I did notice that the operators now say "Gates opening. Please stand clear." Don't recall this at CP, but maybe. Certainly Carowinds and MA.

Not sure if this is the same thing, but I do remember spieling to guests "riders on the platform please stand clear the gates are closing".

Nothing new about that; September 15, 2014 was when I wrote my last entry for the r.r-c songbook...

The Gates, They Are A Closing
September 15, 2014

Step into this train
Wherever you stand
And secure the belongings
You hold in your hand
Sit down, fasten belt
Drop the bar we command
For it's time for you to be coasting
Otherwise take a step, behind yellow you stand
For the gates, they are a closing!

Watch your step, climb aboard
It's your turn to ride
And hold on to your stuff
Lest away it may glide
Bars down, belts tight
Keep your arms and legs inside
For our camera you'll want to be posing
But if it's not your train, let that line be your guide
For the gates, they are a closing!

--Dave Althoff
(with apologies, of course, to Bob Dylan...)

Of course now I want to hear somebody sing it on a ride platform... 8-)

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

I was at Dorney Park a couple weeks ago, and every single one of their rides had a "visual scan". For the most part it was just people moving their arm across their body and then into a thumbs up. Most heads never scanned.

Kings Island also does the visual scan.

Indeed, and increases dispatch times drastically. Seeing Racer race anymore is exciting..the stupid rules that ride ops abide to now is pretty ridiculous..I sat in a train for 2 minutes today waiting for a dispatch..red dispatched on time and had the second train almost done.

I think the person in controls should be doing a visual scan, but it should be happening constantly, not as a "safety theater" action that delays dispatch by multiple seconds. I worked Magnum many years ago and I'd be "visual scanning" like crazy in controls, but we hit interval 99% of the time and if we didn't, it certainly wasn't because of the driver. :)

I'd watch the train as it went out of the station to make sure no one was doing anything stupid or anything was missed (and if so, we could hold it there if it was early enough or on the lift if the station brakes could not hold the train), watch the next one come around the corner into the station and park (if anyone ran up the exit or something, I could always release the button and stop the train), listen and then turn and watch as the one that just left was engaging the lift and getting above the tree line, look back to watch people exiting the train and the next riders getting in, lock the lapbars as soon as the vast majority of them were seated, turn and watch the third train coming out of the tunnel as it came around to the ready brakes, look at the train approaching the top of the lift and announce "ready." Once the train was about to drop off, I'd focus back on the platform and observe ops clearing in order from front to back. I could see the two in the front and the one in the middle on load side. I made sure they were clear and that no guests were near the train on the unload side or on the wrong side of the gates on the load side. Once I made sure of all that, I watched the person at the back of unload side first to give a clear to the person at the back of load side and then a high clear to me. Once I had that high clear, I knew we were ready to go because I had scanned everything previously. There was no need to pretend like I was looking around like a robot at that point because I HAD been looking around for the last 75 seconds.

^Absolutely agree. In controls your watching everything and the trains movement over the course of the ride at all times. You're not staring at the panel and then before dispatch giving a quick look around and going. You are the oversight and the person operating the ride. This visual scan deal I think is moreover a way for companies to say "they looked everywhere and checked everything" kind of deal to clear them of any operational error.

There was no need to pretend like I was looking around like a robot at that point because I HAD been looking around for the last 75 seconds.

Out of curiosity what is the optimum interval for Magnum?

Right now the webcam is on the lift hill and I have timed it at average of 1:32 over 6 cycles.

It was seemed really bad in May, however I did not time it at all.

I calculate 2000 riders/hr with 36 riders per train as

2000/36=55.55 trains per hour

60/55.55= 1.08 minutes interval would be optimum?