News: Cedar Point’s mask rule ignites firestorm of fan protests on social media

There is NO WAY to operate to the standards set right now without guest compliance. You can't enforce your way to near 100% compliance, certainly not with the level of staff a park will be able to achieve. I'll be at Kings Island on the 4th, I hope for the best. We've got our multiple masks ready to go, going to start with 2 cooling gaiters.

Stopped in at KI today for a quick ride on Orion on my way from Indiana to Cleveland after a weekend camping trip.

I was in the park for about an hour and was happy to see almost ALL guests had masks on walking the midways and in the queue for Orion. Yes, some had them tucked below their noses (mostly kids under tweens) but I didn't see anyone with it below their chin that wasn't actively drinking, eating or sitting at a table socially distanced away from other tables. It was a hot one, above 90 degrees. I wore a disposable mask and was fine, only taking it down to chug a cup of water. It was very encouraging to see everyone doing their best and trying to follow rules. I also did not see a single person walking around refusing to wear one at all. For the most part today's crowd, that I saw in my limited time there was doing a good job.

As for Orion, I got one ride, middle row and thought it was fantastic. Definitely a different style Giga compared to Fury or Leviathan and does not ride like Diamondback at all in my opinion.

To answer the question everyone is thinking, my cheap Harbor Freight 10 for $5 disposable mask stayed on the entire ride. I did not have to adjust or hold it on. Will a mask fly off at some point while riding a ride? Probably, just like people lose phones, hats and wallets on rides. But if you wear it properly and it fits correctly I would say the chances are slim.

I was also at Kings Island all day yesterday, and agree that everything went incredibly smoothly in regards to everyone wearing masks and keeping distance in lines. The park did a great job with their policies, and even though we occasionally had to wait 10 extra minutes a few times for them to sanitize trains on rides, it was a nice light crowd, so the waits were overall pretty short. I'm sure the heat was a factor as well... It was scorching yesterday.

We got three rides on Orion, and I'll take a different opinion as WolfBobs. I think it's really smooth and fun, but I felt it kind of lacks the "wow" factor. Obviously it's a really solid ride and will be great for the park. But we rode Diamondback in the evening, and most of my group agreed that the hyper is better than the giga.

I’m excited for Orion but from what I’ve seen in the reviews most people thought it was good, but not great. I think it’s a good fit for Kings Island although with all the land they own I’ll always be a little mystified as to why they didn’t go a little taller or bigger, and why it seems a bit of a copy of Diamondback. I’m not an engineer though so I’m sure the park has their reasons. It’ll sit nicely amongst the other giga coasters overall though.

Now I’ll probably get lit on fire for this but while I do enjoy Millennium, it’s lost it’s appeal to me over the years after riding so many B&Ms, I’d love to see a giga come to Cedar Point from them. They don’t need it and likely will never build one but I can dream. 😎

I was surprised Cedar Point didn't go for the B&M Giga Dive record. Then they would have a unique ride and a B&M giga. Maybe even combine track layouts styles between dive and traditional.

Or a tunnel that goes under the island.

Now see that's an idea I like.

Valravan where it is now but with a longer lift so it's 300 ft drop, turn and dive into the lagoon just to the island side of the iron dragon pretzel, it banks and turns and comes up out of the lagoon next to dragster, with enough space for the SRE of course. Turn over camp snoopy, follow the CPLE by CCMR, dive down under the lagoon next to the second trestle, come up behind frontier trail, sustained airtime over Millie tunnels dive back down under millennium plaza. Then come up where the cedars stood, do some gerstlaur type manuvering, maybe go for the inversion record too, and return to the station.

What say y'all?

Install revolving urinals in the station so I can pee before I board, and you've got yourself a record-breaker.

Now thats actually is much closer to reality than some of my ideas.

I bet we could put some squattie potties in and then people would get that all natural comfort too.

