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Fast Lane/Flash Pass 2013 Usage/Opinions

Have you used it this season? If so, how many times? For it or against it?

  • 1

    Votes: 5 26.3%

  • 2

    Votes: 2 10.5%

  • 3

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • 4 or more times

    Votes: 2 10.5%

  • For Fast Lane/Flash Pass

    Votes: 4 21.1%

  • Against it

    Votes: 3 15.8%

  • Neutral

    Votes: 9 47.4%
  • Total voters
    19
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Mega Poster
Have you used any of these this season? If so, when, and where?

I used Fast Lane for Cedar Point and Kings Island this year.

Cedar Point was for Wed. July 10th(I believe) which was ERT ride night for TTD. I was glad me and my gf purchased it for that day because it was quite busy. 2 hour waits for MF, TTD, maverick and Gatekeeper all day.

Kings Island was for Sunday Sept. 1st which was dollar days down there. I have never seen so much "trash" in one place in my whole life. I will never go there again during dollar days! Fast lane was very useful that day as well, as lines for most rides were over or close to an hour, and only having about 8 hours in the park it was money well spent. Considering it is a 4 hour drive home, I would not have been able to stay at the park the whole 12 hours THEN drive home lol.

What are your thoughts on these programs? Like them? Despise them?
Personally I think it is a great option to have. I feel like if you are willing to pay that amount of money to be able to enhance your park experience, you should be able. Plus it is really nice if you're pressed for time or want to go on notoriously busy days.
 
Re: Fast Lane/Flash Pass 2013

I guess I'm kinda neutral to it. My family tends to avoid theme parks on particularly busy days, so lines usually aren't too much of a problem. Regardless, whenever I even consider using them, they seem too expensive to be worth buying. I just suck it up and wait in line. I've literally used a fast pass once in my life, and it was at Disney. Maybe if a line is 2 hours or higher I'd consider buying one, but any less than that I give them a miss.
 
Re: Fast Lane/Flash Pass 2013

At my local parks... I wont pay for premium ones but in travel I may.
Before I moved and was able to make (easy) yearly visits to Great Adventure, I would almost always buy a Gold Flashpass so I didn't have to deal with Kingda Ka's line or El Toros and so I could power lap Toro (and give Nitro a ride, maybe)
This year I used the Cedar Fair FastLane thing for the first time, at Canada's Wonderland. Mostly because I was far too lazy to wait in lines, although all but the B&M's were pretty manageable without it... so I didn't need it, but opted to anyways. Having already been before I didn't need to rush to coasters but I also wanted to make sure I had time for rerides and such.

In the past I've used them at SFMM,SFOG,SFNE,SFGAdv,SFFT and SFGAm but I've done all of them but SFFT without using them as well.

In the end I'm really pretty neutral to it. If a park has it, I may spend the money for it... but it parks got rid of them, I'd be fine with that too. I just don't like it when parks clearly abuse the system. Like when at Great Adventure, the line for Batman was all the way into the "city park" area at the main entrance well past the sign saying "120 minute wait from here" with an ad for FlashPass WHY WAIT? under it. Turns out, NONE of the queue that's under the station and hidden from the midway was being used it was no more than 20 minutes to get on. It *seemed* like the park was just trying to create the illusion of a longer wait to entice people to buy passes (also rumors of parks purposely running rides at less than capacity / 1 train operations)
 
Re: Fast Lane/Flash Pass 2013

I LOVE flash pass systems. I used CF's Fast Lane at CP and CW this year. I have to say though the company charges far too much for what you get. For $100 at CP you get on everything plus Gatekeeper and TTD, but the way the queue is set up you're still left with a 20 min wait. At SF on the other hand, with the q-bot system, on the 2nd-tier package, it's about $65. You're allowed to ride pretty much by the time you get to the ride (your time has expired) and for most rides this puts you directly into the station.

Regardless I love any kind of line bypass system and try to utilize them whenever available.

PS. The Busch parks seen to have the best system. At Seaworld San Antonio, I paid just $25 for a wristband that few people in the park even knew about, and this gave me a 5 min max wait every time.
 
Used it once this year at Busch Gardens Williamsburg due to accidentally visiting on the day of a concert, only ride I got to fully skip the line was for Apollo's Chariot but either way I never waited more than 30 minutes.

I really don't mind the system since it does have its uses (on capacity days only), but hate it when it's advertised in parks and handed out with no limit to sales. I've seen it happen a few times at Great Adventure where people would spend $80+ for a Flash Pass on a day where the lines never exceeded 15-20 minutes with skewed line arrangements and limited train operations (like what CanobieFan said).
 
Only used it once this year and it was the first time for me using it. Smiler had such a huge wait, so I wouldn't have ridden it without a fastpass...
But I'm generally against it, since it is actually queue jumping, only that you pay for it and do it legally in this case. I like the way how fastpasses function in Disney parks (free, only one by one), otherwise it is just about the park taking your money for what you've already paid for.
 
Youngster Joey said:
Used at SGOT and it saved some time. I'm against it unless its free like at disney
Click to expand...

How does that system work? Do they only give out a certain number? Is it only for resort guests?
 
^ Disney is free for all park guests, and uses a park ticket scanner to assign a specific time to return to a ride for admittance. I believe you are allowed to scan for two rides at a time.

