Universal Great Britain - Speculation & Rumors

[Alicia]

Slowly working my way through all of the documents released today, and one thing which has struck me is that it seems certain that there won't be a theme park '2nd gate' developed on the land that Universal currently own. No doubt there is plenty of opportunity to expand the main theme park over time, by way of pre-planned expansion pads, but nothing in the documentation suggests that a 2nd gate on the Lake Zone is a part of their thinking. This section from the volume 1 of the Environmental Statement (Chapter 2 - Description of the Proposed Development) makes it clear to me that the resort will only ever be a single gate destination:


To my reading this doesn't allow any wiggle room for post-consent development of theme park elements in the Lake Zone.

Yea seems that the northern area will not be for a second gate, so only one theme park. Maybe smaller “entertainment” offerings, but not a full park.

 

[Altonsky]

Water park is mentioned a fair few times though throughout the documents

 

[Alicia]

Water park is mentioned a fair few times though throughout the documents

Maybe that’s the indoor space attached to hotel?

 

[rob@rar]

Water park is mentioned a fair few times though throughout the documents

Yeah, spotted that. But I find it impossible to get excited by the idea of a waterpark as I can't imagine anything more than the indoor collection of slides that the Alton Towers hotel has, or perhaps something along the lines of a Center Parcs tropical dome thing. Sure, nice to have, but Volcano Bay it ain't.

 

[rob@rar]

Yea seems that the northern area will not be for a second gate, so only one theme park. Maybe smaller “entertainment” offerings, but not a full park.

Agreed.

Just in case I'm coming across as unhappy about this, I'd like to state that I'm delighted by what is proposed. I never dreamed that I would live an hour away from a Universal or Disney theme park. The option of taking day trips to a Universal theme park, or even popping along for a few hours in the evening with an annual pass in my grubby paws, blows my mind. That it's unlikely I'd see a 2nd gate in my lifetime really doesn't diminish my excitement about what's happening in Bedford.

 

[Altonsky]

Maybe that’s the indoor space attached to hotel?

Could be but I’d like to think they’d at least be competing with this which is currently being built in Manchester.

Arguably going to be the UKs biggest and best indoor water park/spa complex.

WAT-ER DELIGHT! Therme Manchester coming to the UK | Therme Group

WAT-ER DELIGHT! Therme Manchester coming to the UK

www.thermegroup.com

 

[havaska]

Yeah, spotted that. But I find it impossible to get excited by the idea of a waterpark as I can't imagine anything more than the indoor collection of slides that the Alton Towers hotel has, or perhaps something along the lines of a Center Parcs tropical dome thing. Sure, nice to have, but Volcano Bay it ain't.

I’d expect it to be more along the lines of Rutlantica at Europa Park. That’s pretty substantial!

Also, left field idea; what if it ends up being one of the Therme Waterparks? They want to do a lot of expansion and are planning (hopefully building soon) Manchester and another in Glasgow. They’d certainly want a more London focused location.

 

[EllieB]

If they're going to build a water park (which I hope they are, and there are certainly enough mentions of it in the planning documents) I'd like to see it have the same level of theming as the parks. There are enough aquatic themed films and worlds for that to be feasible, right?

 

[Alicia]

If they're going to build a water park (which I hope they are, and there are certainly enough mentions of it in the planning documents) I'd like to see it have the same level of theming as the parks. There are enough aquatic themed films and worlds for that to be feasible, right?

They tend to keep their hotels and water parks IP free, and tailored to relaxation. Like Volcano Bay’s original concept. Still highly themed, but not based on existing things.

 

[EllieB]

Am I right in thinking their US hotels are not operated by Universal? Do we expect the same to be true here? I assume they do operate their water park though.

 

[TheAlaskanBullworm]

Is there a chance it would be a Yacht/Beach Club pool situation where it’s just a major pool with a few things(I’d imagine bigger/more involved) but essentially a mini water park? Or I guess to keep it more Universal like Cabana Bay but more water attractions? River, slide or two, zero depth, etc etc.

 

[masekwm]

It is a huge assumption but it’s definitely feasible if some operator/the gov wanted to spend some money to do it.

It’s also strange how that councillor mentioned it a couple of months ago and now this has popped up.

The first time I’d write it off, this being in an official document makes that a little bit harder.

I can't see the Government spending the kind of money that would be required to increase capacity on the line from StP, changing the bridges, building such a huge platform to save a 1 hour transfer. Eurostar offers a great service, but with Luton Airport being on the same line as Wixams and being served by Wizz, Ryanair, EasyJet and Jet2 is there any point in such a substantial investment?

The line is already at capacity, it rarely runs to time and a new freight depot is under construction at St Albans. I just don't see it.

 

[BBPH]

Am I right in thinking their US hotels are not operated by Universal? Do we expect the same to be true here? I assume they do operate their water park though.

That’s right in the US it’s Loews, they also do not operate Beijing so I think it’s fair to assume they’re happy with that model.

If they're going to build a water park (which I hope they are, and there are certainly enough mentions of it in the planning documents) I'd like to see it have the same level of theming as the parks. There are enough aquatic themed films and worlds for that to be feasible, right?

If they do, I’d look towards Rulantica at Europa-Park for some idea of what’s likely, no IP and with its own story.