I was part of the group with Dvo the other day at KI and will mirror everything he said. It was very encouraging to see everyone on the same page and practicing proper safety guidelines. I just wish the rest of the country was like that. ::womp womp::

As for Orion, it's a great ride and a great fit for Kings Island. But I agree that it just felt like it was lacking something. I'd be interested to see how it rides when we can safely operate coasters at full capacity again but I don't think it'll change much. I will say that the front and back rows offer fairly different experiences with my favorite being the back row. In my opinion, it offered the best ride on the drop, speed hill and airtime hill. Now, if the trims didn't grab on the airtime hill, that last 1/4 of the ride would be pretty intense. But, despite what us enthusiasts may think, it'll be another home run for the park.

I enjoyed Orion quite a bit. 2 rides back row, last ride we asked for and were granted front row on the 4th. Loved the timed pass system. Entered at open, 30 min wait by the time we got back there and got our passes. Grabbed a 4-5pm ticket later, then a 7-8 ticket after we exited our 2nd ride.

Leviathan added weight to the zero car last year and it did help make the ride even better, so I am looking forward to full train Orion to see if it gets even better. 16 more riders can add a lot of weight. It's not in the same league as Fury IMO, but it's still a great ride. I'd have it tied with Leviathan for now, not better than Millennium. I305 is my least favorite Giga but it's still a fun coaster and certainly unique amongst the other Gigas.

Also, we were very impressed with Kings Island overall on the 4th. Great job by the park and most of the guests.

What was attendance like at Kings Island? Seems everywhere I go is still super slow. Despite heavy disagreement with mask rule, I do hope some crowds for parks this summer for their sake.

The cap, based on their reservation allotment, looks to be about 10k at Kings Island. On the 4th it was booked up but the park never seemed crowded, even in high traffic spots like Area 72, Rivertown and International Street. All rides basically open except Invertigo that I saw. On days coming up that aren't booked up, if you can get there on a nice weather day with like 6-8k people there it could be an amazing day. We had so much fun on the 4th, 14 rides including 3 on Orion. Took it easy midday in the high heat, too. Good mask adherence and easy entry, distancing markers helpful. Plentiful sanitizer stations, most food places open. No freestyle open at all for drink plan, but the standard ones were.

I’m at KI right now. My Orion time was 2-3. There’s weather in the area and I’m still waiting. Ugh.
overall the day isn’t bad- I’ll post a better report later.

I'll second this -- at Universal Studios last month, capped at the same 20% CP is using, I felt like I was the only one there for a good half of the day -- it did start getting more crowded in the afternoon but by that time it was time to go home. I had no need to wait in the only "real" lines that they had for Hagrid and HPATFJ because I've already done them. My longest line all day was about 8 minutes and people all wore their masks and they physically distanced following the rules. I expect most people at CP will do the same -- and by capping at 20% you won't have that same amount of craziness you usually have -- infrequent day visitors/party-goers who just choose CP for todays party/and large groups just won't be there to cause trouble. I don't expect they will have any issues.

RonAnnArbor said:

people all wore their masks and they physically distanced following the rules. I expect most people at CP will do the same

They actually did, surprisingly. But I don't know about the weeks ahead with the park opening up to non-passholders.

I almost wonder, and know I'm generalizing, but are some of the passholders acting entitled because "I paid for a different experience than I'm getting so I'm going to do what I want" wheras the general ticket holders are just happy to be here.

Now that I write that out I'm sure those people exist in both groups though.

That's not a completely unreasonable expectation. We asked for a prorated refund on our Disney passes because the experience would fundamentally not be what we paid for. You can't just go any time, many attractions and entertainment venues are closed, and by the way, you could potentially catch a disease that kills some people. It's not an emotional issue for me, and I'll be happy to return and give them money when my vulnerable-to-respiratory-disease family is at less risk.

Now, if you just complain because you want it to be something different than it is, that's something different. That desire to bend reality right now is not limited to amusement park passholders.

Very good points.

I don't know about Disney but I think Cedar Point has kept up their end of the deal by extending all pases through next year. Sure this year is different but it's essentially a bonus on your pass at this point.

Sure, I think they did it right. Now if next year isn't "better," they might have to make some harder decisions.