How Hersheypark Has Become the Standard-Bearer for Both Safety and Guest Experience in American Parks

There’s a certain type of summer afternoon at Hersheypark when you can hear the rattle of Wildcat’s Revenge from halfway across the park and the air has a subtle chlorine and warm asphalt scent. Anyone who grew up driving through central Pennsylvania will recognize it. The way the park handles visitors entering its gates has subtly changed. Hersheypark did not provide the customary ambiguous assurances following a chaotic opening weekend this April that featured a fight involving two juveniles and an adult. It shifted.

On paper, the new digital photo re-entry system sounds clinical, but in reality, it is practically undetectable. When visitors leave the park, their photos are taken, and when they return, the first and second photos are compared. The deeper goal—which no one at Hershey Entertainment & Resorts is publicly stating—is to preserve the park’s ambience while also putting an end to ticket sharing. Over the past two years, theme parks all over the nation have subtly tightened regulations. Six Flags increased age restrictions, Universal increased bag checks, and Hersheypark appears to have learned from its competitors’ mistakes.

Perhaps because Hershey was founded on a peculiar form of paternalism, the park’s response seems more measured than others’. The park was not built by Milton Hershey with the intention of making money. He constructed it so that his factory workers’ families could spend a Saturday there without having to pay for admission. In ways that are difficult to measure, that history still permeates the area today. You can see it in the way the Guest Experience team discusses their work—not in catchphrases, but in the little things, like the trainer who measured a nervous young girl at the Twizzlers Twisted Gravity ride and gently indicated which seat would feel less frightening.

Additionally, the competitive environment has changed. According to USA TODAY readers in 2026, Hersheypark is one of the top ten theme parks in the nation, and The Hotel Hershey is the top theme park hotel. Although those rankings are flawed and give preference to loyalty over quality, they imply something genuine. Families continue to return. There’s a feeling that Hersheypark has figured out how to feel safe without feeling sterile in a field where parents are becoming more and more concerned about crowds and behavior.

Not everything has gone as planned. This spring, the park implemented an extra security policy for a short time before withdrawing it a few days later due to visitor confusion. In the hospitality industry, where the natural tendency is to support the initial choice, such a correction—acknowledging that something didn’t land—is uncommon. It’s still unclear if the photo verification system will last for the entire summer. Advocates for privacy will likely have concerns. It will be bothersome to some visitors.

However, it is more difficult to dispute the larger picture. With a $99 unlimited summer pass, new water attractions that open at Bayside Pier on May 23, and patriotic programming related to the country’s 250th anniversary, Hersheypark is embarking on its 120th operating season. There will be fireworks. Riders will continue to be launched into its underflip by the Wildcat’s Revenge. Someone like Katie or Jaiden will also be assisting a family in finding their misplaced stroller or persuading a child that she is tall enough for the swings somewhere close to the front gate. The rankings aren’t really able to gauge that. It’s also likely the most important part.