DaptoFunlandGuy

That shit is bloody expensive compared to the alternatives - you don't get HJs because its cheap, you get it because its convenient and you don't have many other options. Those photos make it look like the pressures of the top job are taking a toll though, and the quick HJ's run is all he had time for. I do hope things get easier for him.

I rode on the weekend and the tray passed around to us included sunglasses and phones. they also had a storage area for the refillable sippers. I'm honestly not worried about someone swiping my phone. It locks automatically, and I can make it beep obnoxiously loudly, and track it using NFC and GPS from my watch. They'll hope the cops catch them first. It's worthless as a resale because the phone needs my credentials to unlock it - even after a full factory reset and wipe. And the kids know this. They don't swipe these sorts of devices anymore because everyone knows they're useless.

Go take a look at Universal Singapore - both major coasters - Mummy and Battlestar - don't allow any loose items, all must be in a locker (Battlestar they even wave metal detectors over you before admitting you to the queue) and their waits are consistently an hour or more. It works at Storm Coaster? It does however need to be in the unload zone, not outside the gate where other randoms can get to it. Nobody is going to try swiping someone else's phone when the guy who owns it is standing right behind them waiting to collect it - they won't get far.

2 things. pretty sure only Taipan has the RFID tags, not Rivals. It's true though - the whole exit the ride envelope, and walk all the way around and re-enter the queue thing is a bit crap if the queue doesn't have a cycle's worth of people. I've even seen it happen during a walk-on day on the CAROUSEL. It's probably part of the same crap about not admitting the next group of people until all current riders are clear of the exit gate too - so if we did away with that rule and opened the air gates earlier, you could probably let rerides happen without leaving the station, if there were enough spare seats. Bit more than a few weeks, don't you reckon?

No need to be so snarky about things. You purport to have more knowledge of the situation, whereas i've only taken what's presented in the article and drawn conclusions from that. I've also run this by industry professionals in construction who agree with me - again, based only on the information presented in the article. The key factors relevant though are: Here are the facts as presented: Council approved the development application, with the standard condition that the upper floors be set back. The builder has built the Yong's house without the required set back The certifier has now submitted a minor change request to gain relaxation of that condition. If the situation is as you say, how do you explain the minor change application? You don't retrospectively apply for relaxation if the council approved you to build it that way to begin with. Whether or not the new home is built to the same rules isn't the topic at hand here, but I have absolutely no doubt council inspectors will be checking everyone's compliance very closely here and no doubt anyone non-complying will get pinged. There is a case recently of a fellow who built an extension to his canalside property with approval from council, but he did not build it in compliance with those conditions (it was a tennis court but he built more of an entertainment space with music and lights on it too). I'm not sure if GC or Sunshine Coast but after several battles, he was required to demolish the extension, so it can happen.

The problem here lies with the certifier of Mr Yong's home. GCCC has a required setback of 2.5m unless council has given relaxations, which hasn't happened here as no application was made. The private certifier signed it off as compliant. It isn't. They're retrospectively applying for the relaxation and they'll want to hope that they get approval else the building will need to be redone to meet the approved specifications. The fact that the other house now needs a firewall installed too is an additional cost, and the builders\ certifiers will probably be sued to recover those costs from whomever is required to foot the bills.

Considering the Leviathan campaign was primarily "we don't strike, we rise above the rest" which was a direct dig at the Taipan campaign, if it is a dig at leviathan, i'm ok with that.

You're asking the wrong person. I never said their ops were faster. I'm not in a position to judge as I haven't visited LPS since Ranger was there. I'm simply saying it can't be the ticket explanation as the explanation is incorrect. I could speculate? Perhaps there's a better culture fostered by management that makes operators keen to do things enthusiastically? Perhaps as said above, different state health and safety requirements apply? Perhaps the park's attendance levels don't slam ops from start to finish so they have more energy to get through a shift if they only have to hustle for 10 minutes a day? Perhaps the lower latitudes are cooler and more comfortable to work in? Perhaps their proximity to the Sydney Harbour Bridge inspires them to move quicker because its such an iconic sight, and that's why our GC parks are building so many ICONIC attractions to try and replicate it? Perhaps it's because the heritage rides are exempt from all the modern safety rules. (Spoiler - I thought seriously about maybe 3 of those suggestions - i'll let you guess which ones)

Yeah 2 just seems the simplest - doesn't obstruct construction works near 3. Behind west is a really odd position for it that wouldn't attract attention. Putting inside superman just shuts down the ride unnecessarily for construction, and we've already covered that its a tight fit. I would still prefer it at vikings. I saw the viking pad on the weekend and it is just THE. PERFECT. FIT. The surfboard theme also fits well with the park and no real retheme is needed (you can even continue to call it surfrider)

Claw's original theme had it invading the beach. Sand, and beach plantings surrounded the ride. The car it is crushing with one leg was your typical surfer panelvan \ wagon. Even the bus stop marketing campaign had it terrorising the gold coast, so yes, that was the tie-in.

