Ridership.

What's up with Monster? Having a drop of almost 27% seems odd.

Jugga, while staying open for Halloweekends did help the numbers, from remembering what we hit each day on a regular basis, I would attribute about 60-75% of that increase to that. The rest of the increase was our crew's work ethic. Scrambler being up at all was a surprise to me. That ride just screams low capacity.

Question about the coaster numbers . . .

Did they relax the running in the rain requirements last year vs 2007? Would that have made any difference?

(Regardless, great job crews)

The weather restrictions were the same in 08 to the back half of 07. If anything, it would have decreased numbers from the year before. Just high park attendance and good crews this year.

Kind of strange that Sky Ride was down in the numbers. The ride always has a line, but it was down a lot I guess due to wind.

It does seem that it rained a lot less in 08 than in 07, which could attribute to the increase for most coasters. Although I'm not entirely convinced the weather restrictions were exactly the same from year to year. I can recall many times when Magnum would run a 2 train operation in a light rain. I can't speak too much for other rides, but at Ripcord you definitely notice when Magnum is and isn't running. They also seemed less hesitant to keep running through a one train operation in periods of heavy rain, when in 07 it seemed like they just closed down entirely.

It is noce to see the numbers are up! I hope we have another great year!

At ACE's No Coaster Robin Innes said that, to date, Cedar Point's coasters have given over 500,000,000 rides.

Jeez - and to think in 50 years of rides, that number accounts for less than 1/1400 of the number of dollars that Congress just stole from the American people and can't explain where it went! :)

CONGRATS to the Cedar Point and Lake Erie Railroad - #1. Imagine how many rides they could have given had they run two trains everyday like we did back in the early 80s (three trains on Saturday). Goes to show everyone how important the CP & LE RR is!

Congrats to our Magnum crew on an awesome season! The only crew that I've been a part of where we would hit interval seemingly nonstop all day long without thinking twice about it! I'll never forget our 77-intervals-in-a-row marathon on the 4th of July - what an awesome time!

Congrats to all the other crews in the park on an awesome season for numbers - don't let that stop in '09!

djDaemon said:
What's up with Monster? Having a drop of almost 27% seems odd.

This is the result of a cut in staffing for the location that occurred in Late 2004. Notice the steady decline since 2004's 413,878. Combine that with other employment factors that are debated in the employee forum. If you combine those factors with the radiation of 120-130 degree heat off the black dome in the heat of summer.

You can see the frustration of employees in the employee forum. I will keep my opinions on their frustrations to myself, but the heat I will comment on from experience prior to 2004. It was against dress code, but we would soak our hats in water and wear them. That was after we placed a few thermometers around the dome during a heatwave....

I also beleive CP is misrepresenting the hourly capacity. The number represented (803) will produce roughly 800,000 riders in just the three months of June, July, August (based on 12 hour days). I assume the location would need to be staffed with 11 employees to acheive that number today. Compared that to the current whole season. Also not including downtimes and yad yada yada yada. Under current operation as seen on my last visit with 2-3 employees I guess the hourly capacity is more like 200-300 guests.That guesstimation brings number closer to the numbers you see posted of 200-300,000 guests per year.

^couple times we got over 400. It was hard though. You are 100% right about the heat on Monster though, it can get bad.

southpuddle said:
Congrats to our Magnum crew on an awesome season! The only crew that I've been a part of where we would hit interval seemingly nonstop all day long without thinking twice about it! I'll never forget our 77-intervals-in-a-row marathon on the 4th of July - what an awesome time!

Congrats to all the other crews in the park on an awesome season for numbers - don't let that stop in '09!

Being at RipCord, we tended to notice how often Magnum was hitting its interval, and you guys really did do a hell of a job over there. Just find a way to make that lift hill quieter!

^Boo, that lift hill has a distinct sound to it. Its also the sound that lets me know Im at CP!

I know my family was at the parks many times last year! It was a blast! I hope we will see markers for a new coaster to be built in the next year! It would be nice to see 18 at Cedarpoint!

Touchdown said:
^Boo, that lift hill has a distinct sound to it. Its also the sound that lets me know Im at CP!

Kill yourself. That lift hill is too loud.

Hmm. Telling someone to kill themself? I for one like the Magnum lift.

I too favor the sound. Same as I favor Raptor and Mantis's roar, Dragster's launch sounds, Power Towers hiss, and so on and so on.

Monster usually has a crew of what? 3?

2 load/unload and 1 operator?