 

[rob@rar]

I can't see the Government spending the kind of money that would be required to increase capacity on the line from StP, changing the bridges, building such a huge platform to save a 1 hour transfer. Eurostar offers a great service, but with Luton Airport being on the same line as Wixams and being served by Wizz, Ryanair, EasyJet and Jet2 is there any point in such a substantial investment?

Agreed. It makes no sense to me. It would take a huge amount of investment to make it work, but it would serve a relatively small catchment area (NW France, some parts of the Benelux countries) which already have good transport links via existing rail, road and air options. I think it's a silly idea.

 

[Altonsky]

I can't see the Government spending the kind of money that would be required to increase capacity on the line from StP, changing the bridges, building such a huge platform to save a 1 hour transfer. Eurostar offers a great service, but with Luton Airport being on the same line as Wixams and being served by Wizz, Ryanair, EasyJet and Jet2 is there any point in such a substantial investment?

The line is already at capacity, it rarely runs to time and a new freight depot is under construction at St Albans. I just don't see it.

You’re probably right, but I doubt it’s been included or marked as so for absolutely no reason. Whether it’ll happen, who’ll pay for it and operate it who knows.

 

[masekwm]

You’re probably right, but I doubt it’s been included or marked as so for absolutely no reason. Whether it’ll happen, who’ll pay for it and operate it who knows.

Completely agree, it is clearly shown on that map, but it is not mentioned anywhere else I can find. I expect it is an error, the map is clearly wrong as the key includes a colour that is not used. Also there are the considerations, you have a Eurostar train where the majority are enroute to London, it leaves London with perhaps 1 carriage of people to head to Universal, does it then return to London for cleaning as it can't sit on the fast line.

The transport plan is cracking for this scheme, I get off a packed train in St P at 8:30am, the train heading north has few passengers, Universal customers can board those easily, there will also be able to board at Gatwick & Luton Airport. When I board my busy train home, the train heading south with visitors is also mainly empty.

 

[Altonsky]

Completely agree, it is clearly shown on that map, but it is not mentioned anywhere else I can find. I expect it is an error, the map is clearly wrong as the key includes a colour that is not used. Also there are the considerations, you have a Eurostar train where the majority are enroute to London, it leaves London with perhaps 1 carriage of people to head to Universal, does it then return to London for cleaning as it can't sit on the fast line.

The transport plan is cracking for this scheme, I get off a packed train in St P at 8:30am, the train heading north has few passengers, Universal customers can board those easily, there will also be able to board at Gatwick & Luton Airport. When I board my busy train home, the train heading south with visitors is also mainly empty.

It did mention somewhere within all these documents they’d be offering discounted train tickets if train/park tickets were purchased together (I can’t remember where tbh), maybe they’d offer the same for any Eurostar (or competitors) services.

Go DLP for a couple of days, get the Eurostar direct to universal with discounted tickets. I’d like to think at peak times there’d be far more than one carriage of people coming from France etc via train if this was ever going to be a thing.

Honestly just throwing out a load of hypotheticals.

 

[rob@rar]

I’d like to think at peak times there’d be far more than one carriage of people coming from France etc via train if this was ever going to be a thing.

I agree that there will be plenty of people coming from France that would be happy to take a direct Eurostar service. But it's going to cost tens, maybe hundreds of millions of pounds to get that service operational. The same people in France will be able to take a Eurostar service to St Pancras then with a simple change of train can take a direct train service to Universal, adding a relatively short amount of travel time but without Eurostar having to spend megabucks to overcome the many obstacles to implementing a direct service. Eurostar isn't exactly flush with cash, and to me it makes zero financial sense to invest a huge amount of money to provide a service, when you can already offer 90% of that service within existing infrastructure. If they do spend that money for a direct service they will need to recoup the investment from the cost of tickets, so it's not going to be cheap. The budget airlines like easyJet will be only too happy to fly those same people to Luton from Paris Orly (or Schipol or Brussels) and then it will be a short coach ride direct to the park, undoubtedly cheaper than Eurostar.

I simply can't see the business sense in spending a huge amount of money to create a new service when you can already offer 90% of that service within your current provision. If spending that kind of money opened up a brand new way to travel to Universal, generating a new market of visitors then maybe it would make sense. But to my, admittedly uninformed, viewpoint it seems like madness. We can all think up things which would be lovely to have when we visit the park in Bedford, including transport options, but whether they make financial sense for the companies that have to pay to develop those options is a different question altogether.

 

[tommyhawkins]

I'm going through the planning statement and they're expecting we might hit 12.5m visitors in the future or future year as UDX has put it.
View attachment 27203

Just to be clear, based on the documents they have provided, there is absolutely no way with the current proposed plans that they are building a park capable of accommodating 12m people. The documents set out an 70-80acre theme park (the size of Epic Universe right now. Another contradiction is that the park can accommodate 55K peak visitors, imagine that many people in EU today. This 12m number is currently more than UOR sees (Pre-EU)

I suspect they will initially go with the Europa Model for the Northern site, with more hotels and an indoor/outdoor Waterpark like Rulantica, as mentioned in documents. Europa sees 6m visitors
If they want 12m visitors they are going to want a second gate next door like UOR, they redacted all the land ownership in the documents....

 

[Altonsky]

Quick question about all the stuff that was redacted, is that land they already own or is it the neighbouring parcels of land they don’t (as far as we know) own?