Are Hersheypark's Operations Really Good or Really Bad? 

Sidewinder isn’t that long it was that long in the video because a kid wussed out

As a HersheyPark ride operator, some more information: Storm Runner may have a slower dispatch as you cannot send the train until the other train has returned to the station, which can be inconvenient at times when the other side is delayed. Skyrush has very picky restraints, and 32 of them too, not to mention the confusing exit on the same side. Fahrenheit will always be fast though, because us employees like to push for over 50 dispatches in an hour if possible (it's challenging). There are a lot of circumstances though, such as international employees, just slow workers in general, large guests to deal with, or people who do not remove loose articles (had to take a man off Fahrenheit becuase he wouldn't take off an eagles hat). It's a great park though with coasters that cater to everyone, from family coasters like Blazer, Comet, and Looper, to the highly intense Skyrush and Storm Runner

My music taste = coaster studios operations videos music

I'd cut skyrush some slack because of people having to enter and exit on the same side of the station.

NOW GET READY.... HERE WE GO

I love how Wildcat's brake run sounds like clubbing baby seals.

Out of the 21 different parks I’ve visited, HersheyPark is definitely my favorite! They truly have something for everyone, and that is what I love about Hersheypark

I live for that montage music

So I had fun calculating the real capacity of the rides (with the dispatch times of your video): - Trailblazer: 2 300 pph (That is super fast!) - Storm Runner: 640 pph (only if it was running one train) - Sidewinder: 390 pph (a kid was removed from the train) - Laff Trakk: 720 pph - Lightning Racer: 1 170 pph (if one side only is used with two trains) 2 340 pph (if two sides are dispatched at the same time with two trains on each layouts) - Wild Mouse: 760 pph - Wildcat: 1 310 pph (with two trains) - Fahrenheit: 655 pph (with three trains) - Great Bear: 900 pph (with two trains) - Sooperdooperlooper: 630 pph (with two trains) - Comet: 635 pph (with two trains) - Skyrush: 820 pph (with two trains - also a guest was unable to ride and had to be removed from the train)

haha you know the operations on a ride are slow when the verdict is oof 😂

We need this series back. So much has changed in park management in lots of parks since 2018. Also record at least 5 dispatches and report the average.

Skyrush’s dispatch is pretty long because the ride ops have to provide optimal thigh crushing

Wow the new restraints on SideWinder looks comfortable. I havent been to Hershey in years. I went back in '08' and feel like i need to revisit my favorites. For some of the rides at all of these parks. I kind of blame the passengers because some of them being book bags and junk with them through the que lines. I hate waiting for someone to put there stuff away and checking pockets. Like what were you doing in the lines all this time.

Skyrush is the only one with consistently bad dispatches. I don't know how some people fit in those terrible restraints. I'm really tall but only a little chubby and they have to squeeze me in there every time. I've seen people that are easily 300 pounds ride. I don't get it lmao.

Maybe the Storm Runner time wasn’t great, but it’s worth remembering that this ride has two platform sides, so while one train is loading, the other train is heading out.

These videos are so fun to watch, even though I know I wont go to half of these parks, ever. Lol

I’m a ride supervisor at Hershey Park and I feel like you understand why some dispatches take longer than others but I feel like it’s all relative. If guests checked to see if they fit before attempting to ride, we would have a much faster dispatch time on Skyrush. The sidewinder assessment was by far the most unfair since you can see the operator communicating with a scared child and they had to let them off. Just consider all the variables when you label things as “ouch” or “oof” because we are really doing our best to have an enriching experience for our guests.

My prayers have been answered! Thank you Taylor for making this vid for us!

Been waiting for this for a while!!!!

Y'all Wild Mouse may have flawless dispatch time but it always gives me anxiety trying to get in the car 😂

Hello, former Hersheypark Ride op and supervisor here. I can explain a lot of the timing on these rides with the safety protocol for them. For example the storm runner, one train can't leave the station until the other is back and being loaded and before you send it you must check all tracks are in position to send and receive the train. I would recommend riding multiple times to get and average as well, since things like phone calls, supervisors talking to ops and guest issues can make dispatches take longer. Also 2 mins for Storm Runner is about average unless you have a fast crew with no outside influence.

