RSoxNo1
Well-Known Member
At parks other than MK, yes. Having said that, right now there are still somewhat decent options left relatively late in the day. It will be interesting to see if that changes.
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Disney to increase the number of FastPass+ entitlements per day and include park hopping
- Thread starter wdwmagic
- Start date
orky8
Well-Known Member
Umm, no. Fastpass was motivated by money as well. The idea was people would spend less time in lines and more time shopping and eating. Turned out their assumptions were wrong, as may be the case with FP+, but let's not kid ourselves and claim that either was motivated by guest satisfaction.
That said, based on my experience with FP+, it certainly added more to my general satisfaction than FP did, and once these new enhancements go live, I think there will be very little left to complain about with FP+ itself. (Yes, of course, the complaint that there were better uses for $2 Billion will remain, but that ship sailed, it's time to move on and make lemonade).
WDWDad13
Well-Known Member
I expect we'll continue to see changes more uses of the magic bands on down the road...
I have also heard that that magic bands will eventually be used in the bus queues to keep track of guests and to order additional buses based on the number of waiting guests. Imagine the possibilities here to know pretty much exactly how many are at X resort and if they have fp+ prebooked they could also know where they are going (what bus they are waiting on) too
I have also heard that that magic bands will eventually be used in the bus queues to keep track of guests and to order additional buses based on the number of waiting guests. Imagine the possibilities here to know pretty much exactly how many are at X resort and if they have fp+ prebooked they could also know where they are going (what bus they are waiting on) too
love disney
Active Member
So any concrete word on when this will actually go live?
I completely agree that choice is a good thing for the consumer. But the choice in this case is a side-effect born out out of the necessity to "up the capacity" of the system. The same system that does not have the true attraction capacity to fill the demand. Its propped up by adding FP+ to shows/attractions that dont need it. While this does not affect having a nice vacation, the deception is allowed by us (the guests) not letting them (TDO, TWDC) know that we see their trick and they are not fooling us. If they feel they "got away with it" because nobody spoke up, then perhaps they will feel that they do not need to build more attractions in a park like HS or EPCOT, whose to stop them from trying to "trick" us again in a different manor, one that may actually impact our vacation in a negative way?
Let me say again, you have a valid point that in this case it doesnt really do any harm. Your example of HS is great, a family can choose to FP+ a show like Indy or Disny Jr if their not riding ToT or RnR. My only point is that I would agree with @RSoxNo1 that it is deception, even though its not hurting anyone, its covering up the ugly fact that there is an attraction capacity issue and the less negative feedback they get, the less they will be inclined to build more quality attractions. And while some people will say its not all about attractions, I agree, but in the case of the FP+ system, lets face it, the big rides (TT, TSMM, Soarin') always run out of FP's everyday, compared to something like CoP, which shows that there is a VERY BIG demand for those type of quality attractions. Im just saying that we need to let them know they are not fooling us, they need to know that we, the guests, are allowing this to happen, but we expect something to eventually be done about it. Thats all.
flynnibus
Premium Member
Or it can be looked at as simply 'ensuring the service is offered for the majority of our attractions'. Consistency.. If a resturant offers reservations - it doesn't mean they offer a significant benefit. It can simply be offered to accommodate user habits and expectations.
Then I would suggest you let Disney know with items of substance.. IE how your vacation is impacted, or how your visits are changing -- not 'you aren't fooling me!!' banter.
Agreed. I have written polite emails, and made phone calls to voice my opinion. I wasnt suggesting we all call Disney and tell them "your not fooling us". It was just a general phrase to convey the idea. And please dont get me wrong, Im not bashing the system or expecting it to change, I was just posing the idea that there is a deception, again.. not a major one
Of course, theres nothing wrong consistency. But i feel that in this case the users habits and expectations could still fully be met without FP+ for certain attractions. But like I said, it isnt hurting anyone to add them so why not. But do you think when they decided to add FP+ to attractions that dont need it, that they did it for reasons of users habits and expectations, or in hopes that those attractions and shows would be chosen by guests who didnt know any better, thereby allowing the system to not be overwhelmed? Im not sure what they actually were thinking, just asking. Im not being argumentative, I appreciate your response to my earlier post, good points, as usual.
flynnibus
Premium Member
I think the reasoning is more than a single point. The addition of FP to those attractions serves multiple purposes, and not all are necessarily diabolical.
Would it really have been better to take the stance of 'only offer FP where it really shortens time', end up with only a few FP enabled attractions, and then constantly have to defend why only a finite # of people were able to get a FP at all? Disney would have a hard time advertising FP if a majority of people never get to use it and their primary memory of the service is "yeah, but it was always unavailable!". People would feel Disney was pulling a bait and switch.
Disney NEEDS people to use FP on things besides the E-Tickets.. Disney also NEEDS people to visit all its attractions and not just the top 10%.. offering FP is a way of promoting those attractions and enticing guests to visit them. So in that sense, adding FP is about distributing load.. and trying to increase utilization of the park. This is an example of a self-serving need for Disney... but not an evil one.
Then there is the consistency justifications... This is an example of a need for the customer.. but also dove tails nicely with Disney's needs. Win-Win.
Then there is the postulation that Disney did it only so they can dupe people into 'wasting' FPs and boost their internal metrics of success. <put on your villian hat>. Getting people into Philharmagic is not about 'duping' guests, but trying to increase utilization of the park.. which in turns will boost their effective capacity.. which will in turn increase revenues.
