Virus Impact on CP

The reason those last two weeks lost their daily operation because their college age help has to get ready/go to for college.

Every past year, those two last August weeks were the best time to go to CP as they still had foreign help staying for that. Reduced hours, very short lines, and Michigan schools don't start as early as Ohio schools so many Michigan visitors. Those were my favorite times for the point as the weather was also starting to cool down.

TwistedCircuits said:

They just posted calendar updates. Switching to Fri-Mon operations only starting Aug 16

Friday - Sunday, with the exception of being open on Labor Day.

Universal Studios just cancelled Halloween Horror Nights. A significant decision for them. I guarantee that Cedar Point will not be doing any haunts or houses this year, but will likely still try to decorate and have daytime activities for families. (Maybe)

If they have anything in October, Cedar Point may be looking at compressing the demand. In normal years, weekends in Sept and Oct tend to be very crowded (you could likely add a weekend or two to spread crowds out a little). From what we see in the limited time of this season, that won't happen this season. So rather than be open 6 or 7 weekends in Sept/Oct (and pay the costs for each of those weekends), only open for 2-3 weekends in Oct and those who want to go to Halloweekends will go in those 2-3 weekends. You likely get about the same attendance/spend with less costs. Trick is weather in Oct is often spotty. You could get rain on a couple of those weekends. We shall see.

Dennis Urban said:

The reason those last two weeks lost their daily operation because their college age help has to get ready/go to for college.

This is probably even more of a concern for them staffing the park's late regular season this year than in a "normal" year. It seems that lots of colleges are running a modified first semester schedule - bringing the kids back a week or two earlier in August this year, eliminating fall break and powering through to do finals right before Thanksgiving, then sending them home for winter break until the middle of January.

Even if they could have made it happen on a skeleton crew, my guess is attendance and demand just doesn't justify the park staying open. That they are willing to refund three weeks worth of resort reservations shows how much more they would stand to lose by staying open.

^^ We are indeed doing that here, albeit not by starting earlier. We start on the 24th, and have eliminated Fall Break and then our Finals Week to keep the regular start date. Everything will be wrapped up with a neat little bow 2 days before Thanksgiving.

What and when is Fall Break? Don’t remember that when I was in college, but that was a long time ago.

True story: when I got hired here at Mount Union in 2009, I thought they were joking when they mentioned fall break. But yes, it's a thing (that I also had never heard of).

For us, it takes place in the middle the 16-week semester; usually around October 17th....or in that ball park.

It's just like Spring Break....only in the fall.

Thanks. That's interesting. I had no idea that was a thing now.

Depending on the school it's not always a full week off for Fall Break like it is for Spring Break. Many just do it as a 4 or 5 day weekend with a 2 or 3 day class/work week or a Friday/Monday off.

I think at Capital the “mid semester break” in the Fall was literally one day...just a 3-day weekend between half-semesters. I think it was an equalization thing for midterm exams and a holdover from a “modular” schedule as it meant one week where all classes met twice.

—Dave Althoff, Jr.

You said skeleton crew!!!

Are we supposed to drink?

Checking the CP webcams, the parking lot looks quite busy...at least comparing lot for the past few weeks. Def not a normal July day, but for sure it's busier. Even quite a bit of people on the main midway.

We were in the park last Thursday, def more folks on the midway today.

Had my big trip Mon-Wed, ops were good and park was busy. Not packed but busy. I think things are starting to level off and normalize with whats going on so even with the number of people in the park it was a great experience for my friends and I.

Rumors on another website are saying that there's a chance that all Cedar Fair parks will be closing after Labor day. The coaster fan in me would be sad about it, since I was considering a fall trip. But I'm sure the business is hurting, even with the gates open right now.

I can’t imagine with the amount of efforts Cedar Fair made to open up parks that they’d give up on the fall season altogether. But then again, the virus levels are rapidly increasing in many states and those states are facing inevitable shutdowns again. And it seems that folks didn’t exactly flock to the parks like many had assumed they would. I’d like to see them try and be open, at the least through September and then maybe call it a day.

It seems like amusement parks are some of the safer places to go right now. I don't recall any outbreaks being traced back to any parks, Even though some employees have tested positive it appears that an outbreak didn't come from the park as a result. If you can find anything that says otherwise, please share it here. For many outbreaks, fingers are being pointed at places like bars, and I even heard PIB come up a few times during a DeWine address about a couple weeks ago.

I'm guessing if the parks are voluntarily planning to close, it's more related to profitability than virus concerns. If there were new concerns with the virus, I imagine it would be the government shutting things down. Again, it's rumors for now.