Thorpe Park

Thorpe Park

The attraction’s owners, Merlin Entertainments, first approached us to carry out a review of their on-site communications equipment and make recommendations for improvement.

Dubbed “the UK’s most thrilling theme park”, Thorpe Park Resort is a major attraction which welcomes upwards of 1.8 million visitors every year. Situated between the towns of Chertsey and Staines-upon-Thames in Surrey, the park features more than 30 “thrill rides”, including the UK’s fastest rollercoaster, Stealth, a themed on-site hotel and it also plays host to live events throughout the year.

Brentwood Communications has been supplying two way radio solutions to Thorpe Park for a number of years. The attraction’s owners, Merlin Entertainments, first approached us to carry out a review of their on-site communications equipment and make recommendations for improvement.

One of the key challenges was establishing a system which delivered reliable communications to staff across the whole site. Covering some 490 acres, the park is built on the site of an old gravel pit and includes extensive lakes and other water features.

As well as supplying a permanent two-way radio set-up for day to day operations, Brentwood has also been asked to support one-off events by hiring out additional equipment from time to time to boost capacity.

Our solution

Given the size of the site and the number of staff Merlin Entertainments wanted to supply with two way radios, we advised they upgrade to digital equipment. Our recommendation was a fleet of radios from Motorola’s state of the art ‘MOTOTRBO’ DP series, offering all the power and performance of the latest cutting edge digital two way radio technology.

We supplied three models to suit different roles on site – the Motorola DP4401, Motorola DP4601 and Motorola DP4801. These feature, in order, no screen, a screen and partial keypad and a screen and full keypad, covering the full spectrum of user interfaces available on two way radios and suitable for everything from general use to top-level fleet coordination.

All three models offer a 3km broadcast range, making them ideal for large outdoor deployments like Thorpe Park without the need for extra ancillary equipment. This superb network range is coupled with digitally enhanced audio which is able to clear out background noise and intelligently adjust volume – perfect when you need audio clarity working against a background of noisy rides and excited crowds.

And as safety is a core priority for any theme park, we programmed the handsets with features such as a one-touch Emergency Button and Man Down fall alert, which are especially useful for helping to protect technicians and engineers working on attractions across the site. All radios are also GPS enabled, meaning the location of all users can quickly be identified if an alarm is raised.