I have only used the q not at SFOT. It got us on a few extra rides, and was worth the cost when divided across a group of 6. I have a hard time rationalizing fast lane costs though on an individual basis, and do not use them. My time is not worth so much, and I can often ride everything I want in the day at a given amusement park.
 
Disney's FastPass lets you get 1 pass every 2 hours (or as soon as the first one expires) They've just now started to "close the window" on the return time to stop abuse of people returning at 5-6PM with passes from 11am. (I believe now you can still show up within 30 after your ride time, but its up to each CM at the ride to let you in. I've seen people get turned away just 15m out of their window)

Once the number of passes each ride has for the day has run out, that ride will no longer give out fastpasses. IE: If Rock'n'Roller Coaster only has 10,000 fastpasses available for the day, once all have been dispensed, their gone and you won't be able to get one that day. So if everyone rushes the machine at park opening and they run out within the hour your return time won't be until later in the day, 7,8,9 pm but guests coming in later will not be able to get a pass and will only be able to ride in standby.
And if you do end up getting a late night return time for a ride at the start of the day you'll have to wait 2 hours before getting a second pass (and this can be for the same ride, if still available or any other ride with FastPass tickets)

<-- May or may not work at Walt Disney World
 
I only buy them if the park is packed, and I don't think I'll be back for at least a couple years. I never buy them at my home park (WoF), but would buy them if I took a trip to Cedar Point or another major park like that.
 
I only buy them if the park is packed, and I don't think I'll be back for at least a couple years. I never buy them at my home park (WoF), but would buy them if I took a trip to Cedar Point or another major park like that.
 
Used it once when we stayed on site at Port Aventura a few years back, was brilliant for a first time visit as it meant we could get all of our rides done early and have enough time to go back for more.

Used it at Chessington earlier this year because we arrived late and wanted to make sure we got the coasters done whilst leaving us enough time to go around and do the rest of the park.

If money was no object or I was really treating myself I'd probably do an unlimited pass, just the once. Only at a new park though, somewhere like Europa where there'd be multiple coasters to ride.
 
I have never bought one ever. I don't mind waiting in the Q line for it because I get to shoot some video of the ride. if I had the flash pass, then I wouldn't get that opportunity. The only reason I can think of why I would get one is at a park like Cedar Point. And only if I was there for 2 days minimum. The first day I could wait in line and shoot video, and the next day I could dedicate it to just the rides. Of course, the lines have to be long in the first place...
 
I've used a Q-bot at Dollywood before and I loved it and it gave us tons of ERT, but I didn't need it the other two times I went.

The difference between the Q-bot (which I think is what they have at Six Flags parks but called a Flash Pass) and the Fast Lane is that Fast Lanes slow down the lines for non-fast lane. Flash Passes do as well, true, but the difference is that a Flash Pas is just like getting in line with the non-fast lane-ers, just getting to mess around the park instead of waiting. Fast Lane is a blatant line jump into a smaller line, and I think if they have Fast Lanes they should lower the initial admission price.

I honestly wish Cedar Fair could just get Q2Q like Dollywood has. It's just like getting in line without getting in line, where Cedar Fair's system makes queues crawl at a snail's pace before they merge the two.

Correct me if I'm wrong about how Q2Q works (I haven't used it in forever) but that's how I see this.
 
2012Jarrett said:
I've used a Q-bot at Dollywood before and I loved it and it gave us tons of ERT, but I didn't need it the other two times I went.

The difference between the Q-bot (which I think is what they have at Six Flags parks but called a Flash Pass) and the Fast Lane is that Fast Lanes slow down the lines for non-fast lane. Flash Passes do as well, true, but the difference is that a Flash Pas is just like getting in line with the non-fast lane-ers, just getting to mess around the park instead of waiting. Fast Lane is a blatant line jump into a smaller line, and I think if they have Fast Lanes they should lower the initial admission price.

I honestly wish Cedar Fair could just get Q2Q like Dollywood has. It's just like getting in line without getting in line, where Cedar Fair's system makes queues crawl at a snail's pace before they merge the two.

Correct me if I'm wrong about how Q2Q works (I haven't used it in forever) but that's how I see this.
Click to expand...

It's not the device that CF has wrong, it's where they let you into line is where they have it wrong.

What they should be doing is what many SF rides do, and that's allow you to enter the ride either through the exit or through some sort of "employees only" door, and get you directly into the station. SFOT modified the pathways around Batman so that you enter the ride by going underneath the lift and kind of into a "behind the scenes" area before climbing some stairs to a back door of the station. You walk in to 8 empty (because they do crowd control) rows to choose from. Beautiful really.

What CF does, which is just merge you into the middle of the regular line, often with a 20+ min wait still to go, is what slows down the line.
 
I used fast lane at Cedar Point and Dorney Park, kind of pointless at Dorney, not a single line on any ride (everyone was at the water park) but Cedar Point it was okay. The issue was they sold way too many in my opinion, maverick still had almost an hour wait even with the wristband because of the capacity, and Magnum the line was out the gate. I think that they need to add more than just two rides to fast lane plus. I think adding maverick would be a good idea, but adding millennium force would not in my opinion. I am with them. I am willing to spend $90 to not wait in two hour lines at any park.
 
I've only used it once, at CP a couple of weeks ago. It only saved me about 20 mins wait for MF but was invaluable for Maverick, saved at least an hour of queue time for each ride.
Like many others, I don't bother for UK parks and would only buy another one if I went to SFMM or somewhere similar, unless I win the Lottery.
 
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