Rider Height Wristbands- What's the Point?

I always suspected that many of you preferred the off-season...

I think this page provides a reasonable explanation.

Safer Parks

^^

The alternative is either

1) Accept the Guest Services measurement (i.e. if you have a wrist band you're tall enough, no questions asked)

2) Stop having Guest Services measure (i.e. Do ALL measuring at the rides)

Some people just like to complain and find fault.

I think something that is largely being missed here is simply good parenting. It sucks when kids are almost there but that is life and it is better to learn those lessons now than later.

My 12 year old is really pissed that he cannot try out VR on Iron Dragon until next year (if they have it). 12 year olds typically don't have a state issued ID or even a school ID so I could of course lie and tell CP he is 13 and no one would be the wiser and there probably isn't really a safety issue either. But I won't do it, no matter how much he begs or pouts every time we walk by.

What is the point of the wristbands? IMO it is to give whoever in charge of the youngsters an easy to remember guide as to what rides they can attempt to ride or not. CP is really big and impossible for your average guest to know what the requirements are for all 71 rides. The only thing worse than being turned away is walking a 1/2 mile to get there to find you you didn't even have a chance at it.

Shades said:
What makes your hard stop measurement of 47-7/8" any different than a hard stop measurement of 48"? The same problem still exists with the 47-7/8" stick. Let's say your kid is 47-13/16". Is the employee supposed to be an unthinking robot and not let the kid ride because of a tiny 1/16"?

It's a matter of tolerance, just like in design & manufacturing. No measurement device nor person operating the measurement device is perfect, and when you design and manufacture something it is to a set of tolerances, because you cannot make something that is exactly to the prescribed dimensions.

This is no different. If a guest is measured at Guest Services at 48", and is measured again at a ride entrance and found to be 1/8" short (or 1mm, or whatever), it stands to reason that "close enough" is, in this case, good enough. The kid may be wearing sandals now instead of sneakers. It could be several hours later in the day, and their joints have compressed slightly, making them a tad shorter. So a little bit of tolerance makes sense.

I have a feeling this thread will eventually beat the number of pages that the MS thread had :(

You know, if they calibrated all the measuring devices to read slightly shorter than the "official" measurement for the wristband, nearly all re-measurements would become redundant.

Except, of course, those few irresponsible people that do swap wristbands.

Thank God CP increased the height requirement of Iron Dragon to 48" a few years ago. Remember how all those 46-47" kids kept falling out of the ride??

^ Don't get me started on that one. Explaining to my daughter "Hey you could ride this last year, but you can't now" was a treat. To think that Millennium Force and Iron Dragon have the same height requirement is crazy.

^That's a huge sore spot for my 2nd oldest. He was so looking forward to riding it as he was just a little to short the last day of the prior season. Opening day the next year he was sure he would get to ride... talked about it the whole 3 hr drive to the park.

I'm still going with the majority of kids wearing wrist bands board rides with no problem, and that the folks tasked with measuring kids, wristband or not, are doing what they were trained to do. Make sure.

Ride heights, like many things, are somewhat arbitrary (voting age, drinking age, driving age...): they're a compromise between testing each and every person and finding a balance between that and, well, efficiency. There are 14 year olds I'd be happy to drive me around and 30 year olds that leave me wishing there was a brake on the passenger's side...

Does anyone know how short you can be on the MAVERICK? I didn't look, but I did with the WICKED TWISTER; under 6,6 feet. People over 6,6 can't ride it. Is there any other Coaster or Thrill Ride that are over 6,6 feet?

Rihard 2000 said:
Height wrist bands are intended to make things easier for both the employee and guest. Consider the following scenarios and decide for yourself which is the greater waste of time...

1. A just barely tall enough child arrives with his father at Raptor and is measured at the entrance by the minimum wage employee working entrance. The employee realizes it's too close to call for the child's safety and must therefore call an area supervisor to the ride entrance so that someone higher up makes the decision. Everyone waits for that supervisor to arrive.

2. The employee realizes it's too close to call for the child's safety and decides to tell dad that the child cannot ride. Dad and the child leave angry and upset because earlier in the day they were able to ride Raptor together with no problem.

3. The employee realizes it's too close to call and for the child's safety explains to dad that if the child receives an official height measurement wristband, that he then can allow the child to ride. Dad and child walk annoyingly toward guest relations for measurement, but are hopeful for a good outcome there.

4. The employees measures child, realizes that it's too close to call. Then the employee sees the wristband which indicates the child was previously measured by someone more official/experienced. He inspects the wristband to be certain that it hasn't been tampered with and then finally allows the child to ride.

If a child is well above the height restriction judgement call mark, then there's really no need for the wristband. But if your child is in the dangerously unsure territory, then the wristband is worth receiving to ensure that all measurements later in the day are consistently worry free.

Does anyone here really believe that the height limit for each ride actually marks a point where a half of an inch of height either way is the difference between a safe ride and an unsafe ride?

In what way is a 46" tall rider at greater risk than a 48" tall rider on Mine Ride, Gemini, or Iron dragon? The true answer is that they are NOT at any greater risk, and those rides would have lower height limits at nearly any other amusement chain.

The whole point is that due to human nature, there will always be some idiot wanting to take a small child on a roller coaster or other inappropriate ride, and the limit had to be set -=SOMEWHERE =- for legal and moral reasons. Look at the height limits for the rides at Walt Disney World in Orlando and compare them to the limits for similar rides at Cedar Point. Many at Cedar Point are ludicrously conservative, but the management has a phobic risk aversion that trumps all guest satisfaction metrics, where Disney takes a more pragmatic approach bent towards allowing the greatest ridership while still keeping their guests safe.

Rugrats2001 said:

Does anyone here really believe that the height limit for each ride actually marks a point where a half of an inch of height either way is the difference between a safe ride and an unsafe ride?

In most cases I do not believe it makes a difference. See my post here.

I'm not insinuating Disney is not safety conscious, however a tragic accident at year round Disney doesn't affect nearly the people that would change their vacation plans as a CP on ride death/injury.
The bottom line at Merlin parks was massively affected after smiler incident.
The park being safety 'over'cautious is to protect what little operating/profit season they have.

It's an apples/caramel apples comparison.

It really doesn't matter what any of you think, because at the end of the day, the height requirement is what it is, and not intended to be interpreted. It's not up to someone making minimum wage with no education around human factors and ride safety to decide if a kids is "close enough," so either they're there or they're not. There is no guesswork or judgement, just a binary condition.

And yes, it even works that way at Disney.

If you are a bartender and someone who is 20 gives you a realistic looking fake ID are you liable? If cheaters are really as sophisticated and motivated to find a way as folks are saying, I am sure kids under the height requirement are finding ways to get on. Are we really expecting anyone to initiate a comprehensive investigation to determine some kid isn't wearing deceptively padded shoes?

Give them a wristband and trust that it will work more often than not. If someone screws the system, they lose the right to complain. If someone sneaks through and gets hurt, there is a ready-made defense. The lawsuit would never get past summary judgment.

Jeff said:

There is no guesswork or judgement, just a binary condition.

That is demonstrably not true, given that guests have been measured differently at various locations throughout the park, including Guest Services. I mean, it should be binary, but in practice it just isn't. Which is why there should be some method for overcoming the influence of individual judgement.

Yes, the method is going with whatever the stick says at any given ride, obviously.