Universal's Epic Universe General News & Discussion

[Stitch_101]

My view is this is the first step. Operationally, this is a chance to test the waters and make adjustments as needed with a limited group coming in with no tickets and enjoying a part of the park, but restricting them from the other parts. Instead of opening it up to the general public, doing this on a smaller scale and building from there will hopefully ensure it'll be a better experience for everyone in the long run.

I just don't see a situation where a continuous open hub is feasible, not for a long while at least. The way Epic is built, not only does the park have a specific capacity, so do each and every individual portal. Once Universal starts increasing overall park capacity, the likelihood of individual lands hitting their capacity is going to go up. As those lands hit capacity, ticketed guests will fill Celestial Park more, leaving less room for non ticketed guests. I see this new technology as a Universal's way of streamlining eventually virtual queues for land and ride access because of how the park is designed and less about trying to turn Celestial Park into an open hub... At least not until the park expands more and increases its ride and land capacity. I think these smaller, limited group events are the most we are gonna see of the "open hub" concept for a while.

A lot of this also feeds into my belief that Universal dropped the ball by not adding at least a couple more highly themed flats to Celestial Park. A Samba Tower Balloon ride themed to Captain Cacao and his moonship and an elegant Flying Carousel could have added a nice distraction for families while waiting for portal reservations while not distracting from (and likely adding too) the beautiful park like atmosphere.

 

[Tbad556]

I simply can't get past the fact that: 1) Doing it full time would be an operational nightmare and 2) It really detracts from how cool the portal experience is. Basically, doing it would be right up their alley and wouldn't shock me at all

 

[OrlandoGuy]

I simply can't get past the fact that: 1) Doing it full time would be an operational nightmare and 2) It really detracts from how cool the portal experience is. Basically, doing it would be right up their alley and wouldn't shock me at all

Yeah I’m hung up on #2 myself. I know they could use the restaurant business but there’s something about opening up the park to the public that I feel would detract from the overall sense of place Celestial Park currently has. Even though CityWalk is part of the main campus (it’s on the other side of all security gates), getting to CityWalk doesn’t have that same sense of arriving at a unique place that entering USF/IOA has. For all that went into making Celestial Park what it is, I’d hate that sense of place to be abandoned for the sake of making it an open-access mall.

 

[Cup_Of_Coffee]

The easiest solution imaginable is all hotel guests get free access after 5 pm, no rides. Citywalk doesn’t require a ticket for UOR guests, neither should this. Fireworks is added perk. Citywalk is closer to most of the resorts so business won’t be lost there.