Are the high gas issues keeping you away from WDW?

[Grumpy-Fan]

We also live in a resort area. We own and operate a retail store and a couple of small grocery stores. Our sales are way up right now. We have alot of friends that are in the restaurant business and they are down more than 20% from last year.The Beach House rentals are only down a little. We think that more and more people are cooking at home rather than dining out to offset the higher cost to get here. When we go in Feb. 09, we are going to be dining in more of the CS places than the TS places. That`s a sacrifice for us because we really enjoy the TS restaurants, but hey; We`ll still be there!

 

[sweetpee_1993]

Hubby read an article in some financial magazine...don't know which...and he was thinking it was an interview with Bob Iger but not sure...questions about the economy and it's expected impact on park attendance. Whoever the interview was with stated that they were expecting attendance to drop by 25% compared to the year before by the end of the year. Does that make sense? I don't know how true or far off the mark that was but (at the risk of sounding selfish) I sure hope so. Last December it seemed sorta crowded to me. Then again, prior to that I was only accustomed to going in January/February. LOL!

 

[Clark Griswold]

My family's upcoming trip to Disney will mark the first trip in 11 years that we haven't driven the 1,000+ mile trip to Florida. Eleven years behind the wheel has taken a toll on our driver, although I love the trek through the southern states...gas prices are only making things worse in my hopes to drive to Disney again...it would be a nightmare paying for gas! It will seem very strange in July when it will only take 2 hours to get from Indianapolis to Orlando!

 

[Cubs Brian]

The gas prices are not keeping us away. We drive from Illinois and we are still going. We know that it is going to be more expensive this year to get there but we have not even considered not going. We go every year to Florida for two weeks. One week at Disney and one week at my parents who live about 45 minutes from Disney. We will be there in 27 days.:sohappy:

We just drove dowm there June 10th,gas prices were generally between $3.79-$3.89 . last Feb. they were $1.00 cheaper. We have a Trailblazer and avg. 20mpg, 1207miles door to door each way. 375.00 in Feb vs 470.00 in June. Not even 100.00 difference, spread out over 7 days it's 13.00 per day more. buy 1 less souveneir per day.:lol:

 

[Cubs Brian]

I had a friend just return from Disney yesterday and she said it wasn't as crowded. She goes the same time each year. She said there were vacancies at her hotel, too.

I'd like to know where she stayed. We tried to get xtra nites(2)and were told all of the value and moderate resorts were sold out,We stayed at AKV and they were also sold out.Fastpasses for RRc, ToT Toy Story Mania were gone on back to back days by noon.It was by far the busiest I've seen in a few years. The one thing I did noticewas that European visitors made up about half the Crowd. With US Dollar weak, they are getting a lot more bang for their buck.

 

[DizneyPryncess]

The high gas prices are making me walk to where I can walk, carpool when I can carpool, drift whenever possible while driving, rolling down my window instead of using the car air conditioner, and take flights instead of driving to vacations (which is so hard since i have a pretty severe flying phobia)...but I won't cancel my Disney trips over it.

It just requires further planning for trips for most people I think. In this case, like others said, vacations have been booked for so long that people have prepared for this. It might hurt the Disney vacation economy in the future if things continue like this. Hopefully they don't.

 

[Dwarful]

Were still going in July. We are still driving....its still cheaper for us to drive vs. fly. With the Mississippi River flooded in our area (about 30+feet above flood stage), we are seeing an increase in costs across the board..groceries, household items, gasoline is about $4.25 a gal. right now. However this is our little sanity saver. We normally go 3 times in one year. But this year we will forgo the other two trips and do one 14 day trip.

 

[Dragonrider1227]

nope! We're taking the train on our next trip. (We're from Rhode Island)

 

[Pumbas Nakasak]

In a word NO

 

[Tinkwings]

Nope...got my airline tickets oneday months ago for next winter when a little star popped up and the words promotional rate appeared right next to the days and times I most desire roundtrip...178$ vs 248 earlier in the year and recently have been seeing 238 to 268$ since I purchased for same flight....LOL could not drive there from way up north for that price...:king:...sure park tickets will go up... :lookaroun

 

[Yankeeplex]

My sister, who would be flying from the LA, CA just called me to tell me that 4 tickets were priced at $875 per ticket for a total of $3500 + $25 for her first checked in bag + $30 for each additional bag for a grand total of over $3700...just to get to orlando...before the hotel and putting food in their mouths. She met us last year and tickets were $350 a piece. She said thanks but no thanks...Disney will have to wait.

 

[wdwfan100]

In a word NO

Ditto what he said!!!!!