I LOVE THE OPERATION VIDEOS!! Also, I LOVE THE WHEN YOU PUT OOF AS ONE OF THEM XD

I have been waiting for this forever it’s finally here

Great Bear was by far the slowest dispatch I’ve seen on any coaster I’ve been on, the time you recorded for this video was actually faster than I’ve experienced

4:32 O O F

Love these videos

I mean I work at a theme park and most of the time the reason we dispatch slow is because people faff around putting their bags away once the gates are open. It's more to do with actual guests not the park operations lol

I have visited Hershey so many times because it’s my home park. Here are my opinion about the dispatch times Comet - Usually does well Skyrush - May be one of my favorite roller coasters of all time, but GOD THE OPERATIONS SUCK ON THIS ONE! Sooperdooperlooper - Great Great Bear - Not bad Trailblazer - Good Storm Runner - More on the sluggish side but not as slow as others Sidewinder - Usually slow Fahrenheit - Solid Wildcat - Good Wild Mouse - Quick Laff Trakk - Same as Wild Mouse Lightning Racer - Good

For sidewinder, storm runner, and sky rush, I understand that it would be a bit longer because they’re high intensity roller coasters, they need to make sure that people are extra safe

Really cool video! I was at Hershey earlier this Summer and I had a terrible dispatch on back seat on Thighcrush. Several times whenever the restraints were down, they kept releasing them over and over for almost six minutes. I was mildly infuriated XD

Bout time, but I bet skyrush has a bad one due to the station design

Outta my home-park, outta my home-park! Spirits be gone from my home-park!

The dad on Comet is THE definition of GP, trying to pull down the restraints. GP DAD

When I was at Laff Track not long ago during Christmas Candylane, it did feel a little slow because of how they would get one car out, get another right near the entrance, and vice versa. Not SUPER slow but eh, I get why it goes that way.

5:44 you could see that dudes restraint come down significantly after the ride op pushed it. I pray for his thighs.

My favorite park! Honestly from my last trip there in September, these are almost pretty much in line. Great Bear is definitely a little slower compared to others from what I noticed. Also unrelated to the video, Wildcat was oddly enough a little more bearable recently in terms of the rough department. Could still be better off with a retrack though.

Ok, sidewinder was probably only that long because it looked like someone was having an issue. It’s probably much shorter when everything is in check.

I was there a few weeks ago and the employees did an awesome job!!! The app said the line for Candymonium was 90 minutes, and I was on the ride after 20. Fahrenheit operators also did a great job! Laff Track was the slowest one that I saw, and I rode every coaster in the park that day

This park has the worst operations out of every park I have ever been to in my entire life! Originally from the Philly area but never been here, I was visiting family and wanted to make a trip out here to experience their coaster lineup! I now live in Michigan and my home park for context is Michigan Adventure! Travel quite a bit to cedar point, kings island, and even Dollywood, but hersheys lineup was so great and just opened candymonium, so had to make a stop. I bought the skip the line pass and pretty much half the rides were down during the day. I did not have the unlimited pass, rather the one time skip, and I had already scanned my wristband to ride storm runner, and than not a minute later it broke down. I said to the, I can only imagine stoned teenager at the merge point between the two lines, I already scanned my wristband, so what now? He said, just come back when and if it reopens and I will let u through. Problem solved right? It reopened not 5 minutes after we left the line and the staff changed completely! I had to explain what had happened to a new staff member at the merge point and he told me that I should’ve waited and had the ability to wait and was not listening to what I was told!!!! I explained I had traveled a long distance and paid a fortune for the wristband and I needed to speak to a supervisor. He hesitantly explained where I needed to go to express my complaint, and at that moment a guest in the regular line offered to give him his pretzel to let me through and he accepted lol. So apparently I should’ve went down the fast track with a pretzel instead of this expensive wrist band! This park was awful! Thee worst operations of any park I had ever been too! Terrible employees, with zero training! No employee interaction with guests!! No “how was your ride” when u return to the station! U pay Disney/seaworld/Dollywood prices to get in here and…..I don’t know why! I will give it a second chance at some point in my life but not even a RMC that’s opened half the time, is gonna bring me back anytime soon!! I’m embarrassed to have grown up here and experience the shakedown I did at this park! Never got to do skyrush which was closed for several months, even though they advertised it on the website as the headliner! Just garbage!!!!

Great operations video of Hershey park I thought that Lightening Racer would have had one of the slower dispatch times and Skyrush would have had one of the fastest, but to my surprise it was quite the opposite, anyways keep the operation videos coming they are some of my favorites.

Yes. I've been waiting for this video. Thanks Taylor. Hersheypark is my former home park. Now I live in Orlando, Florida my home now is Magic Kingdom.

I’ve been on wildcat and I came off with a headache. I hope they do a massive retracking by the company who built it (GCI) or a I-Box treatment by RMC. I do understand that it’s GCI’s first woodie and first ones are the introduction.

2 minutes 28 seconds? *o o f*

I went on a pretty dead day, so all of the dispatches were pretty quick. Candymonium takes about 2 minutes, though.

