Early Friday March 13, 2009... 6am...through Sunday March 15, 2009, late.
Excited & tired as hell. Were about to head out for our 11hr estimated trip to Atlanta. The purpose?....Sixflags over Georgia. Little did i know that i would have one heartbreak of a weekend.
I will make this short cause i WILL NOT sit here and vent it all out like I did to corporate.
Alls I can say is that if this were our lovely SFGam or the CP Ive come to know, we would have waited somethin out.
Of course we were there the couple days outta the year that they have nonstop rain drizzle. Little did we also know, the entire state shuts down. WTH! Well they let us in the parkin lot, paid $15. They let us in the park after explaining the coasters may not open. WHAT?...well i said get to testin when the rain stops. GO! nahhhhh....they thought even though it hasnt been raining, well just blame the 50degree weather and decide to close at 1pm.
the next day everyone said the rain would let up by 2pm at the latest, and the sun would come with 60degree temps. Well the same damn thing happens but this time they keep less flats open and decide were not gonna try AT ALL and close at NOON. they opened at 10 30am!!!! so an hour and half later all after these people paid and mangement and security SAID the weather may let up so theyd TRY AND GET THINGS GOIN FOR US.....they close immediatley after! By 1pm NO JOKE...the sun comes out to play and by 2 the temp was 63degrees....AW HELL NAH!
We felt cheated and just purely irritated. They could have tested everything. nope....only superman. and it FLEW! literally....like glass. but they were just waiting, just waiting to go home. didnt do #@$% to satisfy their guests.
I could go into so much details like how the employees giggled, made jokes, and told us to go home but ill stop there cause I feel it was the most beautiful park ive ever been to but sadly, the worst run in any chain Ive visited.
were there a lot of people there or just a few? I can see shutting it down if nobody is there because that's just smart buisness... Sorry your trip was less than enjoyable.
Remember, there's nothing but air beneath the chair.
there were 200 or so people...but thats my problem. when Cedar point has the same re-riding 10guests we stay open or at least close later than 1 30min after park open....
Ive been to great america several times when I was the only guests in south west terr. riding giant drop in the rain over and over. i dont know....just irritating, but i agree with you.
Corporate is the reason they are doing this. I'm sorry to say, but on those days the park should have just not been open. At SFGAm, that happened before. It's based on how many people are at the park, and the fact that they don't want to lose money because of operations (employees, electricity).
I'm sure it's disappointing (frustrating) wasting that money to go to that park, but it's based on the weather, and it's also based on the time of the year (The more into summer you go, that park probably would have been open because there are going to more people in the summer.). Disney World can afford to stay open because they have indoor attractions, and tourists aren't going to say let's not go Disney World today because they traveled all that way. The local people might however say let's not go Disney World today.
I think one of these bad weather days happened last year even though I wasn't at SFGAm that day. They figure if there isn't enough people by a certain time, they aren't coming. The reason is because if a park is open for 8 hour, and 3 of the hours are done with, that's only 5 hours for a full days admission. It might take a hour to get to the park too.
So, if you are going to try that park again, I would say to go in June, or July, and not the beginning of the year. Another problem with the beginning of the year is that not all the rides are going to be open especially the new ride. That park doesn't have Ninja nor Superman open as of now. They only have however less than 4 months to do annual maintenance. If they hired more people to do it, they could have everything opened, but they expect less people at the beginning of the year, and thus they are going to save money on not having every ride open
"I've been staring at the world, waiting. All the trouble and all the pain we're facing. Too much light to be livin' in the dark. Why waste time? We only got one life. Together we can be the CHANGE. So go and let your heart burn bright"
I do not buy that! I do not buy, Only having so many rides open, only having so many employees, or closing early when the park dies down! I DO NOT!
I am not saying i know business more then anyone, but i do know, that you must SPEND money to make money! Why do you think attendance drops, and people stop going to Six Flags? I stop going because i do not want to go knowing that my fav rides might not be open, or at any moment they might announce that the park is closing in 10 min! I want to go to the theme park knowing it says there open 10am-10pm, and every ride should be open from 10am to 10pm!
