Attraction Skyride

[Thatguyoverwhere]

Just throwing this out there, a basic one-day ticket to BGT is $160 after taxes and junk fees. Parking starts at $32, and thanks to BG's own intentional design and lobbying efforts there is no practical way to visit the park except by car. That's more expensive than Universal.
Granted, the annual passes are a great value. But for everyone else, this park is incredibly, increasingly overpriced with precious little to show for it outside the quarterly reports.

 

[warfelg]

I hate this so much. At this rate might as well make that part of the park a zoo with its own gate.

 

[old-fashioned]

Holy shit people are still bitching about this?

 

[Zachary]

Holy shit people are still bitching about this?

Is BGT still scamming guests?

 

[Nicole]

Y'all are both right. Why would anyone have an issue with using the combination of a gigantic 501(3)(c) zoological park and an amusement park with the most rollercoasters in the country to a singular theme park?

Cue the "So about the skyride" post.

Right. And the combined prices of the “gigantic 501(3)(c) zoological park and an amusement park with the most rollercoasters in the country” are less than the cost to visit the ”singular theme park,” despite the economies achieved with the shared infrastructure. That is the exact point. Thank you for helping make it so crystal clear.

 

[Thriller]

I’m confused. Why can’t you compare (a Florida zoo) + (a large chain amusement park with world class coasters and more flats)

to

(a theme park that is both a zoo and a large chain amusement park with a world class coaster)?

And why would a BGW-based Platinum Member cancel his pass in response to something at BGT? That would be a self-defeating temper tantrum. And really, what would it achieve?

Raising awareness of the issue, especially for a theme park site, is the responsible, community-oriented thing to do. Not petulantly “burning my pass” in some dramatic huff.

It’s probably not a dramatic huff. Probably more of the straw that broke the camels back with all the other sleazy things that SEAS us done to customers in the past years.

5% surcharge, cutting operating hours with no notice, sky high pricing, ride removals, with no replacement, cutting live entertainment etc.

The SEAS Parks already have less attractions than other comparable size parks. When they start up charging for any of them, it’s almost equivalent to taking an attraction away.

Personally, my favorite attraction at Tampa was the cable Skyway. It’s one of the better cable skyways left in this country. It’s a nice long ride when I went to Tampa I wrote it probably eight times in a day. That would be 40 bucks to a ticket holder.

This is probably my last year for BGW for a while when my membership runs out. It’s just not an experience worth traveling for anymore.

 

[warfelg]

The SEAS Parks already have less attractions than other comparable size parks.

Decided to quick fact check not exact on this.

Average SEAS park has 26.2 attractions, 279.2 acres, 8.4 advertised kids/family rides, and 8 shows/animal habitats. The big asterisks here are BGT and BGW having 335 acres and 422 acres respectively without all of it being used and BGT having the GIANT safari area not counted in that, so if I were into it enough I would measure the actual used space for BGT and BGW and that likely squeezes the average acreage down.

The current CF average park has 48.4 attractions, 247.6 acres (reported by CF), 26.3 advertised kids/family rides, and ~4 shows (can't find a complete list at every park as they list occasionally used venues as show areas).

So just on a more "thrill ride" level you get 22 on average at CF vs 18 at SEAS, but the trade off is you still get more shows and habitats as SEAS by a long shot. Plus much of SEAS land ends up getting used for things like the habitats, and almost all their parks (BGT excluded) have a giant lake in the middle of the park really impacting the ability to build.

 

[old-fashioned]

Is BGT still scamming guests?

Depends on your level of intellect and ability to understand the definition of the word scam I guess. In the real world I don't think so.

 

[Zachary]

A guest who doesn't like thrilling attractions is interested in visiting Busch Gardens Tampa. They go to the Busch Gardens Tampa website, hover over Things to Do, and select Rides and Attractions. They scroll through the list of rides to see what they might enjoy. Congo River Rapids, Serengeti Express, Grand Caravan Carousel, and the Skyride, alongside the selection of animal attractions, all seem like their speed. Wanting to ensure that all of these attractions are available during their trip, they click through all of them one by one, reading the attraction descriptions to ensure there aren't any relevant restrictions that would impact their ability to experience them. Seeing no warnings or disclaimers, they move on to the Park Map. They locate all of the above attractions on the map. Again, no concerns about any sort of limitations as there are no warnings or disclaimers that any would apply.

