Coronavirus Measures at Theme Parks - Did we feel safe?
As we all know, coronavirus has had a huge impact on the theme park industry over the past 5 months or so. Parks in the UK were completely shut for about four months and started to re-open again after lockdown on the 4th July. Staff spent a long time preparing the parks to re-open to ensure all the necessary COVID-19 measures were in place. The reopening of the parks was obviously really exciting and it was also positive in terms of their financial stability. However, personally I wasn’t sure if I felt comfortable returning to parks quite yet. I was conscious of the fact that even with lots of social distancing and extra cleaning it would still be very hard to follow the measures at all times in a theme park setting - especially if others are ignoring the rules. But equally I felt it was important to support the parks financially at this time. And at some point things would have to go back to at least some form of 'normal’, right? It was hard to know when the right time was to return to parks given that I didn’t feel 100% comfortable with the idea.
We decided to wait and see some updates from other people visiting the parks during the first week of them opening post-lockdown. People reported varying degrees of social distancing happening at the parks so we decided not to visit the parks where it seemed lots of people were ignoring the new rules. We also saw photos of all the different measures put in place, such as extra cleaning on rides, hand sanitisers and wearing masks on rides. It was clear that all the parks had put a lot of effort into making the parks as safe as possible and into preventing the spread of the virus. After seeing the updates from others who visited parks in the first week of them being open, I felt reassured that there were lots of measures in place and was feeling a bit more comfortable with the idea of visiting a park.
Despite these new measures, deciding which parks to visit and when was still really difficult. In the end we settled on visiting Paultons Park and Alton Towers a few weeks after they opened. We were due to visit Paultons earlier this year when their new area, Tornado Springs, was supposed to open. But due to the virus that never happened, so we decided to visit the park anyway to see what it was like. We also chose Towers as it seemed to be the safest of the main UK parks in terms of people sticking to the covid measures (plus we love it there). The decision was made! We booked our tickets to Paultons and we reserved our place at Towers with our Merlin passes.
Visiting the parks with the new measures was certainly a strange experience. We wore masks the whole day, except while eating (obviously), even though they were only required on rides at Towers and not at all at Paultons. We felt if we were going to visit parks right now we should be taking all the right precautions and doing as much as we can to protect everyone. Personally, I was quite nervous at times because I couldn’t control how other people in the parks were behaving and there were times when people around us were completely ignoring the covid measures. It was stressful knowing you had to trust other people to do the right thing. But despite all the differences, we still had a great time and the measures didn’t really ruin our days. It really did feel like the ‘new normal’. Of course, we had to change the way we did certain things throughout the day but the overall park experience was the same as it was pre-covid.
I think if everyone at the parks followed the measures put in place then I would have felt completely comfortable. There was a lot of thought put into how guests could be kept safe and it was clear that the parks were really trying to do everything they could.
Masks
Arguably the most effective way to reduce the risk of spreading the virus is to ensure everyone is wearing a face covering. At Alton Towers everyone above the age of 6 was required to wear a mask on the roller coasters, but at Paultons Park masks were not required anywhere on park. We assumed this was because Paultons is a family park where most guests have children under 6 years old. That’s fair enough, but we felt it would have been important to ensure the parents and adults were wearing masks just as they are at other parks.
We wore our masks all day long at both parks and only took them off to eat - we felt this was the right thing to do. I was expecting the mask to be really uncomfortable and annoying to wear, but once you had it on for a few minutes you got very used to the feeling. By the end of the day it felt weird not to have one on. It also felt good to know that we had an extra layer of protection against the virus and were reducing the risk of us spreading it to others if we happened to be carrying it asymptomatically.
What we found with the masks at Towers was that hardly anyone wore one unless they were on a coaster where they were required. In the queues where some people were standing closer to others than they should have been they were not wearing face coverings. I even saw some people on rides without a mask - they must have taken them off on the lift hill. But there were a selection of people that chose to wear masks all the time which was good to see. Obviously masks were not required, but I thought more people would have been wearing them around the park because of their protective benefits. At Paultons, where masks were not required anywhere on park, we were basically the only people wearing them (I only saw about 5 other people all day also wearing them). This made me a bit anxious, especially in areas where people were not properly socially distancing and it was difficult to move away (like coming off the rides and leaving through the exit). If we all wore masks we’d all be safer!
Social Distancing
Another important one! Keeping your distance from people outside of your household or bubble is also a great way to ensure everyone is safe and minimise the risk of spreading the virus. At both parks there were chevrons indicating where to stand in queue lines to ensure you keep your distance. At Paultons they also had screens installed in queues where social distancing was not possible. Guests were also encouraged to keep their distance from other groups across the park and some paths were one-way only to enforce this.
