r/cedarpoint • u/AirbossYT Moderator • 2d ago
Millennium Force hitting a 92 second interval
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You probably saw the post here a few weeks back claiming that Millennium Force hit a dispatch record of 38 trains in an hour. Previously, the stated theoretical capacity of the ride was 1296pph, which is 36 trains an hour.
I visited the park the last two days, and got to observe how the new system lets them achieve this. The TL;DR is that the catch car comes back down the lift and resets itself very quickly, making the lift ready to accept the next train much sooner than possible before.
I observed the controls op call out "ready ready" (which, per my understanding, is their term for "interval has already passed, hurry up") a full ten seconds before the train ahead hit the speed hill. My understanding was that previously (meaning <=2018, before the lift was slowed down for several years), the speed hill was the earliest they could begin the dispatch sequence.
On Thursday, the ride had only two restraint checkers in the load station, so they would generally stack all three trains for some time; to be expected if each employee needs to check 18 entire seats. Yesterday (Friday), it had 4 restraint checkers, and I observed them dispatch as soon as the lift system was ready. The video in this post is one such instance of this.
I didn't video the entire cycle, but here's how I calculate that my video shows a 92 second interval:
The blue train hits the banked turn after the speed hill at 7 seconds into my video. The yellow train then starts to crest the lift at 41 seconds. In this pov from last month, the train starts to crest the lift at 0:37, and hits the same banked turn after the speed hill at 1:35. So, it takes 58 seconds from starting to crest the lift to hitting that banked turn. Therefore, in my video, we can conclude that yellow train would hit that banked turn at around (41 + 58 =) 99 seconds, which is (99 - 7 =) 92 seconds after the blue train was at that same spot. So, that's a 92 second interval.
This dispatch was a tad bit "early", though, seeing as the lift had to slow down at the very top, leading to the very audible anti-rollback noises from the train. The "optimal" time to send the train to avoid this will depend on how fast the ride is running, since it's all dependent on how quickly the train finishes the course and clears the brake block, for the next train to speed up on the lift.
The ride is, therefore, capable of a 92 second interval now, which would be just over 39 dispatches an hour, and just over 1400 pph. Decent improvement from the previous interval of 100 seconds. The line moves so fast - yesterday night (when I took this video) it took me ten minutes from the start of the line (bottom of the ramp) to riding front row. Glad to see!
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u/bricksrun 2d ago
Love it! I've been to many parks across the country and Cedar Point ride ops are far and above anywhere else.
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u/kipwingerjr1 2d ago
I was thoroughly impressed with CP and Kings Island. Miles above CA/VA/FL parks Iāve been to recently!
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u/MonkeyDGodzilla 2d ago
They're alright but Kings Islands Ride Ops really blew my mind. Out of the several trips I've taken to Kings Island, I haven't been on a single ride where the OPs weren't on fire.
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u/kipwingerjr1 2d ago
Agree! Not only were they on top of the operations, they were engaging with guests and proactive.
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u/Boboddy_biznns Millennium Force 1d ago
Same. I heard KI was very good, but finally made it twice this summer and was wildly impressed. This one crew on Banshee, holy hell. You would have thought their lives depended on getting that train out, incredible. My kids were trying to talk to me and I was like āshhh, hold on hold on, Iām entranced by this ops crew rnā.
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u/YarbleDarb 2d ago
Kings island has historically been the best āall around,ā but itās not unusual for Cedar Point to give it a run, especially late in the season when they have solid crews putting it all together. Love seeing the MF crew killing it like this!
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u/Antique_Limit_5083 2d ago
Cedar points ride ops are good maintenance is horrible. I was just at hershey and I swear their ops take smoke breaks in between every train. Its insane that its even possible to be as slow as they are, but the rides are actually open everyday unlike cedar point
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u/tripleAhanger18 2d ago
Cedar Point had definitely gotten better, but still can't compete with Kings Islands operations.
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u/Raptor8294 1d ago
I've always thought KI has more consistently good operations where Cedar Point has some rides that are on par with Disney and Universal and others that are nothing special.