Been going here all my life, love this park. However the dispatches are always always hit or miss. Great video man!

is the new delicious Chocolate coaster ready yet? ;o

Hershey is my home park! Thanks Taylor!

I am actually happy with the waiting time on some of them because the next one comes back

I tried to pause it at Comet to see who the employees were and I only saw my favorite supervisor 😂 I wish they had Cup Fusion open cuz the Cup Challenge was my favorite to op. Would've loved to see you do one on Cup Challenge or even Cup Fusion

1:05 DAT 🎂🎂🎂DOE 😆

To be fair - Sidewinder's time was kind of sabotaged by the kid. Also, there's not an urgency with Storm Runner if the other train is sitting in front of the station. Beyond the slow load times, something else I'd be curious to know, HP seems to send so many empty seats out. I read on an FB group that they waste more time trying to fill empty seats vs losing the full capacity. If staffing were at optimum levels, could have an attendant assigning seats. It works great at Disney World.

I mean, sidewinder had that unsure kid on it, so I don't think that that time is entirely accurate. Still, great video!

Yes another operations video😀😀😀👍🏻👌🏻

I worked at HP for about 6 months in the games department and let me tell you, it sucked ass. The best part about it were some of my coworkers and 2 supervisors. They didn't have fans at all the games until the end of summer, and you weren't, by rule, supposed to play the game AT ALL while not working with someone. The coworkers were really nice because it's all a bunch of high schoolers and college kids, but I met some really nice people and the interactions with guests wasn't terrible. The overall coworker experience I rate a 5/10 because the higher up bosses all had a negative stigmatism about them and working conditions were unfavorable. Some supervisors were really nice though, some brought cookies in alot and you could go to the big arcade when it rained if they liked you, but the scheduling system was really shitty. The started having nights where the park closed at 1130 and midnight, so ofcourse people had to work until then right, but when I'm a sophomore and they scheduled me for a 430 to 1130 shift the night before the first day of school, so I just tried to call in and tell them, BUT THEY NEVER ANSWERED THE DAMN PHONE OR CALLED ME BACK. So I just didn't show up and eventually stopped emailing me schedules, so I assume I got fired, but I basically quit. Overall experience is 4.25/10

You'll have to do an updated one in the near future since Candymonium was built, Sidewinder is now Jolly Rancher Remix, and Wildcat closed and will likely get RMC'd.

At 4:30 I was wondering if he would ever use “oof” as a verdict and then right then he used it😂

Advice- DO NOT GO ON LAFF TRACK IF YOU DO NOT HAVE SOME FORM OF FAST TRACK! I went on it with fast track and it still took forever, even though the ride isn’t that great. The cars are so tiny that you need to cross your legs to put the lapbar down. I could have gone on skyrush front row 10 times before you could get on Laff track once

When I was gp, I thought sooperdooperlooper was unsafe because it didn’t have over the should restraints (and went upside down)

Once I was at Hershey park and the pirate ship thing that swings broke so people were on there for like 10-15 just getting higher and higher and throwing up it looked so scary

Sorry that people feel that a dispatch is halted due to a guest size. I notice one saw a small child being asked to leave. These are not just a park rule the manufactures dictate who can or can not ride a certain ride for safety reasons. When a guest is to large for a restraint there is nothing that can be done, some manufactures do have 2 or 3 over size seats but if another guest is sitting there and refuses to move the ride attendant can ask the guest to wait for the next train. Height restrictions are followed for the safety of children. Have fun but be safe it's the HersheyPark way.

When I went to Hershey the dispatches were really good except for storm runner. I got there pretty early so there was not really a line so I was in the line to board the train and there were at least three minute dispatches per train. Nevertheless storm runner is phenomenal and I love it

Not surprised that Thigh Crush takes so long because the ride-op wants to be a stapler.

A lap restraint coaster and a over the shoulder with belt restraint shouldn't be timed the same way. Where as one just gets checked by the car the other has to be individually checked which adds time.

Yay you did HERSHEY PARK

I know I’m late but Great Bear usually is very quick for me. I rid it 5 times and each time it took around 45 seconds to get out of the station.

An idea that I have for these videos: also rate the dispatches by the number of empty seats. From a capacity standpoint, I think that making sure that every last seat is taken will make the line go faster even if it makes the dispatch a little longer. The empty seats will really hurt me lines.

For great bear "oof" LOL

For this to be my home amusement park some of these were longer than any normal time, because when I go most of the time it isn’t that long of a wait to dispatch.

When I was there a few years ago in the middle of the summer, lines were super slow. We timed Great Bear from the moment it pulled into the station to the moment it pulled out and it was near five minutes. Unfortunate.