If they do this, people will notice, that no matter when they go, 100% of the park will be running, business will pick up! I refuse to pay admission for a ???? of a day! Is this open? Is this Closed? When is the park closing? Why are these restaurants not open? What do you mean only 1 train op today? Thats CRAP!
Its the same as any business, my current job decided there new scheme to bring in more business was to SPEND more! So they hired more staff, made sure each department had enough staff from open to close and guess what. The public noticed, business improved greatly because customers knew that no matter when they shop, they would have the help they needed! Why cant Six Flags do this?
So what if there are a lot of employees and no customers at start, eventually people will realize they have the staff and that everything will be open everytime they go, i promise business will improve!
No Shopping center, grocery store, department store, theme park or hotel should CUT STAFF to save money, when you cut staff, that means less help for the customer, making the customer wait in longer lines, not be able to find products and guess what, i shop elsewhere so i can get the help, eventually the company crashes
To think, I remember that when Shapiro took over, he said that under his leadership, parks would be open from open to close, and also said that the entire park would be open from open to close. "Staffing" issues were to be a think of the past...hehe.
While he has done some stuff to change SF for the better, he definitely didn't follow through on some of his promises such as these.
And as someone else said, this isn't a SFoG but has happened at SFGAm too, and I'm sure other SF parks.
"I do not buy that! I do not buy, Only having so many rides open, only having so many employees, or closing early when the park dies down! I DO NOT!"
Go to SFGAm opening weekend (Fri/Sat or Sun) and I bet you you stand a good chance at seeing all 3, depending on the weather, and depending on what day you go.
SF St. Louis closed 2 hours early on closing day due to "impending weather." Amazingly, as we left, it was the only sunny time all weekend and getting warmer. The part that made me mad was the 30 minute notice they gave us.
SFaddiction84 wrote:I do not buy that! I do not buy, Only having so many rides open, only having so many employees, or closing early when the park dies down! I DO NOT!
No one says you have to buy it, but it happens....and not just in theme park settings
No Shopping center, grocery store, department store, theme park or hotel should CUT STAFF to save money, when you cut staff, that means less help for the customer, making the customer wait in longer lines, not be able to find products and guess what, i shop elsewhere so i can get the help, eventually the company crashes
Actually...they do, or at least the Old Navy I work at does. We've had plenty of hours cut due solely to the fact that there were just no customers in the store. If there's only 5 customers and 18 employees in the store working, well...what's the point of paying those extra 7 or 8 that don't really need to be there? They try to keep us as long as they can, but in turn you are catering to the customer.
It works the other way around too...we've had real busy days where they planned for a lot of staff and then it gets busier than they planned and they call-in extra help...again, catering to the customer. It's what any business does.
Six Flags is the same way. Why have all these extra people get paid if the customer doesn't warrant it or the situation doesn't warrant it (i.e. weather). It's what's in best interest for the customer/employees. Close a park early due to bad weather....people complain; but keep it open all day yet run no rides/attractions because of whatever weather situation...people complain.
I feel that opening parks earlier than normal is such a bittersweet thing.....which is why I won't be totally surprised if things don't run smoothly with GAm on opening day either because most likely...they won't.
No Shopping center, grocery store, department store, theme park or hotel should CUT STAFF to save money, when you cut staff, that means less help for the customer, making the customer wait in longer lines, not be able to find products and guess what, i shop elsewhere so i can get the help, eventually the company crashes
On a busy day lets say Raging Bull runs with 3 trains and 7 people running it (5 on the platform, greeter, flashpass). On a totally dead day when its a walk on what would be the point in running 3 trains and having all those if you dont have to wait to get on it in the first place, when you could cut 2 platform positions and a train and the ride will still have a 2 minute wait. I agree that things need to be at capacity if theres somewhat of a line, but if they know something is going to be a walk on it does not affect anybody's day at all by making those cuts....those are neccessary cuts. Granted SF goes way overboard closing so many flats and the train, but saying "should never cut staff to save money" if any place just fully staffed all the time even when its completely dead they are just flat out wasting money.