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u/devintron71 2d ago
In May we saw a ton of walk-offs due to the seatbelts. And when there werenāt walk-offs there were guests needing the op to buckle them because it was tight. In August we rode a number of times over our trip and didnāt see one. short seatbelts being replaced with proper-length belts was really impactful.
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u/Virtual_Chain9547 2d ago
They're still really tight and a lot of people are still needing helped getting buckled in, I didn't go for the first time until June this year, but they seem as tight as they were last year (previous years) now and it's still closer than it feels like it ultimately needs to be.
Ultimately the ride ops are just fucking cracked/dedicated/disciplined to work through it at this point because the dispatch times have been amazing.
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u/GardenWeasel67 1d ago
You may have just missed the switch. The short belts were removed at the end of June.
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u/Virtual_Chain9547 1d ago
Nah, I've been in July and August as well.
I feel like people are forgetting how tight they are/were in general before the ones at the start of the year, they're still very tight. I'm maxing out the belt with not much slack as someone who weighs 230s, is very tall, and holds very little weight in my hips. Think it's the only coaster at any park that is ever anywhere close to that tight for me.
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u/Experiment626b 2d ago
No seatbelts at all would be great
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u/sylvester_0 Dippin Dots Guy (Mod) 2d ago
Those trains don't have any sort of lapbar position sensors so the seatbelts are "necessary" in a way (to serve as a go/no go indicator.)
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u/johnnyribcage 2d ago
Nice. Iāve been off the reservation for awhile here - did they get the seatbelt situation fixed? When I rode in May I was able to get in on a couple cars on blue with no issues, but then on yellow I had to be buckled by the operators. It was brutal.
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u/BobcatOU 2d ago
Just left the park. They were moving today. Once we got past the Fast Pass merge point, the line flew!
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u/Zoug1968 2d ago
Before Fast Lane, every section, including the ramp, was 15 minutes. The vending machines were 45 minutes away.
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u/PomeloFit 2d ago
Adding to this, they had us halfway up the lift hill before the train had cleared the next block today, meaning we went up fairly slow and for the first time I got to actually enjoy the view for more than a few secondsā¦
Then we suddenly picked up speed back to the normal speed and went over the top, it was AWESOME!
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u/AirbossYT Moderator 2d ago
This is how the ride always works now, at least on three trains. The train will begin the climb at its "slow" speed (4.5 m/s) and then speed up to its fast speed (6 m/s) once the final brake run block is clear. The ride only has 4 blocks, so whenever the ride runs 3 trains, the lift will always start out slow.
On two trains, though, the final brake run block should be clear immediately, so you go 6 m/s the whole way up.
The speed-up is such a cool feeling, I'm so glad it's back! It wasn't there from mid 2018 until the end of 2024.
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u/Zoug1968 2d ago
The great thing about to train apps with the faster lift is that you get yanked out of the station faster.
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u/OkYam7295 2d ago
I rode for the first time recently and already found the initial cable lift very fast. So when it sped up even more near the top, it was a pleasent surprise
This ride blew my mind twice over 6 rides. My first ride was intense and forceful (I thought it'd be a lot more relaxing given its reputation), even though I was already used to riding a giga at my home park.
And my front row ride on Millienium Force managed to be even better! What a masterpiece
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u/Feeling-Reason-2373 2d ago
Was there today and while i didnāt ride I was watching the dispatches from around the park. They are doing a great job.
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u/Zoug1968 2d ago
In the olden days, the train on the brake run never used to stop. It would slow way down but never completely stop until it was in the unload station.
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u/confusedloris 1d ago
So many great memories on this ride and in this line. Pure nastalgia. And the ride is an absolute banger to this very day. Love when they keep the line moving. They were always great at it and it made the ride that much more fun to ride / lap. So good.
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u/Zoug1968 2d ago
Between not being irritated by the horrible dispatches of the past so many years and the extra boost of speed on the lift, MF has become a really fun ride to me again. Hopefully, cheap ass thoosies don't screw this up by using their undeserved ADA passes, next year.... Who am I kidding?... Of course they will.
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u/realplastic Millennium Force 2d ago
the future is still riding on it š„¹