Sorry I'm very late, but the last 4 times I went (yes, I have a season pass there) Skyrush was dispatched in 1 minute and 17 seconds, and Great Bear took around 50 seconds. Still a good park though. Probably some of the best operations on the east coast.

Guys, you got a remember not all these roller coasters are one the same brand, too they are not all the same type of roller coaster so that’s why they’re going to obviously take longer.

Interesting video, but I'd like it if you could provide a bit more detail as to why tines are good/bad especially bc dispatch times are often related to safety as you mentioned in the video as well as factors related to the design of the coaster itself. For example: -Of course Wild Mouse & Laff Track are going to be able to dispatch really fast bc they have small cars. Also, both coasters have several block sections built into the track meaning they can dispatch much more frequently without risking a collision. -Wildcat & Sooperdooperlooper results also seemed a bit skewed because the trains weren't anywhere near full. To be fair, I know Wildcat rarely gets full trains bc its a really rough ride (Hershey seriously needs To demolish/RMC Wildcat), but I think that would have been good to point out. -Im not sure exactly how you would be able to deal with this if doing a study, but I think Storm Runner's trains tend to sit in the station for longer bc they use track switches to increase capacity.

actually side winder wouldnt have took so long if tthe kid didnt chicken out

my head always gets stuck in the vest part of storm runner/fahrenheit lol

There was this one person on skyrush who did really fast operations

LOL “OOF”

Sidewinder: Kid: exits ride Mom: Why you leaving me?

Yeah for Skyrush, people have to exit and enter on the same side, so you have to wait for everyone to leave BEFORE you can open the gates, also, there are a lot of seats, like the Great Bear, and the restraint system is new and stupid. Some of the lap bars need to be rechecked over and over again, especially for particularly larger people. You check all the seats, then if the light at the back isn't blinking really fast then the operator has to check the screen behind them and call out the number of the seat that didn't quite go down far enough to be locked. If it IS a larger person, it takes a lot of strength to push it down. And if they simply can't ride, you have to unlock ALL the seats to get them out, and recheck the other seats again. Sometimes more than once per train, super annoying. Still my favorite to op, though. That or the triple towers.

Lol at 3:23 you can hear the wild seal on the brake run

On sidewinder a kid got scared and got off, plus the sidewinder naturally takes a while to get on and off

Only thing is for storm runner it takes a little longer cause they have to wait for the other car to go through the ride until they go so they sit there for a while versus Fahrenheit where you unload and load and go

I died a little inside when I saw the times for Great Bear and Skyrush.

I don't necessarily care how long it is, if it's constantly terrible thats one thing, but I'd rather they take their time and be safe

as a person who works at hersheypark. and knowing a lot of people in the rides department. it is not the operators fault more than half of the time. it’s usually the guests taking too long. it complaining about something. so. if you EVER disrespect my park again. you will get canceled. thanks :))

Omg last time I was at Hershey Park the last ride I went on was the sidewinder, and there was a boy next to me who was probably about 13 or 14, and I looked at him and said “I’m warning you right now I will swear”.... He laughed the entire ride because I was swearing

Love hershey and will never leave it

I like to save the ‘OOF’ for Busch Gardens Tampa at Christmas time. Especially Scorpion, 1 train operation and horrendously slow dispatches.

Love Hershey!

I have been to Hershey park a few times and most of they time is waiting for people to get in the car. Some Rides have more rules about what you can and cannot bring on rides and how to sit etc.

Hey Taylor! This was another amazing operations video! I have a quick question. Since you were recently in Orlando, which do you prefer, Disney or Universal?

I love Hershey and I go every summer, but I will admit storm runner’s operations are pretty slow. The first time I went on it was a walk on but it still took about 15-20 to get on, and the train before mine had an issue with the restraints, so that took awhile. But overall I love Hershey and I love storm runner.

Sometimes they take longer than others and if they take a while they are just trying to make sure the riders are safe.

Great bear wasn’t long when I was there, it was like a minute

The first ride I like, I went on it 4 or more times in a row, I also like the oldest one their called the comet.

No way! You were at storm runner and I didn’t notice! I am the ride operator checking the restraints at storm runner! I’m the one checking the restraints next to the stairs

Great bear for me was pretty quick and storm runner took really long like holy crap

4:09 that guy is chewing gum. ON A ROLLER COASTER

Sidewinders time didn't really count since there was a scared kid who changed his mind. You can see the operator talking to him.

I went to Hershey Park and I got stuck on the white wooden rollercoaster at night to😂 I forgot what it’s called tho

omg that's weird in the front few rows of trailblazer I saw my friend!