New ticketing system?

LAN's will be extinct soon. ;)

And Windows 98? Didn't you know they're upgrading their ticketing system to use OS/2?

Maybe we can finally charge Food, Beverage, and merchandise back to the room if your staying at a Cedar Point resort?

Wouldn't that be nice!

The system they had last summer is so old, it was so confusing to me. It was like using a computer back in the 1990's. But at least it worked pretty well anyway. I swear the monitor they used to have in Group Sales was 20 years old. Everyting was done in commands or something like that, either way I'm not really too familiar with that stuff.

As nifty as it sounds to have real time statistics...park attendances aren't exactly stock quotes. I would think the end of day numbers would be what is actually useful, but hey, if you can do it easily in real time, why not?

Ralph Wiggum said:
I think the actual turnstiles should move faster because my understanding is that any kind of ticket/pass can go through any gate, eliminating the mass confusion that season passes go one place and tickets go another. It seems so simple, and there is pretty clear signage, but most people seem unable to figure it out.

That sucks for the season pass holders. Without our "special" gate we will now be stuck in the same line with the paper ticket holders.

Did you really need a gate to make you feel special? I almost feel sorry for you.

When there were 50 people in line for the "regular" entrance and we went through the office, yeah, it did make me feel special.

I'm pretty sure Shades was emphasizing the wait time, as in the special "fast" season pass gate.

No, I don't need a gate to feel special. I just like being 3rd or 4th in line in the morning at the season pass turnstyle as compared to being 50th in line with everyone else who has a paper ticket. For those who like standing in line be my guest, but I would rather be riding.

The line has always seemed to move pretty quickly to me...being 50th in line might cost you 3 or 4 minutes of ride time if that....OMG!!! To me, its not that big of a deal.

Chuck Wagon said:
As nifty as it sounds to have real time statistics...park attendances aren't exactly stock quotes. I would think the end of day numbers would be what is actually useful...

Well, I disagree. You can start making staffing adjustments on the fly in that case, and with time and tweaking, understand when to start closing food stands and shops in a way that doesn't negatively impact the guest experience.

JuggaLotus said:
What's the over under on what year DK upgraded to Windows 98?

Actually, it's my understanding that there are currently computers still on Windows 95 at various parks.

Well then, let's just hope they don't decide to upgrade to Windows ME. That may just beat out upgrading to Vista, though the jury is still out on that one. ;)

^ Hahaha. I think you're right on that one.

Ryan had it right a few posts up. The computers that had been used in Admissions were definitely over 20 years old. They were old command prompt driven mainframe systems that got the job done, but were just barely any better than having no computer system at all. There were a couple of times when I was working the front gate and the computers went down. It got really ugly when we had to stop letting people in for 10-15 minutes.

Oh, and for the record, I never said there definitely won't be a season pass only entrance, although it seems like having one would be unnecessary since the new system should be able to allow anyone through any turnstile. I'm not familiar enough with the Paramount gates to know if that's how they do things, but I think it is.

To me, the special line for season passholders was a perk.

Ralph Wiggum said:
I'm not familiar enough with the Paramount gates to know if that's how they do things, but I think it is.

Not sure about all the other parks, but at King's Island it is.

Jeff said:

Well, I disagree. You can start making staffing adjustments on the fly in that case, and with time and tweaking, understand when to start closing food stands and shops in a way that doesn't negatively impact the guest experience.

Hmm, I guess I didn't think the numbers would be so drastic to require changes like that. Is this micro-management? Or do the numbers really vary greatly that often? Of course, I am shooting in the dark. I have no idea what attendance trends are like aside from the simple "Saturdays are busy. Tuesdays are not."

Too bad it doesn't look like we're ever going to see the park by park attendance numbers.

Jeff said:

Chuck Wagon said:
As nifty as it sounds to have real time statistics...park attendances aren't exactly stock quotes. I would think the end of day numbers would be what is actually useful...

Well, I disagree. You can start making staffing adjustments on the fly in that case, and with time and tweaking, understand when to start closing food stands and shops in a way that doesn't negatively impact the guest experience.

I would think it to work only in the opposite direction: unless people have to scan to LEAVE the park the system can only tell you if you've admitted an unusally large/small number of people that day, not how many people are in the park at a given time.

From what I remember the only real difference between the gates at Kings Island and Cedar Point was the metal detectors at kings island.

Captain Hawkeye said:

Jeff said:

Chuck Wagon said:
As nifty as it sounds to have real time statistics...

Well, I disagree. You can start...

I would think it to work only in the opposite direction: unless people have to scan to LEAVE the park the system can only tell you if you've admitted an unusally large/small number of people that day, not how many people are in the park at a given time.

It really comes down to one thing. Subtracting the number of people who exited the park from the number who entered the park. Even if they're re-entries, you'll still get a count of how many are at that moment are in the park. The problem is that the four gates are separated with no link between them. My guess is that this system will tie together the four gates so that these numbers can be read from one location instantly, and this simple math can be done, thus resulting in a count of how many are in the park at any given time.

If you ever noticed, the park kept re-entries separate from ticket entry turnstyles. This is how they were able to find the number of guests who visited during the day, and keep that number separate from those who were re-entries being counted in that number. This was because not all of the tickets were scanned at the entrance, specifically the receipt-style ones purchased at the gates. The new system, I speculate, will scan every ticket and pass, and count this number for the total number entered for the day, and then separating re-entries from ticketed entries is no longer a concern.

Park attendance for each gate is reported every hour to the main gate, it is all added together, which then is reported to Kinzel or Hildebrant every hour. And what Doug said exit total is subtracted, which gives you the number of people in the park.