Lotl_90

Both Claw and Tower have second booths, Towers is on the load side, Claw on the opposite side to load, where the Q4U entry is. Both booths are actually there for a reason. Standard Dreamworld operating procedures require there to be two operators at these rides, at all times for them to be operating. In claw, the second booth has two buttons, an E-Stop and a Dispatch allow button, which this second operator must be holding down for the Main operator to be able to start the ride. You will see operators everywhere crossing their arms towards each other, giving the all clear to move on to the next step of operation. In tower, there are the same two buttons, as well as a gate control for the door that leads into the loading area. Reptar is very similar, it also has a 'dispatch allow' system, although all other controls are with the main operator. EDIT: Also, both sides of GD are quite capable of single operation, although for the east side (side closest to the queue) to operate, it has to be 'turned on' by the West side control panel.

^ I dont know whether to take that question seriously ahah. At risk of looking like a douche.. i'll leave it at this; For the same reason they have a booth on either side of the track at tower. Operator consistency.

As I said earlier, if two (or three, or four depending on the case) operators get put on a ride, where they both have the skill to operate all aspects of the ride than they can and do swap often. A good example is Thunder river, Staff swap around all day on that ride, moving from load, to dispatch, to unload. Although the senior operator tends to spend more time at unload. Same with Motocoaster, training permitted, operators may swap positions throughout the day. Problem lies though, obviously on rides with two operators like Cyclone, Log ride and wipeout, where in some cases there are two (or three) levels of difference between the operators, they arent going to be swapping, this is where you will find the operators are static all day. With the other two op rides (drop, claw, tower etc) you will occaisonally get swaps, but most of the time there is still a level of difference, so staff cant rotate.

Fair enough. My Argument was based on Dreamworlds current operating schedule, using the level of classification system. Who knows, rotational staffing could be in the mix anyway, Its used in WWW for both lifeguards and slidies, so its not an entirely foreign concept to the Dreamworld ops team. No head biting. Several of the more technical rides, even under the current training system require an operator to be buddied for more than one day. All training sessions are completed by the senior instructing operators, who sign a legal document authorising the person to operate that ride. If they dont feel the person is competent/confident in operating the ride/position safely, then they are not cleared, simple as that. And believe it or not, it happens. Again, making reference to the dora/swinger type rides, they are already trained as a set of two, so not to far to stretch. It would be interesting to see how the system would cope being transitioned to a rotational system, with training on several rides at once, for more of the rides.

To be fair though, i myself have encountered similar situations at Movie World several times. Its quite a universal problem. I suppose its unavoidable with the amount of 'younger' employees the industry appeals to. Doesnt make it anymore acceptable, its just a contributing factor. The sheer amount of Ops staff in the park would make rostering something like this quite painful. Also, before anyone brings up the idea of having set rotations (as in allocated rides to a rotation, every day, which would be a great idea in theory), Dreamworlds rides run in levels of classification, so say you had an operator who had only one Senior level ride, how would they rotate in a loop full of senior level rides that they werent trained on? EDIT: Also, if you end up with two operators on a ride that are trained in both positions, than they are quite welcome to alternate throughout the day, and do often. Also rides in sets of two (i.e Dora's Sea Planes/Swinger Zinger and Mighty go Round/Blues Skidoo) the operators alternate running the rides at their leisure.

Fair enough.. surely you should know better than to listen to compulsive liars. As far as im aware its the 20 rider rule. Theres really no point paying a full hours wages for a senior operator and a deckhand to stand around and do nothing while they wait for 20 riders, and theres no point wasting the majority of the guests hour of early entry scrounging around for 20 people when, as you said yourself they could get the rest of the big 6 done, and come back at 10am to ride wipeout, which has a fast turnover anyway.

But then wouldnt that be an issue for several of the other big 6 rides that have no problem opening at 9am as well? Why would wipeout be singled out?

To me implies that he was talking about the actual process of "turning the ride on". Ill be happily corrected if he did mean otherwise, could just be poor word choice.

Or just because it requires 20 people to operate, and trying to get 20 of the people who entered early together for one cycle is like drawing blood from a stone. It has nothing to do with starting it up. You hear some strange things Dan.

Actually, Motocoaster does run in the rain, unless it is absolutely pelting down, its at the operators discretion. When it first opened they couldnt run it in the rain at all because the sensors weren't housed properly, so everytime it rained the ride freaked out and thought there was a train on the brake run when really it was just drops of water. One would think Intamin would have corrected that though for JR. Cyclone is fine in rain, but its not allowed to operate in strong winds, like drop. And storms are a little different, the moment lightning is spotted or the park recieves a severe weather bulletin, all rides must cease operation immeadiately. With wipeout an e-stop is understandable, if it loses power they need emergency services to come and get people off. Funny stuff (unless youre on it I guess...).

In all honesty, If it is included in admission, I say go for it. Its at least a step in the right direction (i.e away from upcharge attractions). T-Bone, the Chalk Zone area is the vast concrete area up behind Blues Skidoo and the Mighty go Round. Right at the very top of Nick Central.

Or knowing dreamworld an already existing building from somewhere. You're forgetting the Big 'Chalk Zone' space up the top of Nick Central which would quite easily fit a ride in, and the (ex)Fountain Play zone at the bottom, which is in much need of something useful and could quite comfortably house a ride envelope.

This gate actually leads up to the Bottom Gates of the park where the Big Brother House is, and DW's existing overflow carpark. Not alot to see around there really.