To think, I remember that when Shapiro took over, he said that under his leadership, parks would be open from open to close, and also said that the entire park would be open from open to close. "Staffing" issues were to be a think of the past...hehe.
I also remember when he was campaigning that, and he also said "We're not going to open the parks if we cant provide the full product" and now SFGAm is opening April 3 minus probably half the park so they can try and squeeze whatever profit they can to pay off their debt.
^This year is different because we have a water ride (and it's too cold), but the Dark Knight wasn't open with the park on the first day.
"I've been staring at the world, waiting. All the trouble and all the pain we're facing. Too much light to be livin' in the dark. Why waste time? We only got one life. Together we can be the CHANGE. So go and let your heart burn bright"
You should expect this from Six Flags and taking a trip to any of their parks is a risk...
Too bad you guys couldn't ride anything though...it really is a great park and I would be pissed too..
http://themeparkcritic.com/scripts/profile/ViewProfile.asp?ViewID=2909 A furious storm once roared `cross the sea, catching ships in its path, helpless to flee. Instead of a certain and watery doom, the winds swept them here to Typhoon Lagoon!
Ilovthevu' wrote:^This year is different because we have a water ride (and it's too cold), but the Dark Knight wasn't open with the park on the first day.
?? I honestly can't remember when the last time SFGAm had a new attraction ready for opening day. Was it Superman? Usually the new rides open a month or later into the season - unless they're B&M's.
And that's another promise Shapiro hasn't seemed to have kept. He said that it was ridiculous for new attractions to open mid-season/past opening day, but yet, last year and the year before that, IIRC, most new rides did not open on opening day at SF parks, nor even close to opening day.
But yeah, right now, he has bigger fish to fry than worrying about keeping promises that most forgot he ever made.
Raging Bull was not open during the parks opening weekend in 1999. I don't remember if Superman was ready or not for opening weekend.
Trying to think, but Viper was probably the last ride to actually open on opening day. I barely remember the 00's, but I know Raging Bull, Ragun Cajun (well the whole area plus revolution), Camp Cartoon Network, Giant Drop, Wiggles World, basically everything has opened late at SFGAm
Favorite Wood Coasters: The Voyage, Ravine Flyer II, Thunderhead, Balder Favorite Steel: Voltron Nevera, Steel Vengeance, Expedition GeForce, Olympia Looping Parks visited: 232, Coasters Ridden: Steel: 894, Wood: 179, Total: 1073
^ Wiggles World was a few hours late, but it did open on Opening Day. Superman opened on opening day in 03, Revolution opened on opening day in 04. Still though, SFGAm does have a very poor record for getting construction projects done before the park opens, and most of the time it is entirely their fault for just not starting early enough. Best example I can think of is Ragin' Cajun which didn't even go vertical until a week before opening day.
Best example I can think of is Ragin' Cajun which didn't even go vertical until a week before opening day.
Cajun was cake, I remember in 2001 they didnt even go vertical on DejaVu until March .
I remember SUFs opening day very well, it was operating however the queue railings werent painted yet and were covered with taped-on newspapers, there was no entrance sign, and the area was all muddy dirt with tracks from construction vehicles. I remember the spiel "please stand behind the yellow safety line" and it didnt have yellow safety lines painted until like August.
Chitown wrote: I am looking forward to the b*tch fest that will happen on opening weekend at SFGAm when attendance is about 50 people and they shut down early.
I cant wait for it, going to make it worth it
Favorite Wood Coasters: The Voyage, Ravine Flyer II, Thunderhead, Balder Favorite Steel: Voltron Nevera, Steel Vengeance, Expedition GeForce, Olympia Looping Parks visited: 232, Coasters Ridden: Steel: 894, Wood: 179, Total: 1073
:D:D AND GIRLS 
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