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Volcano Bay Water Theme Park - Universal Studios Orlando


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Tapu Tapu is so far the worst possible scenario. Can you imagine going to any water park in the world where you are told you can't ride any slide in the whole park for at least two hours? That's not even a thing and somehow they've created this problem.

In several trip reports, I've read people have not even been able to ride some slides as they have run out of available slots for the day.

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Tapu Tapu is so far the worst possible scenario. Can you imagine going to any water park in the world where you are told you can't ride any slide in the whole park for at least two hours? That's not even a thing and somehow they've created this problem.

In several trip reports, I've read people have not even been able to ride some slides as they have run out of available slots for the day.

 

As I mentioned earlier, this seems to be a recurring theme for reservation only experiments, they would be gone 3-4 hours after opening all the time here whenever a ride was reservation only in the Korean parks.

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It sounds to me like they need to shutdown the "ride reservation" portion of Tapu Tapu and fix it--seems to be more than a simple case of "tweaking."

Edited by cfc
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Hi I am a lurker on another board dedicated to Universal and got some information. Universal has stopped selling express pass for Volcano Bay on line. It sounds like that is not helping the wait times and a big part of the problem implementing it with tapu tapu. The express pass is put on the tapu tapu system and it is probably to much for the system or they didn't account for the volume of guests. However, if you have already purchased them (I have them for July) they will honor them. There is a chance based on capacity that they will sell them in the park.

 

Have a good day!

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It sounds to me like they need to shutdown the "ride reservation" portion of Tapu Tapu and fix it--seems to be more than a simple case of "tweaking."

The problem is that they've likely spent a lot of time and resources training their team members to operate with the system exclusively. Further "tweaking" the system may make more business sense than turning it off and having to retrain everyone, add wait time meters to entrances, and change their marketing strategy.

 

I won't speculate on which approach they should / are going to take, as it's not my place. But, for better or worse, this is the sort of thing that happens when a park makes an attempt to innovate. It's a gamble.

 

Universal has stopped selling express pass for Volcano Bay on line. It sounds like that is not helping the wait times and a big part of the problem implementing it with tapu tapu. The express pass is put on the tapu tapu system and it is probably to much for the system or they didn't account for the volume of guests.

IF that's the case, it's an unfortunate cascade / domino effect. Lines get long, more people buy express passes to skip them, which means lines get longer, then express pass returns take longer because there are more people... Do they set a limit on how many express passes they'll sell in a day?

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The park looks absolutely incredible. That's a shame about the Tapu Tapu, but really, they should have contingencies in place for when it isn't working properly. A good communications plan and contingency operations, like a "standby only" day for the busiest of days, could be a solution. I look at Tapu Tapu as part of the attractions, that may or may not work, like any other aspect of a park.

 

Congratulations Universal Orlando Resort for creating something really unique and breathtaking.

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Great report and photos! Despite the reservation system, I can't help but be discouraged with the super long wait times. Recognize some of that is a byproduct of a busy holiday weekend and attendants still working to maximize efficiency.

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The park looks absolutely outstanding! I'm not really a big water park person but THIS is a park I'd definitely want to visit as soon as they work out these issues!

 

I was at a water park this weekend reflecting on the fact that for me, the worst part about being at a water park is waiting in a slow-moving waterslide line in the sun, barefoot, in a bathing suit, and getting too hot or too cold and completely drying off before then getting plunged into cold water to experience the 30-second slide and going through the process again for the next one. Being able to wait for a slide while relaxing in the water or in the sun somewhere else seems like a great idea in theory, but it sounds like the Tapu Tapu system has not achieved this at all, and actually made things worse. I would definitely not be happy having to wait for one slide (unable to wait for any others) and then having to wait again when I get there. If this works out to eliminate the "unpleasantries" of water park waits, I'll be completely onboard. Until then, I'll hold off on visiting the park.

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The park looks awesome. Theming is great (though I do think they missed an opportunity by not theming the interior of the volcano and leaving it open on the back side so it's just a mass of slides and staircases) and just looks like a great park to explore and spend a full day at. That being said, as everyone else has said, the Tapu Tapu system issues are a major problem (though not terribly surprising). The extreme long waits for the reservations are one thing. But to me the single biggest kicker is having to wait another 30-40 mins in an actual queue. I would consider a 30-40 minute wait for a water slide a long time already, but if you're having to twiddle your thumbs for 4-5 hrs or longer you should be going basically straight on the ride, 5-10 min wait max.

 

I would guess that as the crowds calm down in general and the system is tweaked, things will improve, but I'd think they'd need to at least entertain the idea of maybe opening up some of the slides to stand-by only so that guests can be waiting in line for one ride while they are virtually in line for the other.

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Volcano Bay looks like an amazing water park, but seriously, what were they smoking when they decided to open a brand new water park on Memorial Day weekend with a brand new and untested virtual queue system? They should have at least planned to have the park open in March so they could have worked out the kinks of Tapu Tapu by now.

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So this weekend should be VERY interesting for Volcano Bay. Did they learn from what they experienced last weekend?

 

So far since opening they have...

 

- Opened the 2nd lazy river to help with "non reservation" capacity.

- Added a wait time sign (with chalk!) to help people make smarter decisions on reservations.

- Stopped selling express in park on most days.

 

What they haven't done...

 

- Found a way to address 300+ minute waits for simple water slides.

- Apparently the downtimes are just as bad.

- Driving by during the day this week, the lines were still almost to the bottom of the slide towers AFTER you waited your virtual wait.

 

With gay days in town and more schools off, this should be another very busy weekend for them. I'll be checking #VolcanoBay on twitter to see if they are getting just as many complaints as before!

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Now that the rush to be there for opening weekend is over they should put a lower cap on admissions for the near future and slowly increase as operations become more efficient and wait times more understood.

 

Not an operations expert but my guess understanding how bottlenecks and queue theories work is that just a 10% reduction in attendance would have a massive impact on the in-park experience and the good word of mouth (plus exclusivity effect) would pay off in the long run.

 

The issue with Tapu Tapu isn't that the system itself is flawed rather with operations and lack of data. Disney had years of data to use before doing fast pass plus reservations and here we go with 15 different attractions with no data on load times, time of day fluctuations, or breakdowns.

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I can't even imagine standing around for 2-4 hours (or more!) for a water slide, and not even being able to wait for others in the meantime. That's just insanity. However, the place looks really amazing - great TR!

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When I read reviews on TripAdvisor I usually do so with a shade of skepticism, throw out the really bad and really good ones and kind of look for the average consensus on things (mostly hotels, never really read theme park reviews), but holy cow people are absolutely destroying Volcano Bay on there. 97 total reviews and 71 of them are "Terrible" or "Poor".

 

Anyone heard if the wait time issues have improved any lately?

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Anyone heard if the wait time issues have improved any lately?

 

One of my friends was at Volcano Bay yesterday and said that waits were generally around two hours and the slides had downtime issues, but he still had a good time. Granted, he wasn't the one paying for admission, so I suppose you could take it with a grain of salt...

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Hope they can figure out the mechanical issues and the wait times soon. The park looks gorgeous!

 

How long have they had water running through the pipes? Have they only had water running a couple months? No idea what it takes to get a waterpark approved but I haven't experienced any slides being shut down outside of staffing issues.

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Stupid question but how are water slides having frequent downtime issues? They're water slides...

 

HI from what I heard on one of my other sites is they are having multiple problems.

 

1. A couple of pumps broke

2. The chemical levels in the water have been off

3. A conveyor belt broke

4. The sensors to let people know when to go have been off.

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