Bags and Baggage

If you are going to spend an entire day at a theme park then it can be difficult to take everything you need in your pockets but carrying a bag can be a total pain. Unless you are at a Disney Park where they don’t appear to care what you take onto the rides with you then your bag is going to have to go somewhere whilst you experience an attraction. Parks have adopted various solutions to the bag issue but not all of them work too well.

Bag Rooms

Merlin entertainments are very fond of bag rooms at their parks in the UK. The big coasters often have these depositories where you can drop your bag and then collect it after your ride. These are largely quite helpful to the guests being secure but can cause nightmares with the running of the ride. Log jams of guests build up waiting to drop off their things which can delay the despatch of the ride and some people arrive with so much stuff they look like they are moving house!  Bag rooms are OK as long as they are well away from the platform so that they don’t hold up proceedings.

These cloakrooms are also the most boring place to work in any park leading to the staff doing anything they can to avoid having to work in one! It is amazing how many people develop arm injuries when they are allocated to a bag room! There is also the small matter of exposing the staff to accusations of theft when a guest’s items go on the missing list which they can from time to time, usually because the guest hasn’t left them there in the first place! In practice it is very rare indeed for a staff member to attempt to steel anything.

tatsu

Tatsu

Platform

We have all been on one of those rides where you just dump your things on the platform or in a box or rack before you jump into the ride car. I have never liked this situation as anything can get pinched unless there is no access to the platform whilst the ride is in motion. When people exit the rides there is generally an air of chaos and it is hard to see who is picking up what as they leave. If someone fancies your nice new bag or spots your camera in your rucksack then they could go for a walk without you. I remember being at Six Flags Magic Mountain and having to leave my Kipling bum bag in a rack on the platform at Tatsu. The ride was running on two trains and I was convinced I would return to find my bag had been pinched which would have been very unfortunate as it contained my money, car keys, passport and mobile phone. In the event it was there waiting for me but things could have turned out badly.

Lockers

Lockers may appear like a decent solution but they are only practical when they are situated next to a ride otherwise you will spend the day walking miles to retrieve your things. Many of the rides at the big American parks like Cedar Point have lockers close to the big attractions but you have to pay for them and the costs can mount up. I am not too sure I am happy about paying extra for my day in the park because I have a bag with me. This was particularly true at Cedar Point as I had already contributed vast sums to their coffers by buying several of their cold drinks which are ludicrously over-priced.

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Silver Star

The Best Option

I personally feel that the best solution for everyone concerned is to use bag depositories on platforms which are only accessible to the riders of a specific train. You know the ones. They have numbered doors or boxes to correspond with the ride vehicles. There are no hold ups at bag rooms, the park don’t have to pay for extra staff to mind your things and the chances of theft are very limited as the racks are locked whilst you are on the circuit. This system works very well on Silver Star at Europa Park and Raptor at Gardaland facilitating the free movement of the guests whilst offering a decent level of security

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Article by Sally Stacey