I know its no help for those visiting WWW, but when they have the DW overflow carpark in operation, the Old Blue Lagoon Buildings are turned into a Makeshift Admissions building. On the hectically busy days, WWW park goers are directed into one lane of the entry, DW into the other, so that they can accurately monitor when to open the overflow for DW, but still have enough room for WWW guests. If that makes sense.

Id put money on the fact that you were looking in the wrong spot. Im down in the vacinity quite often, and last I saw it was still there.

For Dreamworld, get in when the park opens and head straight for either Tower of Terror or Motocoaster. They are the rides that take the longest to get on to. Rides like claw and wipeout have a high throughput and will move through the queue pretty fast. After the TOT and Moto, id probably go to giant drop or cyclone. Fitting in whatever you want in between. The tiger shows attract a lot of people (at 12 and 3:30) so they are good times to be heading for rides as well. Hope that helps

It all comes down to how you want to look at it really. Personally, I see that yes it may be reducing capacity on one or two rides for a short period of time, but realistically, even if the Q4U guest was standing in the queue line in front of you, you would still have to wait for them to ride before your turn. I dont see it as too much of a difference. If people were actually not waiting for the ride and walking straight on and riding, yeah i'd have a problem too, but they are still waiting for the ride. A lot of Q4U guests show up early in an attempt to get on the ride early, and in every instance will be turned away, or told to wait until their designated time. If too many guests are booking for a ride or showing up at a ride, the 'Virtual line' is closed (so that no more bookings can be made) until it clears and the physical queue is reduced again so that the normal queue waiting guests arent made to wait longer than is fair. I think you really have to experience the system before you can make a clear cut decision. Sure, it may be an excuse for dreamworld to drag every last cent out of the guest, but its just like any decision, It benefits the people who use it and the people who dont use it (for whatever reason) are going to whinge and complain. I see both sides of the story, and im not discounting anyones POV, but im more inclined to run with the company on this one.

Just to clear a few things up, the user of the device doesnt need to go anywhere near the ride itself to reserve their spot. It is all done using the device. Dreamworld also has more Q-Bots for sale now, as 130 were seling out every day, and there were quite a few dissapointed people. Im with the opinion of Lo-Q. In no way (IMO) is it queue jumping. Users are still waiting the same amount of time as everybody else, that I know for sure. Guest comments about the system and its use have all been positive, and guests who see other guests using them then go to get one for themselves. Especially families. Anyone who has waited in a 90min queue with children will understand the interest in wanting to utilize this system. Normal riders are not disadvantaged in an overly large way, as the Q4U riders are mixed in with normal riders to fill up each cycle. If the Q4U line is becoming over large, they will send a whole ride/train of Q4U guests to keep the lines moving, where possible. I think if dreamworld can successfully offer this service and keep the same level of operating 'efficiency' then they may as well go for it. Maybe if Macquarie sees a bit more money coming in they will be more willing to spend a bit more. Anyway, thats my two cents worth.

They have been having a lot of trouble with one of the trains, hence it was off for so long leading up to christmas, they were working on fixing it, however when it started to get really busy, they rushed the repair just to get the train back on the track. Seems to be causing more problems than its worth. Runs ok early in the morning, then by lunch time they are having to take the second train off because its jamming up the sensors on the brake run, wont allow the train at dispatch to leave the station because the second train hasnt made it off the track into the unload, but it wont move. Its bizarre. If it was requiring a maintenance guy to 'press a button' it was probably something silly like the rear station gates didnt close properly, and required a reset to allow the harnesses up. And as for hating Q4U, you are in a mega minority. The positive response has been overwhelming. When people realise its not queue jumping, it makes a huge difference.

As far as im aware it will be open on both monday and tuesday.

^ Pretty much, unless you are going to be in the park today (8th), tomorrow(9th), the 12th or 13th, then an event booking is the only way in.

To be fair, A few GC theme parks closed their gates today due to the amount of people. DW/WWW extended trade to 6:30pm to allow for the amount of people. 9am-6:30pm is a fairly decent day really. Being a passholder doesnt mean that you get extra special treatment, too many pass holders develop that mentality and its just disgusting really. It the park is full, its full. I personally wouldnt want to go in if I knew the park was that busy. Also, being a passholder you should know better than to go this time of year, CRAZY STUFF!

Dreamworld allows staff to take photos for personal use only, either before or after their shift, or during their lunch breaks, but in guest areas only (i.e only places that guests are allowed to take photos).

Flat out Dan? Wait until you have a 10,000 day ahaha. That wasnt even 6000. To be fair, Rapids was pumping through, their rider count was over 4500 by 4:30pm with an hour of operation left, so Its not like they werent trying. And log ride was doing bloody well to only be down for 45 mins considering the issues they have had with it the last few days. To stay on topic though, Im sure Seaworld are doing their best to get whatever the issue is with corkscrew fixed, im sure they dont want their one of their biggest attractions down this time of year either. Not much fun.

A lot of that plantation area is all eucalypt (and theres not just sheep.. theres all sorts of crazy stuff out there!). Because of the large amounts of koalas at dreamworld, they have to be able to generate a sizeable amount of their own eucalypt to be allowed to house them. But yeah, Basically that plantation, all of the bush land behind that etc is owned by Macquarie. To give you an idea, Dreamworld Currently occupies about 30Ha of a total 85Ha Site.