There is a finite capacity for the marque attractions - just because Disney has to take steps to balance offering perks with some tradeoffs or because choices made benefit Disney as well does not mean Disney is all evil. Things are rarely that black and white.
Kuzcotopia
Well-Known Member
If this is true, that would be pretty awesome. Hate to say it, but on this point. . . go Big Brother.
WDWDad13
Well-Known Member
I truly believe we are just scratching the surface here of what all they can potentially and may do down the road... this foundational project really lays a good ground work for future development that people seem to be blind to. Everyone just automatically associates this project and the cost of it to rubber bracelets and new fastpass system while that is just 1 piece of it... 1 brick at a time and it'll continue to get bigger
dstrawn9889
Well-Known Member
and tons of pc hardware in the background to keep up with the hardware that can be seen...but that billion number bounced around was for .30 cents of TPE surrounding maybe 20 cents worth of electronic components.(at the volume WDW is buying, anyway)
Thats a much better way of looking at it. Its a self-serving need, not an evil one.
Its a win for Disney because it helps utilization of the parks, I feel its only a draw for customers, or maybe a small win, in the sense that it DOES allow you more choices for FP+, but those same choices would mostly be walk-on and are only needed to be added to the selection pool due to the high demand and/or lack of other 'marque' attractions. Like you said, "Disney NEEDS people to visit all its attractions and not just the top 10%" The lack of demand for the other 90% of attractions isnt because they are not good ones, but most guests would choose to repeat an attraction like Soarin or TSMM over Philharmagic or CoP. Philharmagic and CoP are awesome attractions but they never required a FP simply for the fact they are not in as high of a demand and they are in MK where there are many other rides to help distribution load. HS and EPCOT dont have that.
Am i saying Disney needs to build a lot more 'marque' attractions? No. But parks like HS and EPCOT need something extra for distribution. The system is holding in place for now, and I dont blame Disney for adding FP+ to attractions that dont need it. Heck, I would have done the same thing. But what stinks is that they are prevented from adding additional attractions because of the massive amount of money being poured into MM+. The system that has added to the problem of attraction capacity is also preventing the problem from being fixed due to its high cost. Its a catch 22 for Disney. (kinda). But I agree with you, there will always be a finite number of marque attractions, there has to be a trade-off, at least until they can build more stuff.
Next Big Thing
Well-Known Member
There isn't a big incentive to show FP+s right now, no. I admit to that. But If someone is in the mood to see Festival of the Lion King or Finding Nemo and doesn't feel like waiting a long, winding line (with no shade), then I don't see why using a FP in that situation is bad for that person. FP+ is more about making your vacation what you want it to be than saving time. And yes, the system as a whole does save you time. The app on it's own is a time saver. No more running from Space Mountain to BTMRR to check the time, only then to find out that Big Thunder is closed. You can see it right on the app. So arguments that MM+ doesn't save time are largely off-base imo. It doesn't save you time in the same way legacy FASTPASS did, but it does in other areas.
BigTxEars
Well-Known Member
That is good stuff, nice ideal I had not thought of. Just more ways MBs will help the immersion of guest at WDW to improve.
ToTBellHop
Well-Known Member
Well stated.
I found FP+ to be very useful for VotLM, which routinely DOES get lines.
Disneyfamily4
Well-Known Member
I actually kiddingly asked if they were ever going to put magic band readers on the busses in order to keep non-resort guests from using the busses and I was told the idea was shot down completely. If you calculate all the busses, with all the people, plus all the stops along the way to pick people up, you would be adding a tremendous amount of time to get to the parks.
Not to mention, the resorts know how many people are staying in their resorts. Even though they know not everyone goes to a park each day, they still base their busses on the fact that they all do.
WDWDad13
Well-Known Member
right, but having a live look at people queued up (and knowing where some are even going) could really help with bus flow
Disneyfamily4
Well-Known Member
It would make it 10 x's longer. I was upset recently while staying at Riverside. It was long enough to have to wait four stops plus the French Quarter to get to the parks, adding readers would make it much longer.
If there were readers, I would dread the ride home. As you know, when the bus stops to let people off, other people get on to go to the park. If you are trying to get back to your room, that whole process would take so much longer.
Like I said though, I was told there was no point of it, because Disney knows how many people are staying in their resorts and they base the busses on each and everyone going to the park each day. Not to mention park hopping. People may leave a resort and get their bands read that they are going to Epcot, but then they will monorail over to MK. The readers would never be able to get an accurate account of where busses are needed the most.
doctornick
Well-Known Member
I don't think WDWDad13 is talking about using MB readers at bus stops or to get on the bus. He is saying that Disney can use the longer range RFID to "count" the number of people waiting at a bus stop (resort, park, whatever) and then use that information to manage their bus routes "on the fly".
For example, if they know that 2 busloads of people are waiting in the "Carribean Beach Resort" line at MK waiting for a bus, then they know that sending just one bus there won't accomodate everyone -- so they can pre-emptively plan to send two buses to that station. You don't need people to scan the bands individually to have Disney read the total number of people waiting in the area.
To integrate it even further: At a resort, they can count the number of people and cross reference them to see where they have ADRs or FP+ scheduled. That way they can estimate how many people are waiting for a MK bus versus an Epcot bus versus DAK, etc. and dispatch buses appropriately. Obviously that is not going to be a 100% accurate count (some might be going to a water park or DTD or going to a different park first before hoping to a later one where they have FP+ booked) but it would give a pretty good idea in general as to what is needed.