6/25/02
Kings Dominion
16000 Theme Park Way
Doswell, Va 23047
Dear Guest Services,
On Saturday June the 22nd
I, Ivy Kennedy was a visitor in your park. Three out of the four people in our
party were physically disabled. Two of us use wheelchairs, and the third has
trouble walking. Now I don’t want this letter to be filled with complaining, I
also have some suggestions about your disability policy that I hope you take a
note of for future consideration. I understand why you have made these rules,
in order to be fair to everyone, but it looks like the disabled folks get the
bad end of the stick this time. Maybe you made the rules because people were
abusing them, such as people with casts going through up the exit. Well, you
should crack down on them and not the physically disabled. We do not abuse the
rules, so why punish us? I know when I usually go to Kings Dominion; I only go
on each coaster once. I do not keep going back to the same ride, and ridding
over and over.
We didn’t know anything about these new rules until
we had made our way to the first coaster we wanted to ride. The park should’ve
a big sign displaying the new rules somewhere near the entrance. There was one
up for the Hypersonic informing guest it wasn’t operating, why not one for
disabled guests, letting us know about the new rules? We spent $14 on parking,
plus money to buy tickets and we had a real crappy day. Why don’t you guys
offer a discount when one of the rides is out of order for the whole day?
Why change the rules now anyway? I know people are
probably complaining…. saying we cut in the lines. They have a point too, but
did you ever think to survey a disabled person about some changes that needed
to be made, before you went ahead and changed them? The way it is now it’s very
unrealistic. Going back and forth to get signatures, waiting for your assigned
time, it’s not efficient. We have to conserve our batteries or our energy to
push, and running everywhere all over the park is just not right. We can't even
stand in the line until our assigned time, when anybody else can go wait in
line whenever they want. They have a choice, rather they want to wait in a
line, or to try and find a shorter one. We have to stand around and wait, which
wastes tons of time, that's not fair because anybody else can walk around and
wait then come back to a ride whenever they want without an assigned time.
We were quickly handed one booklet when first came
in, nobody took time to explain to us what it was all about. My boyfriend
almost threw it away, not knowing what it was. Later on that day at Guest
Services we found out that we were supposed to get three booklets, one for each
disabled person in our group, instead we had only been given one. If there had
been a big sign at the front, we would’ve known how many booklets were allowed,
and we wouldn’t have wasted close to four hours getting signatures to only two rides
in one booklet! You need to make sure each disabled person that goes through
the gate receives a booklet.
The fellow at Guest Services did give us free passes
to three rides to try and make up for it, that was nice, but by that time we
were all the way up front (and so disgusted) we did not feel like using them.
Why don’t you have Guest Services in other areas of the park, other than the
front? I did try to call guest services by the Anaconda, but I wasn’t getting
my point across. I had a hard time talking; somebody should’ve come out to us,
rather than us to go up front again. We wanted to start at Anaconda, by the
time we got hungry, we’d be near the front by our cars. We would’ve used those
passes you see if we were already in the middle of the park. The Guest Services
fellow also explained that we could get all three booklets signed, and pull out
the one that better corresponded to that time. It seems silly to me that you’ve
made all these rules, and then you’re telling us how to break them!
Why not make each wait 30 minutes from when you
arrive at a ride? One wait time we had was 1 hour and 45 minutes between rides,
ridiculous! Or why not get assigned times for rides when you walk through the
front gate. When we have to get signatures from everybody, it feels like we are
children. Or at each ride you can put different times for that one ride, incase
a person misses a certain time. If you did that, we can better plan our travels
through your park. The funny thing is that when we do go back at our assigned
times, it still looks like we are cutting! So, it’s defeating the whole purpose
of the booklets. Maybe one person in our party, who can walk, can go wait in
line for us. That way we still would be waiting the same amount of time as
others.
Sometimes after all we go through; the staff badgers
me when I try to get on a coaster. “You must be able to walk without
assistance.” I’ve been going on Kings
Dominion coasters since I was 11 years old; I think I know my limitations. If I was able to walk, I wouldn’t be
disabled therefore I wouldn’t be going in the exits! I can sort of walk with
support under my arms. I understand that the coaster may get stuck, and I might
need to be able to walk to down safety. If you are so worried about us suing
you, there should be some kind of paper we can sign for you saying that you’re
not liable for anything that may happen to us.
Change back the rules, to the way they were before!
If people are going to be so ignorant, add a note in the park guide asking
people to have patience for the disabled. Other people can do so much other
things that we can’t do, so why are they complaining? They only have to wait a
few more minutes for their car, after we take theirs. If they only understood
what it means to be disabled, they wouldn’t make a fuss. If you have all this
energy to making all these rules, why not make the lines accessible to us? Your
park is not ADA compliable and because of this you SHOULD let us go through the
exit whenever we want! Kings Dominion used to be one of the few places I can
really enjoy myself at. Now, it feels like that is being taking away from me.
It has wonderful memories for me, it was one of my first dates with my
boyfriend now of five years.
So few disabled people visit your park, I don’t understand
why you guys are being such sticklers. Because so few of us are disabled, I
fear that you’ll not make any changes to your rules. I will make sure to pass
it along to other disabled folks what you are doing. I’m positive that they
will find it to be too much of a hassle to go, and you will loose out on money.
On a different note, Kings Dominion needs to install
Family Bathrooms throughout the park. Many shopping malls have family
bathrooms, why not theme parks? Many people with disabilities need assistance
using the bathroom, I know I do, and usually my boyfriend is the only one
around to help. All public facilities should have one. It would be worthwhile
too also because some parents sometimes don’t feel comfortable letting their
children who are 7-12 years old go to the restrooms by themselves. The children
are too old to go in with their parents, but not old enough to protect
themselves.
How about a disabled day at Kings Dominion?! That
would solve all this mess. I know you’d probably have to spend a lot of money
to advertise it, but I’d do my best to spread it around!
Please inform me if you do change the rules,
otherwise I’ll just not go anymore.
Best
regards,
Catherine Ivy Kennedy
Responses/Results:
Kings Dominion gave us four free tickets. So, three friends and I went again. I wrote to them again to follow up. Here’s what I wrote…
Hi, it’s me. Just wanted to let you know that our visit
on Saturday was much better than the last. The 30-minute rule worked great!
(Rides that have waiting times less than 30 minutes, we could get on first
without a signed time) Even though we
left when it started raining around 5:30, we still got to ride a number of
coasters. Just on more thought, the wheelchair lift for the Hurler needs a
battery operated fan or something. It’s so hot and stuffy in there…a fan would
really help.
I’m so
glad we could work together on your policy, thank you!
Sincerely,
Ivy K. & Friends
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