In an ideal world, everyone would respect these measures. People would stand on the chevrons and move to the side of the path to ensure they keep their distance from groups passing them. But we don’t live in an ideal world and there were plenty of people at both parks who seemed to be ignoring the measures in place. This was to be expected and was one of the main reasons I was anxious about visiting parks. Sometimes we were in positions where we were unable to move out of the way when people were not keep their distance from us. For example, in queues for the rides, if the people next to us did not stand on their chevron we were unable to move out of their way. This stressed me out the most because it was completely out of our control. But in other places, such as on paths, we were more able to keep our distance from those not following the measures.
Another thing I noticed was that there were a lot of groups visiting the park together who appeared to come from more than three households or bubbles. These groups were not distancing from each other at all, so there were groups of 6+ friends walking around together and being batched on rides together as if they were part of the same household or bubble. There’s a chance that they were in fact from the same household - but I highly doubt it. This kind of defeats the whole point of the measures put in place by the park and there’s nothing the park can really do to ensure people are not mixing with lots of different households. Of course, we all want to visit the parks with friends and socialise with them, but this can be done while also maintaining social distancing.
The thought of groups mixing with different households was difficult for me. I just feel it was too soon to be mixing with lots of people without maintaining some form of social distancing. That’s why we decided not to tell any of our friends when we were visiting parks as we weren’t going to be mixing with any other groups. We actually happened to be visiting Towers at the same time as some of our friends and we met up with them briefly from a distance to see how they were getting on, but we didn’t join groups or ride anything together. It was really great to see them and say hello but we kept our distance. We didn’t feel it was right to be mixing with lots of friends when social distancing measures were in place and we should be limiting our contact with others as much as possible.
Cleaning
Of course, there was also lots of extra cleaning going on across both parks to ensure surfaces were kept clean and disinfected. Rides were cleaned every half an hour but we didn’t find that this interfered with queue times too much - staff appeared to be quick and efficient at cleaning the trains. There were also lots of hand sanitiser dispensers available across both parks. I felt there could have been more though - perhaps one before and after every ride as some rides (especially at Paultons) didn’t have one anywhere near the exit of the ride. Having said that, Paultons had installed hand washing stations across the park which is something Alton Towers did not have. These were outdoor stations with multiple sinks and hand dryers for people to use to wash their hands. I thought this was a brilliant idea as it reduced the number of people using the sinks in the toilets just to quickly wash their hands, which meant people were able to socially distance better at the toilet sinks.
Again, these measures rely on guests actually using the hand sanitiser and washing their hands frequently. But it was great to see the parks providing the right equipment for guests to be able to do that. We also took our own hand sanitiser and anti-bacterial wipes which we used frequently. I’m glad we took them because there were times when I felt I should sanitise my hands and there wasn’t a hand sanitiser available (plus the wipes came in handy when a bird pooped on Harry at Towers!). So I’d recommend taking your own sanitiser as a back-up option for extra protection/safety.
Other Measures
There were also other little measures in place at the parks. At Towers we were temperature checked before we entered and guests were able to enter the park early to stop queues forming in the plaza. Towers also had regular tannoy announcements reminding guests to follow the social distancing measures and informing them that they would be required to wear a mask on the coasters. At both parks guests were encouraged to pay by card if possible to minimise spreading the virus through the exchanging of physical money.
Lots of restaurants and food outlets at the parks had also undergone changes. At Paultons we ate at the Wild Forest Restaurant which was serving main meals from a reduced menu which you could order at the counter. There was a socially distanced queue and screens to protect staff members. The tables were also distanced from each other to ensure groups were sat far enough apart to eat. It wasn’t too busy in there and we were able to enjoy a delicious and reasonably priced lunch comfortably. At Towers we ate in the Pizza & Pasta Buffet. We were expecting to be able to order a whole pizza from there instead of the usual buffet set-up as we had seen others do on social media. But when we got there the buffet was open with staff serving the food behind screens for you. The food was great and the new system appeared to work well. However, the restaurant is quite tight in some places and some of the tables were relatively close together.
Final Thoughts
As I said before, the new measures didn’t really affect our day too much in terms of how much we enjoyed the parks. It felt natural to socially distance and wear a mask so we weren’t at all bothered by the changes in place. The only thing I would say is that the experience depends on how much the other guests respect the measures. I was anxious about the actions of some of the other guests and there were times when I felt very out of control. But in the end, we did everything we could to be safe and protect others.
I’m not sure when we’ll be visiting a theme park again. With everything going on we’re not keen to start rushing off to as many parks as we can. We might visit another park in the future but at the moment we don’t have any plans. It’s a difficult and strange time which means it’s very hard to know what the right thing is to do. As long as we all try to stick to the measures in place I think theme parks can be a relatively safe place to visit. But that’s assuming we all respect the measures!
Have you visited a theme park post-lockdown? What was your experience like?
- Zoe
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