It's long been spoken about (but I've not come across anything concrete and public from Disney themselves) that Disney parks aim for an '8 attraction rule' - the idea being that guests leave satisfied if they can do 8 attractions in a day (attractions aren't just rides). Now, we always say 'but this isn't Disney' and I accept that, but at the same time, human mentality is going to have similar expectations everywhere else. I think 6-8 would be a good solid number of rides and attractions. Joz's bad planning gets 5, so it's probably achieveable at our parks, if you think and plan hard enough. This problem with that is that we all well know guests check their brains at the gate. And you shouldn't have to plan to hit 6 attractions in a 7 hour operating day. I agree - MW's capacity sucks, and i hope Oz contributes towards this, but the park we remember from 20+ years ago is no more - capacity monsters like LTRR and PASS, Effects show and stunt show that people would happily do multiple times in a day just don't exist, and no amount of roller coasters (family or otherwise) can possibly replace that kind of capacity. Since the discussion is the validity of Google reviews, most parks these days don't hand out paper maps and showtimes, with the expectation being that you'd go online to get that sort of information. Dreamworld also has screens (at least in Main Street) with showtimes posted on a slideshow basis. Guest services can also provide a copy of showtimes and details like this, and it sounds like this person just waltzed into the park and expected someone to glue a copy of the showtimes to their forehead. (i'm aware this appears in contradiction to my previous comments about leaving brains at the gate, but in a modern 'theres an app for that' world, loading the park map \ app \ showtimes on your phone is a bare minimum expectation.) ETA: since they're capable of using Google - here's the first result for "Dreamworld Showtimes": Dreamworld | Daily Shows

I think I already replied to something like this, but in case I didn't - my thinking is that doing it while Oz is under construction means they can access the Scooby stage from both sides while Oz is scorched earth. Doing it after Oz has opened will likely 'wall in' a lot of the scooby stage and make it harder to access - especially for cranes and whatnot needed to swap out the track pieces mentioned.

It's a shame - Viking's old station area would have been perfect for this, and is currently surrounded by ugly black covered fencing. I wonder where they're gonna jam this in, and what theme it'll have...

Perfectly said! This is exactly what our parks need to focus on - Determine a FAIR average dispatch time and then compare. Unfortunately modern management prefer metrics over common sense, and will only see 'x' drop in time, rather than the reason for 'x' was because idiot guest did 'y' stupid thing and caused a stop. The person timing \ measuring has to allow for things beyond the operators control, but instead they'll just install a computer that counts the time between dispatch and they'll all be judged based on the clock (which is why Maccas parks you at Drivethru and then walks it out to you seconds later - they live and die by the clock) Most people enter LPS and walk straight to the ticket booth. They've no idea how fast the rides are dispatching, and are only aware of closures if posted at the ticket booth. They don't do individual ride tickets, so the argument that LPS has faster ops because of their ticketing structure is fatally flawed.

If you watch the movies, Donkey hooks up with the Dragon from the first film, and their kids are donkeys that can fly - Dragon + Donkey = Dronkey. Yeah to me its a way of keeping the ride operating until it goes down for its retheme - they can't continue using Dreamworks, but other than the IP imagery, everything else (including the gumdrop buttons on gingy!) is still there - so candy flyer matches the current theme without referencing IP. Once they close it for the rebrand, it'll come up with the new name.... simples! I came here to say that but you beat me to it.

Yeah if Serpent slayer is a permanent name and theme rather than just a temp one so they can keep operating it without the KFP ip, then its downright lazy. If they plan to redo it at say next maintenance or something like that i'd be ok with it during transition. Long term it's pathetic. As for Dodgems, I wouldn't be surprised if they had the previous shells from the cars stacked up in dexion racking somewhere BOH - wouldn't take much to dust them off and give them a sea-themed paint job, but the bodies would likely just be fibreglass and you could have them remade pretty easily once you've got the mould.

exactly. and the cycle continues.

It's not the first time they've registered a trademark without necessarily having it used down the track, we saw that with Sky Voyager and Taipan. A quick google tells me you can register a trademark for under $500 and as far as i'm concerned, that's cheaper than it costs to do market research, for you lot to tell them whether its a good idea or not.