Satisfied, the guest proceeds to purchase tickets online. Buy Tickets -> Tickets. The guest sees a reassuring disclaimer that the Weather-or-Not Assurance guarantee applies to their purchase, but still no mention of any sort of limitations regarding what specific attractions their ticket is valid for. This is an extra diligent customer. They click "More Details" on the ticket they're looking to purchase and read all of the extra fine print—not only on their ticket either—they read every bit of fine print on the entire page. They stick to that policy all the way through the checkout flow ensuring that they know every last detail about what they are or could be purchasing. They spend $100+ on their Busch Gardens Tampa ticket reasonably expecting that they are entitled to ride each of the attractions listed on the park's website as many times as they like.

Not once in the entire ticket purchasing process is there any hint that some of the rides and attractions listed on Busch Gardens Tampa's website may not be included with their admission ticket. The ONLY point at which this customer COULD have been tipped off to the fact that their ticket is not entitled to the Skyride is if they had scrolled well past the fold on the Skyride page and clicked through some of the FAQ items on the website. Even then though, there is not a specific statement anywhere buried in that FAQ expressly stating that the Skyride is not included with a Busch Gardens Tampa admission ticket.

Just as was true with the SEAS parks willfully hiding disclaimers about the 5% surcharge in all in-park transactions, this is a clear, deliberate attempt to trick park guests.

scam
noun
a dishonest plan for making money or getting an advantage, especially one that involves tricking people

Definitionally, this is a scam perpetrated on consumers by Busch Gardens Tampa. I don't know what other way there is to slice it. It seems completely and totally indefensible on its face to me. I'm honestly baffled by how anyone could defend it.

 

[YachtyLogs]

To be fair, you have to have a very high IQ to understand Busch Gardens Tampa. The scam is extremely subtle, and without a solid grasp of economics most of the nickel and diming will go over a typical tourist's head. There's also SEAS's capitalistic outlook, which is deftly woven into their characterisation - their personal philosophy draws heavily from 5% hidden surcharges, for instance. The thoosies understand this stuff; they have the intellectual capacity to truly appreciate the depths of these scams, to realize that they're not just smart- they say something deep about LIFE. As a consequence people who dislike Busch Gardens Tampa truly ARE idiots- of course they wouldn't appreciate, for instance, the genius in Busch Gardens's existencial catchphrase "Guests will pay $5 per ride," which itself is a cryptic reference to the genius Skycoasters and other upcharge attractions I'm smirking right now just imagining one of those addlepated simpletons scratching their heads in confusion as Neal Thurman's genius unfolds itself on their computer screens. What fools... how I pity them. And yes by the way, I DO have an Iron Gwazi tattoo. And no, you cannot see it. It's for the ladies' eyes only- And even they have to demonstrate that they're within 5 IQ points of my own (preferably lower) beforehand.

 

[Mushroom]

Depends on your level of intellect and ability to understand the definition of the word scam I guess. In the real world I don't think so.

I felt scammed by my recent trip to BGT in January. I loved my visit back in 2011 because of how varied and high-quality the park experience was. When I saw that the cost for a ticket is now $100, I stomached that cost because I figured the premium price was justified by a premium experience.

Instead, I got a park with little to offer besides coasters and legitimately the worst operations I’ve ever seen at a theme park. I got two coasters closed for scheduled maintenance despite not being listed as such on the website (SheiKra and Kumba), one train ops on Montu, and glacially low capacity as the park heavily prioritized Quick Queue on every major attraction.

Relying on your brand’s long-term reputation as a high-quality experience and cashing in on that brand value to dupe consumers into paying for a dramatically cheaper product is a scam.

Charging $100 for admission, which signals a premium experience, and providing a deliberately inferior experience is a scam.

Knowingly closing two major coasters for annual maintenance and advertising them as open on your website, while charging full price for admission, is a scam.

Operating attractions at such low capacity — far lower than any reasonable expectation — that it’s impossible to experience all the advertised attractions in a day, when it should be reasonably possible to experience them all, is a scam.

Making it so that you need to nearly double the amount you paid to get into the park, in order to buy Quick Queue if you want any chance of experiencing the attractions without waiting hours in line even on a low crowd day, is a scam.

And, in the case of the Skyride, advertising it as an attraction while only mentioning that it’s an upcharge in the fine print — after promoting its return for months with no mention of it being an upcharge — is a scam.

