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[shavethewhales]

I see it now. So they did add some siding treatment, it's just hard to notice behind the food stands. I guess that's better than nothing, but it's just short of what they needed to do to add some real ambiance to the area. In the good old days they would have extended the facades up to hide the HVAC units and probably broken it up into false store fronts with lots of cheeky signage, props, etc. What they did just makes it look a little bit more like a barn...

I'm sure they'll work on it a bit over time. I know they wanted to leave it open to allow for large crowds since there aren't many other places for people to congregate in the park, but a few more trees would have a large impact.

[sdcfan88]

I remember the top complaint when Grand Expo was new was the lack of tree canopy making that area too hot to hang out in during the summer. Some additional somewhat mature foliage around the tables would help the new area out a lot as the trees in Grand Expo have grown in quite nicely offering shade making it feel less like a former parking lot.

[Swoosh]

If you can avoid May 31st I would highly recommend it.  That's Mercy day and the park will be slammed. 

[Duelist]

^ Thanks for the heads up, Swoosh.  We've been there on Mercy Day before and it was a nightmare.  Fortunately we were planning on leaving by around 2pm anyway but left a little after noon due to the crazy lines. The wait for Hannah's Ice Cream Parlor was out past the Gazebo.  I always thought the City should close that day for the general public and only let in Mercy employees and their families.  It would cause a lot less irate visitors.

[SDCisHome]

Visited the park on Saturday, not a part of Mercy Day. We arrived around 9 a.m. and I was surprised at the lack of traffic trying to enter the parking lot. The park wasn't too busy during the morning hours, even with how nice the weather was. You could tell around 2 p.m. it had gotten a lot busier. I never felt like it was overly crowded, definitely have been when it was way worse. We left around 6 p.m. and had an enjoyable experience. FiTH was down most of the day...I think it came back online for a bit and then went down again. At one time in the afternoon, OR & WF were both down at the same time. I did ride AP and it was kind of disappointing. I say this because it has just seem to have lost some charm. The tunnel extension, although not super long, makes an already long tunnel even longer. After exiting the tunnel, the pool with the animatronic dog saving the guy was completely empty. The mechanical head just sitting there was odd. The best part is obviously the drop...and I got soaked...but the ride is in need of some help, IMO. Always a great day in The City no matter what!

[Preachin_Bill]

Visited the park six times this summer.  Most of it was good but one day was so-so, and one day was probably the worst day I have experienced there in over 30 years.

Shout out to the young lady working the kid rides at fireman's landing.  Reminded me of the old days.  Very cheerful.  Can't remember her name.  The new Wild West show was good I thought.  Another thing I appreciated that I want to highlight is powderkeg running two cars.  It seems they are always running 1 even when busy.

The park obviously isn't as good as it used to be regarding theming and overall culture, and some of that is because of the administration and managers of the park (more college indoctrinated grads) but also due to the difficulty in finding quality people to hire.  It's obvious that SDC has reached the realm of "just find someone to cover the shift and be there".  They can't help some of that stuff, I'm just not sure if there's enough quality candidates.  Heck I even caught the new sheriff (who has worked there for years in other capacities) on his cell phone in one of the homestead cabins.  If he can't stay in theme and off his phone why would a 20 year old employee who has never visited the park before working there even care?

Since there is still a lot of good in the park let me highlight one thing that exemplifies what I mean.  I absolutely hate how much Hannah's ice cream parlor has changed and I cannot believe how far that place has fallen.  They used to have demonstrations, but I get why they don't do that anymore.  However, it used to feel like you were in a different place there, a better place.  It was clean, cool, and happy.  It was charming.  A true slice of Americana.  Now?  I hate the new ordering system, it completely ruins the ambience of the place.  The workers are terrible.  They messed up a very simple order (although the new system doesn't do them any favors).  When I tried telling them what mistake was made and how it would easily be fixed, they just could not accept that the ice cream they served was not what was ordered.  One of them clearly didn't get the memo that one "scoop" is actually an entire bowl, not just a single scoop (thankfully the others knew this, to their credit).  But the place was DISGUSTING.  The workers obviously have zero pride in their work or for their ice cream shop, nor do they care about their customers.  I cannot believe how dirty the place was, especially one day.  It was 3:30 or so and it was not busy in there.  Workers standing around.  I brought them a cup to throw away because the trash cans were so full; do you think they got the memo?  Nope, just stood there.  Floors and tables were dirty and full of ice cream, napkins, spoons, etc.  Some of this also speaks to the culture we have of people not cleaning up after themselves, but this was a whole new level of worker negligence.  That's an example, I'm seeing more and more of that stuff at the park.

Pretty soon I literally do not want them to call it silver dollar city any more, especially once all the old stuff is gone.  When it comes to anything new, they clearly do not care about the theme of the park.  It's insulting.  It's almost as if they make a mockery of the old theme.

[Coaster]

Thanks for your report, Bill. Pretty disappointing to read about the downfall in quality customer service at the park. That used to be one of the hallmarks of the park. Something they desperately need to get back to and improve on.