Your 'bad decision' day does let you get on five rides, and this is achieveable as a solo adult, or a group who entirely follow the group plan unwaveringly. This is not the only demographic in the park. A family with smaller, and older kids, for example, is going to have different priorities. You didn't see any shows, or main street entertainment. You only grabbed a quick service bite to eat, rather than finding somewhere to sit and ordering food for everyone, and then having kids that take a while to eat their lunch (And certainly not wanting to waste it because it cost you the GDP of a small african nation). You didn't get photos with any of the kid's favourite characters, you didn't browse the giftshop so your kid could spend the $10 Grammy gave him on the small piece of plastic crap that is all he can afford... And TOILETS. You haven't allowed a single moment for the umpteenth trip to the toilet because Sally's bladder isn't bottomless and the bottomless sipper is. I can't really be bothered going through a hypothetical analysis on the queue wait times and what not, but if you throw in 'wanting to go to the toilet' and 'wanting a snack' and 'need another drink' and 'can we get a photo', as well as trying to herd the 16 cats that make up your family, I can assure you, 3 rides in a day with a family of mixed age kids isn't outside the realm of possibility. Especially if the kids age groups mean that a trip to WB Kids is necessary so the little guy can ride something too (sure families can split up to do things like that simultaneous but not all families want to do that). Can others do more? Yes. Does that mean the 3-rides in a day reviews are bullshit? No. We've long talked about guests in general leaving their brains at the door. they're on holidays. they don't walk into the park with a game plan... and they shouldn't have to. I think I covered this, but just to be clear, you seem to be discussing a single person's experience in the park (And I agree, probably only one person who wants to do both) but in the scheme, Dad, maybe Mum, definitely Teen are heading for Rivals, but early primary schooler wants to do JDS, so as a unit, that family wants to do both, and therefore has to line up for both. Yeah, the teen is probably going to go off on their own (these days they've got phones) but Dad and maybe Mum probably want to ride Rivals too - and someone has to look after Jimmy who isn't tall enough to ride yet.

When they did Arkham's train, the running gear stayed, and the new chassis went in underneath. Perhaps Scooby is the same? *shrug* The cars likely weren't borked - they were likely either dispatching empty to prevent a cascade stop, or if the staff member was riding solo afterwards, perhaps they were doing something (filming perhaps?) and they didn't want any guests in front of them getting in the shot?

Yes, there is definitely a culture of poor motivation in some parks (and the 5 o'clock knock off was the best motivation there is) but that doubles back to the double edged sword - what manager is going to insist they work faster, when any safety accidents that occur fall back on them? I'm not saying it's right, i'm just saying what it is, in the culture. We need park management that is brave enough to come in and say 'this isn't good enough, we need to be better, and i'll assume responsibility for it'. Nobody is doing that, and that's why there's no motivation prior to 5pm.

Wonder why Vortex is having so many issues?

You referred to corkscrew being manual locking, and betting the 80's ops crew could load really fast. I was explaining the process to explain the flaws - this is why these systems were replaced with more failsafe systems that aren't reliant on an operator's intervention to ensure safety. Yes, that "MUST SEND" light on the console is a really good motivator - but does that not then hamper operations because they'll end up sending empties to keep ahead of the cascade? It seems to me also that this is a big reason why they don't run all cars very often. Even in the January peak season, the 'reduced capacity' sign was out - and I think they were only running half the cars they normally have. Yeah this is probably my biggest bugbear, and is clearly a simple fix that doesn't impact safety. It's not an exaggeration. It just takes perspective. Few people are visiting solo, unless passholders where the price factor is less relevant. Most people buying day tickets are coming in a group - a couple at least, if not a family. Single day tickets at the gate are currently $129 per person. The standard "Family" of 2a2c is going to set you back more than $400 for the day. Can assure you, with friends who visited from Sydney over the holiday period, they only got 3 rides due to rides going down, early closures of queuelines when they were large lines, etc. They didn't stop for lunch either.

Not mirror balls... IIRC the old mirrors are still there, aren't they?

Look - i'm the first person to complain about slow ops, but I also know what happens when you encourage people to do their jobs faster than they should. It's a double edged sword here with no correct answer. Are we being too cautious? Are we being too risky? where is the line, and who falls on that sword when something happens and the investigation discovers the line wasn't far enough (or too far) ? Back in those days, Corkscrew had a line for each train row too. I don't know at what point we decided that the entire train's worth of people had to be counted in by the operator, but the safety system was also a bit more rudimentary. (I'm assuming here based on my knowledge of the Demon at Wonderland, but I imagine the systems were similar) - The harness locking mechanism on each train car was a foot pedal, pushed down to unlock, and pulled up (usually by a golf putter style device or by foot) and this engaged \ disengaged the ratchet locking mechanism. These pedals had small reflectors (like a bike reflector) mounted on the outside edge. As the train dispatched from the station, an IR beam would 'count' the number of train carriages that passed it to ensure the lock pedal was in the correct position for dispatch, and the ride would fault (lift would shut down) if any of those pedals were missed in the count. Such a simplistic system, but also one that can fail in an unsafe state, as the ride is already moving. Also, even if the pedal was in the locked position, the harness still needed to be pulled\pushed down onto the rider, and i've seen Demon dispatch with harnesses in the 'fully up' position. Back in the 80's, we also saw rides from overseas, and copied them over here, without regard for the lessons the overseas professionals had learned in development. This is what gave us TRRR. This is why our jurisdiction has higher requirements for health and safety than overseas jurisdictions - because we don't accept even one person getting hurt as acceptable. Anyone in management who advocates for 'faster' operations will be crucified as soon as anyone is injured as a result.