 

[mikes]

This further solidifies my plans to not get a membership anytime soon. I could understand an upcharge if you wanted a roundtrip, but this is insane. Is the train next?

 

[warfelg]

Random question: does this make a complete loop like BGW, is it an end to end, or does it do an out and back?

Also random but doesn’t matter here - Growing up going to Hersheypark, I think at times I would have been more than happy to pay $5 not to have to walk across the park. They used to have a ride that did that but took it out years ago rather than charge.

 

[netdvn]

BGT's makes a complete loop, but there's two stations like GAdv's skyride.

 

[warfelg]

BGT's makes a complete loop, but there's two stations like GAdv's skyride.

Is it a two station loop or a three station loop?

 

[bfgfgd]

Just throwing this out there, a basic one-day ticket to BGT is $160 after taxes and junk fees. Parking starts at $32, and thanks to BG's own intentional design and lobbying efforts there is no practical way to visit the park except by car. That's more expensive than Universal.
Granted, the annual passes are a great value. But for everyone else, this park is incredibly, increasingly overpriced with precious little to show for it outside the quarterly reports.

They do offer tons of discount tickets and passes deals during the holidays... not many other chains in Floirda do that.

 

[netdvn]

Is it a two station loop or a three station loop?

There's three stations but two of them are used. The middle station hasn't been used as a proper station in decades.

 

[Mushroom]

It has two stations in use; the third “station” is a turnaround point where guests stay in their gondola but staff members move the gondola along to the next leg of the trip.

The layout is a V-shape. Unlike BGW’s triangular skyride, there is no direct connection between the two stations. So, the whole layout doubles back on itself.

In this map, the two stations are circled in yellow and the turnaround point is circled in blue.

 

[bfgfgd]

I felt scammed by my recent trip to BGT in January. I loved my visit back in 2011 because of how varied and high-quality the park experience was. When I saw that the cost for a ticket is now $100, I stomached that cost because I figured the premium price was justified by a premium experience.

Instead, I got a park with little to offer besides coasters and legitimately the worst operations I’ve ever seen at a theme park. I got two coasters closed for scheduled maintenance despite not being listed as such on the website (SheiKra and Kumba), one train ops on Montu, and glacially low capacity as the park heavily prioritized Quick Queue on every major attraction.

Relying on your brand’s long-term reputation as a high-quality experience and cashing in on that brand value to dupe consumers into paying for a dramatically cheaper product is a scam.

Charging $100 for admission, which signals a premium experience, and providing a deliberately inferior experience is a scam.

Knowingly closing two major coasters for annual maintenance and advertising them as open on your website, while charging full price for admission, is a scam.

Operating attractions at such low capacity — far lower than any reasonable expectation — that it’s impossible to experience all the advertised attractions in a day, when it should be reasonably possible to experience them all, is a scam.

Making it so that you need to nearly double the amount you paid to get into the park, in order to buy Quick Queue if you want any chance of experiencing the attractions without waiting hours in line even on a low crowd day, is a scam.

And, in the case of the Skyride, advertising it as an attraction while only mentioning that it’s an upcharge in the fine print — after promoting its return for months with no mention of it being an upcharge — is a scam.

Very similar to Sea World Orlando as well with their one train operations mess. Just bad park management. They're so out of their league in Orlando these days and it shows with poor attendance on weekdays while the other parks are busy. Its only gonna get worse in 2025 Im sure. The summer season is usually fine for them but with these slow operations all the coaster lines are very long by the afternoon. Guess they have to keep those ticket deals coming to attract visitors.

 

[warfelg]

Thanks for the feedback @Mushroom and @netdvn . Been a while since I’ve been to BGT. It’s bad enough that they charge for it now. Worse that it barely goes over anything worth seeing.

I was not a fan of having to pay at the Richmond Zoo, but at least it went over stuff and gave a unique view.

I showed it to a friend who defended the practice saying the turn needed to be staffed, and I shut that down. It’s a lame excuse to say because you needed to staff an “unused” part to put gondolas back on the cable then why not charge for other rides where someone stands around.

Personally I think that being unused than them feeling a need to charge shows how poorly laid out BGT is. You have huge swaths of nothingness to walk past, and you need a transit ride because of the distance. Either use that back corner or infill the middle of the park. I just can’t get over that employee parking and area smack dab in the middle. Anyways that’s another topic and rant.